ENG-2003 — Page 332

TRANSPORT

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As regards non-Hong Kong airlines, three airlines commenced scheduled passenger services to Hong Kong in 2003: Mekong Airlines and President Airlines, respectively, between Phnom Penh and Hong Kong in March; and Kenya Airways between Nairobi and Hong Kong in September. In October, Transaero Airlines resumed its services between Moscow and Hong Kong, which had been suspended since April 1998. Also, Myanmar Airways International resumed its services between Yangon and Hong Kong in December after suspension of the services in January 2002. In addition, Saudi Arabian Airlines commenced scheduled all-cargo services between Jeddah, Riyadh and Hong Kong in January.

In the midst of the SARS outbreak, a number of airlines suspended their services to Hong Kong. However, most of them resumed services in the third quarter. Two airlines suspended their scheduled passenger services to Hong Kong, namely Mekong Airlines between Phnom Penh and Hong Kong in May and Air Philippines between Laoag and Hong Kong in October. Three other airlines suspended their all-cargo services: Mandala Airlines between Batam (Indonesia) and Hong Kong in March; Transmile Air between Kuala Lumpur, Penang and Hong Kong in August; and Pacific East Asia Cargo Airlines between Clark (Philippines) and Hong Kong in September. A number of airlines operating in Hong Kong underwent reorganisation during the year. Air China took over the operations of China Southwest Airlines in January; China Southern Airlines took over China Northern Airlines whereas China Eastern Airlines took over both China Northwest Airlines and Yunnan Airlines in March. A new all-cargo carrier, Lufthansa Cargo AG, took over the all-cargo services of Lufthansa German Airlines in October.

As regards domestic helicopter services, the Government made available a temporary site at the southern tip of the West Kowloon Reclamation Area to facilitate the continuous development of commercial domestic helicopter services after the closure of the Central Heliport. The new West Kowloon Heliport was officially commissioned on December 7. The development and management rights for the facility were awarded to HHK through an open tender exercise conducted earlier in the year.

Air Traffic Control

The overall air traffic control (ATC) system continued to perform in a stable and reliable manner during the year. To handle effectively the projected growth in air traffic movements in Hong Kong and the Pearl River Delta area, it is necessary to further enhance the operational efficiency and increase the data processing capacities of the ATC system. In this regard, the CAD had implemented an enhancement programme on six major ATC equipment systems, namely Radar Data Processing and Display System, Flight Data Processing System, Radar Simulator, Speech Processing Equipment, Automatic Message Switching System and Aeronautical Information Database System. The programme was satisfactorily completed in March, as scheduled.

With regard to the replacement of the long-range primary Route Surveillance Radar at Mount Parker, the CAD started equipment installation in September and system acceptance tests in November. With satisfactory commissioning flight check results, the new radar underwent operational evaluation and further system optimisation began in December.