Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has set an unusual instance as it took a flight to Manchester with one passenger on board on Sunday.
The national carrier turned into a chartered flight when a single passenger from Gujrat traveled to Manchester although the flight had a capacity of 370 passengers. The video of the lonely passenger went viral on social media yesterday.
Commenting on the video, a social media user said that the number of passengers traveling to the UK has been drastically low in December. According to the users, only 2 passengers flew on Britain’s Virgin Atlantic Airlines on December 22, 2020, from Pakistan to the UK.
From manchester to Islamabad, only one lucky passenger #COVID19 pic.twitter.com/xBlWg1JJUZ
— Murtaza Ali Shah (@MurtazaViews) January 3, 2021
A lot of social media users asserted that the national carrier should have canceled the flight and saved the fuel costs instead.
This news coincided with the decision of the PIA to commence flights for Saudi Arabia this week. PIA announced the recommencement of its regular passenger flights to Saudi Arabia which were otherwise suspended amid Saudi Arabia’s ban on all flights in and out of the Kingdom. This was announced after Saudi Arabia lifted its travel ban on Sunday.
Read more: PIA to bring back stranded Pakistanis in Saudi Arabia
According to the Saudi General Authority of Civil Aviation’s (SGACA) latest notice, the Kingdom has now lifted its travel ban on international flights to the country. However, it has presented strict requirements that need to be fulfilled before entering the country.
According to officials, passengers from countries where the new variant of Covid-19 has spread, such as the United Kingdom, South Africa, and others, must spend 14 days in a country where the new variant has not been reported, before entering Saudi Arabia.
Read more: PIA announces discounted fares for domestic flights
Most of the flights these days are dead. On 22nd December only 2 passengers travelled on Virgin Atlantic flight from Manchester VS362.
I wonder why they don’t cancel it. https://t.co/yjnWfdyKzc— Tahir Imran Mian ✈ (@TahirImran) January 3, 2021
The passengers whose flights were already booked with PIA are requested to go to their nearest PIA offices to reactivate their flight bookings, said PIA’s spokesperson. Those who want to travel to the Kingdom must do the same or contact the call centers of PIA.