Cebu Pacific to skirt Garuda and Gurag flight paths for North Korean rocket launch

(Updated 8:24 p.m./April 10)Cebu Pacific Air (CEB) will reroute its Osaka-Manila flights from April 12 to 16, skirting the Gadura and Gurag airways as a precautionary measure against the planned North Korea rocket launch.

 

The decision was based on a notice to airmen or NOTAM issued April 3 by the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP), which closed the two airways–known as Garuda and Gurag–northeast of Luzon island, said CEB public relations officer Michelle de Guzman. 

 

Only the Osaka-Manila flight will be affected, and not the Manila-Osaka flight, said CEB vice president Candice Iyog in an emailed note to GMA News Online on Tuesday, April 10.   As such, “the flight won’t take longer, since there will be no changes to CEB’s flight schedule,” Iyog added.  

CAAP issued the NOTAM based on estimates that the rocket boosters of the North Korean rocket ship would crash through those airways. According to Pyongyang, the rocket ship–supposedly carrying  a satellite–would mark the 100th birth anniversary of North Korea’s founding President Kim Il-Sung, saying the launch is entirely peaceful.

 

Also affected by the airways closure are Philippine Airlines, Korean Air, Japan Airlines, All Nippon Airways, Singapore Airlines and Garuda Indonesia. —VS, GMA News