Korean Air resumes flights from Busan to Japan after three-year suspension

Korean Air Lines Co., the largest airline and flag carrier of South Korea, said on Tuesday that it would resume its operations on the Busan-Fukuoka and Busan-Nagoya routes in Japan from September 27. This comes after a three-and-a-half-year hiatus caused by the global pandemic.

The company plans to operate two flights daily to Fukuoka and a daily flight to Nagoya, deploying 173-seater Boeing 737-900ER aircraft for these routes.

Korean Air's move is seen as part of an effort to support Busan's bid for the 2030 Expo and simultaneously promote Busan, South Korea's second city, through Japanese local channels. This approach will likely bolster the promotion of available seats on these routes.

In preparation for the impending travel peak season, Korean Air is actively expanding its international service supply across all regions. The airline's current capacity, as measured in available seat kilometers (ASK), has recovered to 82% of pre-pandemic levels of July 2019.

To increase its service frequency, Korean Air is adding flights on several US routes this month, including from Incheon to Chicago, Dallas and San Francisco. The airline is also boosting services to Europe, particularly to Frankfurt and Milan.

Within Asia, the airline is intensifying flights to Sapporo and Bali from Incheon and increasing capacity on several Chinese routes, such as Changsha, Weihai, Wuhan and Ulaanbaatar.

Despite the planned suspension of some Chinese routes from August to October, Korean Air reassured that the overall number of flights will continue to rise due to the expansion of other routes.

Write to Mi-Sun Kang at misunny@hankyung.com