The Hong Kong government has ruled out chartering Cathay Pacific Airways flights to bring home residents stranded in the Middle East, given the potential danger of navigating partially reopened airspaces and challenges in securing take-off slots at foreign airports, sources have said.
The South China Morning Post learned that officials had also weighed the option of repatriation flights from Oman, but the absence of direct Cathay services made the route “impractical” because obtaining aviation clearance could not be guaranteed in a short period of time.
As the US-Israel war with Iran stretched into a week, more Hongkongers returned from Dubai on commercial flights on Friday evening, including the Hong Kong women’s football team with 27 players via Bangkok and a nine-member tour group, after the region’s busiest aviation hub resumed limited operations.
But at least hundreds more residents remained stranded in Gulf countries, with some calling for government-chartered flights as nations, including the United States, the United Kingdom, France and Germany tried to organise repatriations.
The Immigration Department said on Thursday that 200 out of 730 people who had contacted the government had left the region, adding authorities had been trying to reserve seats for residents on weekend flights, operated by Emirates, leaving Dubai in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
On Friday, two sources said officials had discussed with Cathay, the city’s flag carrier, the possibility of sending planes, as was done in previous emergency operations.
“Internal assessments concluded that the narrow air corridor over the Gulf is still not safe because of missile and drone risks. Safety of passengers and crews must be the priority,” an insider said. “A chartered flight from Hong Kong is not an option for now.”
A second source explained that repatriation flights were considered not time-efficient as Cathay needed to fly planes from Hong Kong to Dubai, which would be more time-consuming than helping residents secure services operated by airlines based in the UAE.
“Even if Hong Kong can immediately send a plane there, how can we be sure that Cathay could secure a take-off slot when many airlines are scrambling to accommodate travellers?” the insider added.


Most of the Middle East’s airspace remains closed due to the threat of missile activity, with only a limited number of flights departing Dubai, Saudi Arabia’s capital Riyadh, and Oman’s Muscat.
Dubai’s main airline Emirates said it would operate 106 daily return flights to 83 destinations, or 60 per cent of its network, by Saturday and hoped to restore its full global network “within the coming days”.
Repatriation efforts by other countries have also been hampered. A government-chartered Air France flight to bring French nationals back from the UAE was forced to turn back on Thursday due to missiles in the area. Britain’s first repatriation flight from Oman landed in London on Friday only after being rescheduled due to operational issues.
The second insider explained Hong Kong had also considered repatriation flights from Muscat, as Singapore planned for this weekend, but the absence of direct Cathay services could mean there was no guarantee of quickly obtaining clearance from aviation authorities.
Cathay earlier announced all commercial services to and from Dubai and Riyadh scheduled between February 28 and March 14 would remain cancelled.
In response to the SCMP, the Civil Aviation Department said it had been closely monitoring the situation in the affected airspaces and sharing information with local aircraft operators to assist them in conducting risk assessments for flight planning.
“In this regard, operators are also urged to closely monitor all available aeronautical publications concerning the affected region(s) and take all appropriate risk mitigation measures to ensure the safety and security of aircraft when operating in the affected airspaces,” it said.
Twenty-seven players and staff of the Hong Kong women’s football team, which withdrew from an international tournament in the UAE due to the war, returned from Dubai to Hong Kong via Bangkok on Friday night.
“In Dubai, things changed very quickly and information kept shifting, but we received a lot of support from different people and departments,” captain Ma Chak-shun told the SCMP at the airport. “We are very grateful to be home safely.”


Among the Hongkongers stranded in the Middle East was a 28-year-old therapist named Rita.
After being stuck in Doha, Qatar, for four days, she decided to travel to Riyadh via carpool on Wednesday, as she felt unsafe following two drone attacks. She found her travel companions via Reddit, and each paid HK$1,750 (US$223) for the seven-hour journey.
Rita said she was unable to reach the Immigration Department’s 1868 hotline, and the responses from the official WhatsApp account were “bot-like”.
“I couldn’t see any effort to try to exchange information or give advice, but just some cold, official replies, something I can learn from the news,” Rita said.
“Consulates of other countries at least have real officers getting in touch with their stranded nationals, but we only got a document of information. No one speaks with you.”
A spokesman for the Airport Authority said Hong Kong International Airport saw 73 flight cancellations and four flight delays from March 1 to 6. Another three flights have been cancelled for Saturday.
Captain Steven Dominique Cheung, chairman of the Hong Kong Professional Airline Pilots Association, said Cathay’s decision to suspend flights was likely to be based on safety considerations, while other carriers resuming flights earlier might have wanted to prioritise the repatriation of citizens.
Additional reporting by Theodora Yu and Ada Li

國泰航空

<p>香港政府決定不租用國泰航空的航班將滯留在中東的居民遣返，原因是出於安全考慮和後勤挑戰。官員們考慮了從阿曼進行遣返航班的選項，但發現這些方案不切實際。隨着美以衝突的持續，一些香港居民已通過商業航班返回，而仍有數百人滯留。民航處正在監測情況，強調受影響空域的安全。香港女子足球隊成功返回，而其他人在試圖離開該地區時與當局的溝通面臨困難</p>

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