Qatar Airways increases capacity to Beijing

Qatar Airways is celebrating the first anniversary of its Beijing service by increasing frequency on the route to meet growing demand.

An extra scheduled flight is being launched from today between Doha, capital of the State of Qatar, and Beijing, taking capacity up from three to four non-stop flights a week.

The new service QR898 departs Doha on Monday evening at 2305, arriving in the Chinese capital at 1215 the following day ensuring passengers arrive in the city in time for lunch. The return flight QR899 leaves Beijing on Tuesday afternoon at 1610, arriving in Doha at 2045 the same day.

The Chinese capital is part of the airline’s strategy to develop services to North East Asia where it already operates scheduled flights to Shanghai, Seoul and Osaka, together with cargo services to Macau.

Qatar Airways Chief Executive Officer Akbar Al Baker said, “We have been looking at increasing capacity on the Beijing route for some time, but due to limitations on traffic rights and availability of aircraft, we have not been able to fulfill our requirements.

“China is fast developing as a future economic powerhouse and we, at Qatar Airways want to continue to be part of the China success story. We are not only facilitating the growth in air travel between the Middle East and China, but between many points on our global network and China.”

Qatar Airways already has a strong presence in the Chinese market, with thrice-weekly flights between Doha and Shanghai and a codeshare partnership with Air China. The airline is planning to increase frequency to Shanghai in the New Year.

And from March 26 next year, the Doha-based airline will launch daily scheduled flights between Doha and Hong Kong.

Hong Kong will become Qatar Airways’ 12th destination in the Far East and South East Asia that already covers Osaka, Shanghai, Beijing, Seoul, Manila, Cebu, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Yangon and Jakarta.

The extra Beijing flight will be operated with an Airbus A330-200 in a two-class configuration of up to 24 seats in Business and 259 seats in Economy. Business Class seats, arranged in a 2-2-2 configuration, recline to a bed mode of 160 degrees.

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