Dhaka-Riyadh Flights May Resume From Wednesday After 146 Cancellations Left 22,241 Passengers Stranded

Flights on the suspended Dhaka-Riyadh route may resume from Wednesday. Saudia Airlines conveyed the information citing the Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport authorities, according to a text message sent to a media group on Tuesday, which said that if everything goes well, Saudia flights on the route could restart from Wednesday.

The Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh (CAAB) said the same day that, if conditions remain favourable, Saudia Airlines flights from the Saudi capital Riyadh to Dhaka could begin from Wednesday, citing the Saudi authorities in its statement on Tuesday, 27 October.

Flight operations on the route were suspended after attacks by Yemen's Houthi armed group on several Saudi airports, including those in the capital Riyadh and in Dammam.

According to CAAB, after the Houthi attack on Riyadh's King Khaled International Airport on 10 October, flight movements at the airport were suspended for several days. All activities at the airport remained closed until 3am Bangladesh time on 14 October, after which flight movements gradually resumed.

In a separate press release, CAAB said that because of restrictions on flight operations at Saudi airports, 146 direct and transit flights from Dhaka have so far been suspended or cancelled, leaving 22,241 passengers of those flights in difficulty.

According to CAAB, the number of affected direct flights is 69: 29 of Biman Bangladesh Airlines, 10 of US-Bangla Airlines, 19 of Saudia Airlines and 11 of Riyadh Airlines.

Of the 77 affected transit flights, 30 were IndiGo's, 7 Salam Air's, 1 EgyptAir's, 14 Emirates', 9 Qatar Airways', 8 flydubai's and 8 Air India's.

In this situation, Biman Bangladesh Airlines has suspended all flights on the Dammam and Riyadh routes until 4 November, while US-Bangla Airlines has announced cancellations on the two routes until 31 October.

Earlier, as the situation improved somewhat, Biman resumed flights on the Dammam route from 21 October, and on 22 October a flight left Dhaka for Dammam at 8am carrying 379 passengers. The suspension on the Riyadh and Dammam routes was later extended again. Although those routes remain suspended, Biman is operating flights on the Jeddah and Madinah routes.

US-Bangla Airlines general manager for public relations Kamrul Islam told journalists the decision was taken for security reasons, but that anyone with a visa complication or an urgent need to travel could go via Jeddah, as flights on that route are operating. Biman said its passengers, too, can in urgent cases travel to and from Saudi Arabia using Jeddah and Madinah international airports.