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SriLankan
Fly SriLankan to Shanghai!
e-news
NORTH AMERICA
SriLankan Airlines will launch its
new four-times a week service to
Shanghai in July 2010, the third Chinese
city in its global route network.
SriLankan Airlines’ Chairman Nishantha
Wickremasinghe said: “Our new service
to Shanghai will open yet another chapter
in the long history of excellent relations
between China and Sri Lanka. We
expect this service to become popular
very quickly among both tourists and
business travelers of both countries.”
The flights on comfortable wide-body
Airbus A330 and A340 aircraft will
operate via Bangkok to China’s largest
city and commercial capital on Monday,
Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday leaving
Colombo at 01.25 in the morning and
arriving in Shanghai at 12.45 in the
afternoon. The return flight would leave
Shanghai at 4.20 in the afternoon and
arrive in Colombo at 9.55 p.m.
Sri Lanka’s national carrier already
operates three flights a week to the
Chinese capital Beijing, and another
three to Hong Kong.
The new service will greatly expand
SriLankan’s cargo carrying capacity
between China and Sri Lanka, with rapid
connections in Colombo to SriLankan’s
global route network. Shanghai is the
world’s largest cargo port, which serves
China’s booming export economy. It is
one of the largest cities in the world,
with a population of 19 million. Located
on China’s central eastern coast at the
mouth of the Yangtze River, it is also a
major tourist destination.
The two Asian nations have greatly
strengthened their centuries-old
relationship in recent years with China
emerging as a major business partner
and investor in the Indian Ocean island
nation. A number of China’s companies
are heavily involved in the ongoing boom
in infrastructure in Sri Lanka, including
the construction of ports, airports, power
stations and highways.
With the addition of Shanghai, SriLankan
will expand its route network to 49
destinations in 31 countries across
Europe, the Middle East, the Indian
Subcontinent, the Far East, and North
America.
SriLankan is rapidly expanding its route
network with the island fast becoming
a destination of choice among global
tourists. Services were launched to
Milan last December, and code-share
partnerships with other airlines over the
past year have added New York, Chicago,
Los Angeles, Sydney, Melbourne,
Jakarta, Athens, Larnaca (Cyprus) and
Seoul. SriLankan has also announced
that it will soon increase capacity to all
of the country’s major tourism markets
including India, the UK, France, Germany,
and Italy.
Total tourist arrivals to Sri Lanka grew
by a phenomenal 68% in February in
comparison to the same month in 2009.
Sri Lanka’s government has announced
an annual target of 2.5 million tourists to
be achieved by 2016, a more than fivefold
increase from the less than half a
million of 2009.
SriLankan’s services to Chinese cities
are tailored to pamper Chinese travelers,
with flights having Chinese cuisine;
Chinese movies among the 40 movie,
television and radio channels on the
Touch Screen Entertainment System; and
even Mandarin-speaking stewardesses.
SriLankan• e-news - NORTH AMERICA 5