Cebu Pacific to resume Hong Kong flights beginning Sept. 1

MANILA – Low-cost airline Cebu Pacific (CEB) will resume passenger flight operations six times weekly (daily except Saturday) beginning September 1.

In a statement on Tuesday, CEB Chief Commercial Officer Xander Lao said there is latent travel demand, and the airline remains cautiously optimistic as it boosts operations where it is most needed.

Hong Kong authorities imposed a ban until September 11 on Philippine Airlines (PAL) passenger flights from Manila after three of its passengers tested positive for coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) upon “arrival testing” in the Chinese territory last August 27.

With this, PAL will only be mounting passenger flights from Hong Kong to Manila for two weeks.

Michelle Lim of CEB Corporate Communications told the Philippine News Agency that while the carrier’s cargo flights to Hong Kong were unhampered, its last commercial flight there was mounted last April.

Currently, CEB operates passenger flights to Nagoya, Osaka, Seoul (Incheon), Singapore, Taipei, and Tokyo (Narita), Lim confirmed.

CEB also regularly mounts “bayanihan” flights from Dubai to Manila to ferry overseas Filipino workers.

Meanwhile, passengers bound for Hong Kong are required to show a negative RT-PCR (reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction) test result conducted 72 hours prior to their flight.

In addition, they need to accomplish the Hong Kong Department of Health online declaration form, and must show a confirmed room reservation for not less than 21 days.