The aircraft of China Southern Airlines - the first company in Asia by the size of its fleet - took off at midday from the city of Canton (south) to that of Zhengzhou (center), according to information given by the FlightRadar24 flight tracking site.

A second flight was then made, with the same model, in the early afternoon from Canton to Wuhan (center).

Neither the company nor the Chinese civil aviation regulator could be reached immediately, while Boeing in China, contacted by AFP, declined to comment, referring to the airline.

China was the very first country in the world to order its carriers in March 2019 to suspend Boeing 737 MAX flights for safety reasons, after two accidents in a few months that killed 346 people.

The day before the ban, an aircraft of this model operated by Ethiopian Airlines crashed shortly after taking off from Addis Ababa.

The disaster, which killed 157 people, occurred just over five months after the accident of another 737 MAX in Indonesia, where 189 people died.

Flight from Mongolia in October

After 20 months of immobilization on the ground, the device had been authorized to fly again in the United States.

Then it had also been in most parts of the world, after modifications to the flight control software at the origin of the two accidents and new pilot training in particular.

China had maintained its ban.

In December 2021, the Chinese regulator had officially judged that the device was fit to fly again, predicting that it would return to Chinese skies by "the end of the year (2021) or the beginning (2022) ".

The announcement had raised hopes at Boeing after two years of setbacks for its star plane, but the delays were ultimately longer than expected.

This flight ban in Chinese airspace affected most companies in the Asia-Pacific region, thus causing great harm to the American manufacturer.

In October 2022, however, a flight from the national company of Mongolia, Mongolian Airlines, with this device, was able to land and then depart from Canton, a connection that has since become regular.

The C919, Chinese competitor

Boeing boss Dave Calhoun was pessimistic at the end of October about the resumption of deliveries of the Boeing 737 MAX, believing that the geopolitical situation did not allow for an immediate improvement in the situation.

Persistent trade tensions between the United States and China have reportedly slowed progress on this file.

China's new airliner, the C919, during a demonstration flight at the Zhuhai Air Show in southern China on November 8, 2022 © - / CNS/AFP/Archives

The leader also noted that "Covid-related restrictions and China's policy have reduced demand for aircraft in general".

China has applied a strict so-called “zero Covid” policy for nearly three years, isolating itself from the rest of the world and drastically reducing air traffic to and from the country.

Health restrictions that were suddenly lifted in early December, while the quarantine on arrival from abroad was abolished in early January.

This resumption of domestic flights with the Boeing 737 MAX comes a month after China delivered its new airliner, the C919, a competitor to the Airbus A320 and which should make its inaugural commercial flight in early 2023.

First medium-haul designed by China, even if most of its important parts come from abroad, the twin-engine aircraft from the state manufacturer Comac is also intended to compete with the 737 MAX.

According to Chinese media, four planes were to be delivered before the end of 2022 to China Eastern, the second national carrier in terms of number of passengers, before an entry into service scheduled for the first quarter of this year.

© 2023 AFP