CAAC issues red alert for flight delays

The Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) has issued a red alert for large-scale flight delays, saying the air space above Shanghai is expected to be busy from 2:00pm to 6:00pm on Tuesday.

During the affected time period, the air traffic capacity at the city's Hongqiao Airport and Pudong Airport are expected to drop by as much as 75 percent, the Xinhua news agency reports, citing the Air Traffic Management Bureau of CAAC.

Likewise, the capacity of air routes above Zhengzhou, capital city of central China's Henan province, is also expected to drop by up to 75 percent.

In that time span, the airports in at least eight key cities in east China's Shandong and Jiangsu provinces will not receive flight landings. Meanwhile, north-bound flights at a dozen airports in Jiangxi and Zhejiang provinces will be banned from taking off.

An announcement on the Air Traffic Information Platform website run by the CAAC attributes the expected flight delays to stormy weather and busy air space.

The CAAC issued an orange alert for flight delays on Monday in Shanghai.

On Sunday, stormy weather led to widespread flight cancellations and delays at Beijing Capital International Airport and Shanghai Hongqiao Airport.

In China, the four colors of blue, yellow, orange and red are used to mark increasing severity of flight delays and cancellations, with red indicating an extremely severe situation.

The Chinese military has announced that it will conduct an exercise in the southeast coastal areas starting Tuesday, July 29, but the military says that the exercises are not the major factor behind the recent massive flight delays.

The Ministry of National Defense says in a statement the maneuver is important for testing combat capability and improving real-combat training levels and military preparation.

It says both military and civil aviation management authorities have taken measures to minimize the exercise's impact on civilian flights by opening temporary air routes, allocating protection airspace, and setting down alternative deviation plans.

It says recent flight delays were mainly the result of meteorological conditions.