The third regular flight route conducted by China’s first self-developed narrow-body aircraft C919 was launched on Friday between Shanghai Hongqiao International Airport and Xi’an Xianyang International Airport in Shaanxi province, according to the first global customer of the jet China Eastern Airlines.

The jetliner coded as B-919A debuted in the Shanghai-Xi’an flight along with 153 passengers onboard on Friday morning. The C919 aircraft will operate two round trips between the two cities on a daily basis, according to China Eastern Airlines’ schedule.

Xi’an is the biggest aviation hub of China Eastern in Northwest China, and the carrier operates some 2,200 flights via Xi’an Xianyang International Airport every week.

In addition to the Shanghai-Xi’an route, the rest of the first five C919 aircraft are carrying out flights between Shanghai and Beijing, as well as Shanghai and Chengdu of Sichuan province on the same date.

Since the maiden commercial flight on May 28, 2023, China Eastern’s C919 fleet has conducted 1,131 commercial flight trips by flying 3,272 hours and safely making 145,000 passenger trips as of February 29.

As more C919 aircraft join its fleet in 2024, China Eastern will constantly expand the operation scale and add more flights for the homegrown passenger aircraft.