SINGAPORE, 25 July 2024: Airline timetable schedules show Tibet Airlines flying a new service from Xi’an, China, to Thailand’s Samui Island on 14 August, but there are no signs that bookings are open.
Independent airline schedule data shows the airline flying a three-week service using Airbus 319s on the Xi’an (XIY) – Samui (USM) route starting on 14 August.
Flight TV6119 will depart Xi’an at 1250 and arrive in Samui at 1620 on Wednesday, Friday and Sunday.
Flight TV6112 will depart Samui at 1720 and arrive in Xi’an at 2240 (Wed, Fri and Sun).
Founded in 2010, Tibet Airlines is a regional airline based at Gonggar Airport (LXA) in Lhasa. In 2020, it terminated all its international services, including flights to Samui, and now serves only domestic destinations in China and Tibet.
Hahnair handles some ticket sales for the airline as a general sales agency. However, a check of the booking platform Skyscanner failed to discover flights on the XIY-USM route in August or September. That might suggest the three-weekly services are scheduled charters sold to Chinese travellers by travel agencies based in Xi’an.
Reuters reported last February that Tibet Airlines had ordered 40 C919 and 10 ARJ21 jets from China’s COMAC on the sidelines of the biennial Singapore Airshow. The airline has a fleet of 27 Airbus A319s, 12 A320s and 5 A330s.
According to a screen message on its homepage, the airline’s website is offline, and the www.tibetairlines.com domain is for sale, but the airline is serving a busy schedule of 40 routes to cities in China.
