The first airplane to be used by China's pioneering budget airline landed yesterday at Hongqiao International Airport in preparation for its maiden flight next Monday.

The Airbus 320 will take off from Shanghai to Yantai in Shandong Province at 8:50am.

About 160 people are expected to be on the flight, including a crew of six, said officials with Spring Airlines Co Ltd, the low cost carrier which is affiliated to Shanghai Spring International Travel Service, the nation's largest private travel agency.

Sixty percent of tickets for this trip have already been sold, most of which were purchased by individual tourists over the company's Website (www.china-sss.com). The tickets went on sale on Monday, said Li Weimin, a Spring Airlines official.

The cheapest tickets, which go for 199 yuan (US$24) for a one-way trip, have sold out, he said.

Those tickets, which are part of a special offer for the maiden trip, accounted for less than a third of all seats available, he said.

Other tickets for the flight range from 400 yuan for children to 500 yuan. By comparison, railway tickets to Yantai for a soft sleeper cost 304 yuan, and economy-class tickets on a China Eastern Airlines flight generally sell for 630 yuan.

Passengers who buy their tickets from Spring International will pay 50 yuan more than those who book online, company officials said.

"Those who book earlier will have a better chance to get more favorable prices for the same class of seats," Li said.

"The airline will adjust the percentage of the special offerings according to market response. If the tickets are selling very well, we could raise the price."

The airline will operate flights from Shanghai to Yantai, Guilin in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Mianyang in Sichuan Province and Nanchang, Jiangxi Province.

The airline's only plane will spend 11 hours a day in the air flying between Shanghai and three of those destinations. Most airplanes only spend nine hours a day in the air on average.

The company expects the occupancy rate of the budget flights to reach 85 percent, well over the industry standard of 70 percent - a necessity to cut costs. It will introduce another two Airbus 320s before the end of this year, Li said.

(Shanghai Daily July 13, 2005)