KARACHI: After reducing international flight operations to 20 percent, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has now brought down domestic flight operations to 40 percent on the directives of the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) in wake of rising COVID cases,
The new schedule, according to the CAA, will remain applicable between May 05 to May 20. The Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) will be allowed to operate 29 flights for Karachi, 55 for Lahore, 76 for Islamabad, and 41 for Peshawar.
The national flag carrier would not operate flights for Quetta and Faisalabad. The airline will continue to operate 11 flights for Sialkot, 17 for Multan, and four for Turbat. The Air Blue was also allowed to Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad, and Multan while restricting its operations for Quetta, Faisalabad, Sialkot and Turbat.
It will operate one flight for Karachi, 15 for Lahore, 19 for Islamabad, and 10 for Peshawar. The Serene Air will operate no flight from Karachi as per the schedule of the CAA, besides operating 10 flights each for Lahore and Islamabad. The schedule from the airlines will remain applicable for two weeks.
Earlier in the day, the NCOC devised new protocol for the inbound passengers, imposing a condition of COVID testing at Pakistan airports. The NCOC in its handout issued today said that in view of prevailing global and regional disease trends, Pakistan has decided to reduce inbound international travel from 5 May to 20th May by 20 percent.
The restrictions would be reviewed on May 18 as category C would remain unchanged for the duration. The fresh protocols released on NCOC’s Twitter handle for the inbound passengers stated that people having Pakistani passports could return to the country and had to carry a negative PCR test report performed 72 hours before travel.
Besides this, the passengers will undergo rapid COVID testing at the Pakistani airports and would stay in quarantine for 10 days at their homes
