British Airways (BA) announced on Thursday that the flight connection between London Heathrow and Beijing will be paused for at least one year starting October 26th. This follows similar steps by European airlines that have reduced their flights to China due to weak demand and high costs for avoiding Russian airspace.
The decision by BA comes less than a month after the airline reduced its flights to Hong Kong by half and Virgin Atlantic announced that it would completely discontinue its connection between London and Shanghai from October 25. Virgin cited the "significant challenges and complexities" on this route.
European airlines have been excluded from flying over Russian airspace since the full invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which has extended flights to East Asia by hours and significantly increased fuel costs. For example, a British Airways (BA) flight from Beijing to London on Wednesday took 13 hours, as it followed a longer route over Mongolia and Central Asia before reaching European airspace. In comparison, an Air China flight on the same route took only 10 hours, as it took the shorter route over Russia.
For many European airlines, this additional burden has led them to reconsider their Chinese networks, with some airlines deciding to scale back their operations or withdraw from the market entirely," explained John Grant, chief analyst at aviation data company OAG.
Several European airline CEOs have already complained that they have difficulties competing with their Chinese rivals due to the additional costs of avoiding Russian airspace. Ben Smith, CEO of Air France-KLM, described the situation last year as an "unfair advantage" for Chinese airlines. At that time, Finnair CEO Topi Manner stated that only the busiest routes to China would remain profitable.
The decision to suspend some flights to China also comes against the backdrop of slower-than-expected recovery in demand for flights between Asia and Europe from the Covid-19 pandemic. IAG, the parent company of BA, cited weaknesses in the Asian market in its latest results, while Lufthansa reported a decline in revenue from the region last month. In addition, Australian airline Qantas suspended its only flight to mainland China in May due to weak demand.
