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The American Chamber of Commerce in China (AmCham China) is planning to fly 200 U.S. executives back to China on a charter flight, and if the first charter flight is successful, the chamber would consider scheduling more in the future.
AmCham obtained the green light from the local government last Friday, and has set the departure date from the U.S. on September 12 to make sure all the passengers have enough time to obtain necessary documents for the trip, according to an AmCham source quoted by a South China Morning Post report.
According to the report, the passengers need to get letters of invitation issued by AmCham member companies they're employed by and also need to obtain valid re-entry visas.
To ensure the safety of all the passengers and crew, and also people they are going to interact with after they get off the plane, all passengers need to pass a COVID-19 test before boarding and need to enter a period of quarantine upon arrival.
Family members of the employees will be allowed to come back to China with them, according to the SCMP report.
The demand for a seat in the flight is hot, according to the SCMP report. The minimum requirement to kickstart a charter flight is 120, and so far almost 200 people had signed up for a San Francisco to Beijing charter flight.
However, according to the anonymous source quoted by SCMP, some of the 200 people who signed up for the flight may not be eligible, since the requirement by the local government are "quite strict."
Currently the U.S. still has the most coronavirus cases in the world and the highest deaths, and the new cases are still increasing at an average of over 40,000 daily. Meanwhile, China has mostly contained the virus spreading, spotting only single or double digit new cases occasionally.
The charter flight will be operated by United Airlines, and is currently priced at 4,300 U.S. dollars a seat for economy class, and 10,000 U.S. dollars per seat for business class.
According to the SCMP report, AmCham China estimates thataround 5,000 to 10,000 of the US business community are currently stuck overseas.