On March 10th, American Airlines announced that it would be suspending service to Hong Kong from its hub at Dallas-Fort Worth through June. In the press release, the airline said that this DFW-HKG service would resume at a reduced capacity in July. True to its word, the airline will restart the service on July 10th. Here's what you need to know about the return of this flight.

Three weekly services

According to The Points Guy, service will resume between Dallas and Hong Kong starting July 10th. This will be the airline's longest route and American will be the first of its US peers to restart the service.

"We plan to resume service to Hong Kong in July three times per week on a Boeing 777-300 from Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW)," an American Airlines spokesperson tells Simple Flying. In fact, the schedule for this service is as follows:

  • Flights from Dallas-Fort Worth to Hong Kong are schedule to fly out on Sundays, Mondays, and Fridays as AA125. This service will depart at 10:30, arriving the next day at 16:10.
  • The return journey from Hong Kong to Dallas-Fort Worth will depart on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays as AA126 (the number is currently being used for a Miami-Bogota flight). The service will depart at 14:40, arriving on the same date at 16:55.
dfw-hkg
The flight from Dallas to Hong Kong takes about 17 hours to complete. Photo: Great Circle Mapper

Asia slowly reopening

Of course, East Asia was the pandemic's epicenter for quite some time before the situation subsequently worsened in Europe. In late-February and early-March, travel advisories centered around travel from countries in the region, prompting many airlines to cut their transpacific services.

However, it's been over two full months since some of those flight suspensions were announced, and the situation in the region has drastically improved. In fact, earlier this week, we saw Hong Kong record an additional day without any new COVID-19 cases, and the city had a 12-day run without any new locally transmitted cases.

According to the South China Morning Post, the government has allowed for the reopening of additional entertainment venues as of this week. Even better, the Special Administrative Region will permit transit passengers once again, starting next week.

American Airlines B777 in the hangar
Notice how the Boeing 777's fuselage comes to a flat, square ending at the back. Here you can also see the 777's lack of winglets. Photo: American Airlines

Hong Kong not yet open to everyone

As we've cautioned with other flight resumptions, just because tickets can be purchased doesn't mean everyone will be allowed to enter the destination country. In fact, at the time of publication, the government of Hong Kong continues to impose a strict ban, denying all non-Hong Kong residents entry. The government's website specifically states:

 

"All non-Hong Kong residents coming from overseas countries and regions by plane will be denied entry to Hong Kong."

American Airlines Boeing 777
Hong Kong still has a travel ban in place. However, it's hopeful that conditions will relax by the time flights resume. Photo: American Airlines.

Of course, American's service to Hong Kong won't resume for another month or so. This means that there is some hope that Hong Kong's government will have relaxed its restrictions on international arrivals by then.

However, if that's not the case, it appears that the airline has you covered, saying on its website: "Buy a new trip March 1 – May 31, 2020, for all future travel, you can also change it a later date without change fees."