Finnair will cancel all flights to mainland China until April 30 in response to the coronavirus outbreak.

The flag carrier flies to Guangzhou, Nanjing, Beijing Capital, Beijing Daxing, Shanghai and Xi’an.

It has also announced numerous reductions to other services.

Daily flights to Seoul will be suspended from March 9 to April 16.

Throughout April it will fly to Hong Kong once daily rather than twice daily.

It will also reduce its Osaka route from 12 to 10 weekly frequencies from March 29 to October 24.

The launch of a new route to Busan will be postponed from March 31, 2020 to July 1, 2020.

The airline has also released a detailed breakdown of affected European flights, as follows:

  • Finnair is cancelling all flights to Jyväskylä, Kajaani, Kokkola and Kemi in Finland between April 1-30;
  • Finnair is cancelling its flights to Bologna, Stuttgart, Split, Umeå and Venice between March 29 and 30 April 30;
  • Finnair will fly to Mariehamn with triangle flights via Bromma;
  • Finnair is reducing frequencies to the following destinations between March 29 and April 30:
    • Gothenburg flown with 14 weekly frequencies instead of the normal 27 weekly frequencies
    • Copenhagen flown with 27 weekly frequencies (normally 39)
    • Stockholm Bromma flown with 17 weekly frequencies (normally 28)
    • Stockholm Arlanda flown with 45 weekly frequencies (normally 55)
    • Moscow flown with 21 weekly frequencies (normally 28)
    • Tallinn flown with 53 weekly frequencies (normally 58)
    • Barcelona flown with 14 weekly frequencies (normally 21)
    • Hamburg flown with 14 weekly frequencies (normally 21)
    • Berlin flown with 21 weekly frequencies (normally 28)
    • Warsaw flown with 14 weekly frequencies (normally 21)
    • Brussels flown with 19 weekly frequencies (normally 24)
    • Tromso flown with 2 weekly frequencies (normally 3)
    • Trondheim flown with 4 weekly frequencies (normally 5)
    • Bergen is flown with 6 weekly frequencies (normally 7)
    • Vaasa flown with 20 weekly frequencies (normally 33)
    • Oulu flown with 54 weekly frequencies (normally 66)
    • Joensuu flown with 20 weekly frequencies (normally 31)
    • Kuopio flown with 32 weekly frequencies (normally 43)
    • Turku flown with 22 weekly frequencies (normally 33)
  • Finnair will fly to St Petersburg and to Vilnius with ATR aircraft instead of Embraer 190 aircraft in April;
  • Flights that were scheduled to be operated with an Airbus 350 to Brussels will be operated with Airbus 321 aircraft in April, as is one of the two daily wide-body frequencies between Helsinki and London.

It said it would communicate with customers on affected flights, who will be able to claim a full refund or postpone travel.

Customers with Finnair flights booked in March will be able to change their travel date to the same destination until the end of June 2020.

The airline also said it would begin negotiations on temporary layoffs affecting its entire Finland-based staff, as well as those outside the country.

This may see staff made to take unpaid leave for 14 to 30 days.

Finnair has long focused on connectivity to Asia. The airline’s new CEO, Topi Manner, recently told Business Traveller its strategy this year would centre on increasing frequencies to Asian megacities.

The airline has now withdrawn its capacity guidance of approximately 4 per cent growth for 2020 and has issued a profit warning.

Coronavirus: will insurance cover your cancelled trip? 

finnair.com