Thai AirAsia is planning to reactivate all of its 53 aircraft to meet the growing demand from China. Going ahead, the airline might also add more aircraft to its fleet from other AirAsia Aviation Group units, said Santisuk Klongchaiya, Chief Executive while speaking to Bloomberg.
"Our advance bookings have demonstrated strong earnings momentum. We may find a big challenge to expand seat capacity with the demand from Chinese travellers. But seat shortages are a problem we're happy to deal with," he said.
The airline is planning to further boost its China capacity in coming weeks considering the fact that China was Thailand’s largest market for inbound tourism prior to pandemic.
Currently the airline operates 12 weekly flights to China connecting Bangkok Don Mueang with Chongqing, Kunming Changshui, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Hangzhou.
About 40 million tourists visited China prior to pandemic in 2019, of which about 10 million were from China. In 2022, despite Thailand reopening to visitors from all countries with minimal restrictions, the number of tourists was 11.2 million.