First of historic cross-straits flights lands in Taiwan

TAIPEI – The inaugural flight of the historic first regular direct service between mainland China and Taiwan in almost six decades landed in Taipei this morning.

A group of some 100 Chinese tourists were among 258 passengers, piloted by company chairman Liu Shaoyong, on the China Southern Airlines flight, which touched down at 8:05 am from Guangzhou, an AFP report said.

Taiwanese authorities rolled out the red carpet for the mainland tour group, who were accompanied on the flight by Chinese and Taiwanese business people, students and other travellers.

Taiwan’s China Airlines jet carrying 297 Taiwanese tourists left Taoyuan airport for Shanghai this morning. Eight other flights from various airports in Taiwan will fly to Beijing, Guangzhou and Xiamen today.

There will be a total of 36 round-trip flights across the Taiwan Strait weekly, operating from Friday to Monday. They will fly between six Taiwanese airports and five mainland ones.