Flights cancelled as snow blankets Beijing

Beijing and other parts of northern China were blanketed by heavy snowfall yesterday, prompting a fresh round of air travel chaos and road closures. The snow fell overnight amid thunder and lightning, and was the second snowfall in eight days.

'The occurrence was rather unusual and rare for early November,' Sun Jisong, chief forecaster of the Beijing Meteorological Bureau, was quoted as saying by Xinhua. 'More snow is forecast to hit Beijing on Wednesday and Thursday.'

A spokeswoman for Capital International Airport said that as of 3pm yesterday, more than 150 flights had been delayed and 80 cancelled.

'The bottleneck is de-icing. Ice on every plane must be removed before take-off or the journey will be jeopardised. We've started all 17 de-icing vehicles and each can clean a jet in five minutes,' she said. 'Nevertheless, there are so many planes waiting and the ultimate hope lies with the weather. If the temperature rises, all problems will be solved.'

As the airport gradually worked through the backlog of flights, Air China appeared to have suffered more delays and cancellations than other airlines. An Air China spokesman yesterday said that more than 60 flights were cancelled in the morning. According to the airport's website, Air China saw the largest number of flight cancellations. Between 7.30am and 8am, for instance, 11 of the 13 cancelled flights were Air China's.

Huang Bin, board secretary for the mainland's national carrier, said Air China's planes took longer to de-ice because they were in Beijing during the overnight snowstorm, while planes from other airlines flew in from other cities.

'We had the largest number of delays and cancellations because we have the largest fleet waiting to be de-iced,' Huang said.