(Yicai) Sept. 19 -- US carriers Delta Air Lines and United Airlines have requested to delay the resumption of flights between the US and China because of ongoing market challenges and reduced travel demand.

Delta has applied to the US Department of Transportation for a dormancy waiver for 28 of its 42 weekly flights to China for the upcoming winter season, which will run from Oct. 27 to March 29, Aviation Week reported on Sept. 16. United is seeking a similar waiver for 42 of its 63 weekly frequencies to China.

China and the US signed an air transport agreement that allows airlines to operate air routes between the two countries with DOT approval. If carriers do not fulfill the flights, they risk losing them. The DOT began issuing waivers during the Covid-19 pandemic and has extended them while gradually resuming China-US routes.

Since March 31, Chinese and American airlines were again allowed to operate 50 round trips per week between the two countries after a break during the Covid-19 pandemic. However, only Chinese airlines fully resumed operations, while American carriers only resumed 39.

Delta only operates the routes between Detroit and Seattle and Shanghai, while United only flies between San Francisco and Beijing and Shanghai and between Los Angeles and Shanghai.

The number of flights between China and the US has only recovered to 26 percent of the level in 2019, before the Covid-19 pandemic. However, China’s outbound flights to other destinations have resumed at a much higher rate.

According to data from flight booking app Flight Master, some 11,745 outbound flights departed from China between Sept. 9 and Sept. 15, equal to about 77 percent of those in the same period of 2019. Among them, flights to Malaysia, the Middle East, Singapore, and the UK exceeded the pre-pandemic level.

Flights to Southeast Asia were the most popular, accounting for 39 percent of China’s international total in the above seven days, followed by East Asia at 36 percent and Europe at 12 percent, Flight Master data also showed. Flights to North America made up only 1.8 percent of the total.

Editors: Dou Shicong, Futura Costaglione