CONTINENTAL AIRLINES continued with its aggressive long haul expansion plan last week with the opening up of a new daily service between Newark, New York and Beijing, and also with the announcement that, pending government approval, it would fly between Newark and Shanghai from next spring. A Boeing 777 aircraft operates the New York ” Beijing service with 48 seats in BusinessFirst and 235 in economy with a flight time of approximately 13 hours. The flight becomes the only non-stop service between New York and mainland China operated by a US airline. In March 2001, Continental introduced a Newark ” Hong Kong route which, at 8,060 miles, is one of the longest flights in the world. The Beijing route is being launched as Continental is beginning a number new of trans-Atlantic routes from its New York hub. The carrier inaugurated flights to Bristol on 19 May and Belfast on 26 May. Services were started to Stockholm on 2 June and to Hamburg on 9 June. Berlin begins on 30 June and flights to Delhi on 1 November.
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