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China Eastern is relaunching flights to London Gatwick

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China Eastern Airlines is bringing back flights to Shanghai from London Gatwick, a route which was cancelled at the start of the pandemic.

The service will start on 26th June using an Airbus A330-200.

There will be four flights per week, departing Gatwick on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Flights will depart London at 11.35 and arrive at 06.10.

China Eastern is relaunching flights from London Gatwick

China Eastern will continue to operate its existing daily flight from London Heathrow to Shanghai.

China Eastern is a member of the SkyTeam airline alliance. In theory this means that you can earn and spend Virgin Points on these flights following the entry of Virgin Atlantic into SkyTeam earlier this year.

In practice this is not currently possible. China Eastern is one of two SkyTeam partners – the other is Italy’s ITA Airways – where redemptions are ‘coming later in 2023’. You also cannot earn Virgin Points on China Eastern until later this year, although earning is possible with ITA Airways.

Full details of how to spend Virgin Points on SkyTeam partner airlines can be found in this HfP article.

Comments (13)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • ASEAN Traveller says:

    Not sure those flight times from Gatwick are correct. Perhaps those are the west-bound ones from Shanghai instead?

  • Dubious says:

    With a view of Russia on the way too.

    I am not sure I would want the risk of a diversion during that flight – whether for technical matters or for supposed ‘security matters’.

    • David says:

      Is this why there’s been such cheap tickets from this airline? £300 ish from CDG to Saigon/Ho Chi a few days back.

  • GeoffreyB says:

    That’s some good levelling up from HFP. Well done

    • TimM says:

      Rhys has reached celebrity status – ‘An Evening With Rhys’. I hope the event is broadcast.

      • Freddy says:

        Rob couldn’t face entering the northern regions so sent his poor employee Rhys. He told Rhys he was going somewhere exotic far far away

        • Rob says:

          I’m in Edinburgh!

          • Bagoly says:

            Yes, but that’s Scottish not Northern. 🙂

            Venezuela is not “Western”, while Australia is.

        • GeoffreyB says:

          Liverpool isn’t a northern region. It’s central UK

  • Tony says:

    Is the raffle prize a night on the town with Rhys? 😉

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

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