Cathay serves Surabaya

JAKARTA (JP): Cathay Pacific started serving a new route linking Hong Kong and Surabaya in East Java Thursday night with a TriStar aircraft carrying more than 250 passengers, a company executive said.

N. Pramono, chief of Cathay's marketing division in Surabaya, said that the airline plans to provide two flights weekly from Hong Kong to Surabaya.

He was quoted by Antara as saying in Surabaya that the aircraft, with a capacity of 250 economy class and 49 business class passengers, is expected to operate at 60 to 70 percent capacity in the first months of service.

The Indonesian consulate general for Hong Kong, E. A. Tamara, said that the new service is aimed at increasing the number of Hong Kong tourists visiting East Java as well as encouraging Hong Kong investment in the province.

Tamara said that the number of Hong Kong tourists visiting Indonesia last year reached 70,000, which represented too small a portion of the nine million Hong Kong tourists traveling abroad.

The aircraft returned from Surabaya to Hong Kong yesterday.

Cathay said in a statement yesterday that the airline will replace the TriStar aircraft with an Airbus A330-300 in November, when the number of passengers is expected to increase.

The company said it currently has ten weekly flights between Jakarta and Hong Kong and four weekly flights between Denpasar and Hong Kong. (32)