Malaysia Airlines is reinstating some of its international flights between April to May 2020 to bring home families who haven't been able to return home due to travel restrictions in many parts of the world.
Its group chief executive officer Captain Izham Ismail said that many Malaysians and foreigners had reached out to their global offices requesting for available flights, mostly between Kuala Lumpur to Australia, New Zealand as well as London.
"Being a network carrier, Malaysia Airlines is able to maintain connectivity and bring our customers direct or closest to their intended destination. And being Malaysia's national carrier, it is our duty to ensure accessibility for Malaysia domestically and internationally during these difficult times," he said in a statement on Monday (March 30).
Since the enactment of the movement control order on March 18, Malaysia Airlines has had to reduce its domestic frequencies and schedules.
It is running at minimum mostly to facilitate essential travels and cargo movement.
Capt Izham said that together with their sister airlines under the Malaysia Aviation Group, they supported the Health Ministry with space across their domestic and international network and on MABkargo's global freighter network for the transport of medical devices and supplies.
They recently transported two tonnes of face masks and personal protection equipment from Kuala Lumpur to Kota Kinabalu as well as 300,000 pieces of disposable masks, 50,000 pieces of protection suit and 8000 pieces of protection suit with eye masks courtesy of the Jack Ma Foundation and Alibaba Foundation from Shanghai to Kuala Lumpur.
In the next few days, MABkargo will be flying in more than 10 million pieces of masks and ventilators from Shanghai and Guangzhou which was made possible by the National Disaster Management Agency (Nadma), Transport Ministry and, Pharmaniaga Berhad.
Capt Izham said that domestically, Malaysia Airlines, Firefly and MASwings are facilitating movement of goods as well as medical staff across Peninsular Malaysia, crossings and within Sabah and Sarawak.
The three airlines have also positioned standby aircraft at Subang Airport, KLIA and KKIA to initiate rapid mobilisation of medical staff and professionals as well as other (non-Covid-19) patients to support MOH's resource management efforts across Malaysia.
Passengers looking for flights to return home on Malaysia Airlines may book their tickets on Malaysia Airlines' official website at https://www.malaysiaairlines.com/my/en.html or via Malaysia Airlines' app with some departure dates available for booking from 30 March 2020 onwards.
Source: The Star, Malaysia Airlines