There always seems to be some kind of random event going on in Beijing making life hard for GA/BA ops. This month it’s the Conference on Dialogue of Asian Civilizations, and already the parking situation for GA/BA is starting to look pretty bleak.

ZBAA/Beijing

There are two main periods with heavy restrictions: 

0800L on 13 May to 0800L on 17 May
0800L on 21 May to 0800L on 24 May

(Beijing local time is UTC+8, so you can read those times as 0000z).

During these periods, only one slot will be made available per hour for aircraft not connected with the event, and no overnight parking will be allowed. So that means short turnarounds might be possible, but you’ll be lucky to get a slot. 

Plus there’s the other standard ongoing rule at ZBAA to keep in mind:

Daily between 0900-2200L, GA/BA can only make one movement per aircraft.

So this means that if you arrive during this period you then have to wait til 2200L before you’re allowed to depart again! Confusing? You bet.

ZBTJ/Tianjin

Many operators like to use cheeky ZBTJ/Tianjin as an alternative to ZBAA/Beijing, but it’s now getting busy here too. Local handlers here are saying that ZBTJ is not allowing any overnight parking for GA/BA at all right now, and even some requests for short-term parking are being denied as well.

This is related to ongoing construction work planned through to the end of June, which means a bunch of stands are closed, and with an influx of aircraft shifting over from ZBAA, there’s less space all round.

ZBSJ/Zhengding

Where?? Fair question. We had to find it on a map. Zhending! Home to… well, not very much, by the looks of it. Unless temples, towers, and Olympic table tennis training centres are your thing.

But the good news is that the airport currently has no restrictions on GA/BA flights. Although they don’t have an FBO or VIP lounge here (#notsurprised), the airport has a nice long 11,000ft runway, and is open H24. You can get in touch with Mainland GroundExpress to arrange handling here.

1. From now until the end of June, ZSAM/Xiamen airport will closed daily between 0010-0610 local time, and business flights will not be allowed to land or take-off between 0700-0900 local time daily as per the CAAC’s regulation (the same regulation applies to over 20 other airports in China including ZBAA, ZSSS, ZSPD, ZGGG and ZGSZ).

 

2. China’s “two sessions” begins this week – two big political conferences (CPPCC and NPC) that are held every year. ZBAA/Beijing gets busier than ever.

Even at the best of times, ZBAA only allows 24 hours maximum parking time for foreign GA, so expect to get sent to ZBTJ/Tianjin for parking: an Airport of Entry that regularly takes overflow traffic from Beijing.

As the nearest airport from ZBAA, ZBTJ is also accepting more ferry flights at the moment – the ZBTJ airport authority has been told to continue to do so until 30th April.

 

3. Be aware it’s going to become more and more common this year for Chinese immigration to record fingerprints of foreign travellers who enter China via international airports.