Heavy downpours are sweeping through Beijing on Monday, causing massive flight delays and cancellations.
The Air Traffic Management Bureau issued an orange rainstorm alert for severe flight delays on Monday morning and later upgraded to a red alert at noon, due to the increasing rains. It means the takeoff and landing capacity was cut by 50% and 80% at Beijing Capital International Airport.
On Monday afternoon, the authority degraded the alert to orange, which is expected to last until 8:00 p.m. on the day.
As of 3:30 p.m., Air China has cancelled around 181 flights at Beijing airport, while China Southern Airlines announced it has cancelled 44 flights, with 27 flights delayed over one hour.
Beijing airport planned to handle 1,654 flights on Monday. As of 5:00 p.m., 710 flights took off and landed at the airport, with 415 flights cancelled.
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