Over half of flights cancelled in Asia Pacific due to coronavirus scare

Air traffic in China and or Asia Pacific countries has plummeted by more than half due to coronavirus scare, Darren Hulst, Vice president and global he of marketing, Boeing Commercial Airplanes, said on Friday. Speaking on sidelines of 'Wings India 2020', an aviation-related event here, he said China used to witness as many as 15,000 departures on an aver in a rmal day and it has come down to about 3,000 flights a day whereas, in India, it did t have much impact.

" mainland China market in rmal operations we see about 15,000 departures a day and at peak of virus, y were operating around 3,000 flights a day, about 80 percent decline. If you exclude China, in rest of  Asia Pacific market, probably about 5,000 flights a day and at one point in time we saw about 2,500 or something like that. se are rough numbers," Hulst said.

He said or areas such as Europe and rth America where presence of virus is felt, several airlines have started taking measures in terms of passenger missions. "I think we are going to see a similar reduction in capacities by airlines for a very short period of time, t necessarily to magnitude of that China number," he ded.

Asked if re are any deferments in deliveries of aircraft by airlines due to slump in industry, he said: "Aircraft deliveries are case by case and one on one basis. We have t done any deferring yet." Boeing's sourcing from India stands at over USD one billion a year from over 200 suppliers who are manufacturing high-end systems and components for some of Boeing's most vanced products as part of its global supply chain and aircraft maker has plans to double it to USD 2 billion, Hulst said without specifying any timeframe. Through its skilling initiatives, Boeing is training hundreds of pilots, aircraft maintenance engineers, technicians and frontline factory workers across India with ir industry partners like Tata, Rossell Techsys, Jaivel, and Lakshmi Machine Works, a press release from Boeing said.