Skytrax, the world’s most prestigious rating agency for aviation, awarded Yichang Sanxia Airport, Haikou Meilan International Airport and Sanya Phoenix International Airport the official 4-Star Airport Certification at an awarding ceremony held in Sanya, Hainan Province on the afternoon of June 26. As the only one being awarded the certification among all the airports with the capacity of less than 5 million people, Yichang Sanxia Airport has added a new international brand for Yichang. Jointly with Beijing Capital International Airport, Shanghai Hongqiao International Airport, London Heathrow Airport, Zürich Unique Airport, Yichang Sanxia Airport and other 15 SKYTRAX four-star airports have become one of the world’s most advanced airports.
　　At the awarding ceremony, Edward, Chairman of SKYTRAX, presented the certificate of “SKYTRAX 4-star Airport” to Wang Hong, Chairman of Yichang Sanxia Airport, and said: “I hope that all the passengers could enjoy the four-star service of Yichang Sanxia Airport. And the four-star service mode of ‘fast and efficient, delicate and friendly’ created by Yichang Sanxia Airport can be set as the service standards for passengers of small and medium airports around the world.”
　　“Yichang Sanxia Airport has been awarded as the SKYTRAX 4-star airport successfully. “This is a great event not only for Hainan Airlines, but also for CAAC. And it also shows that the international competitiveness of Yichang Sanxia Airport has been further improved”, said Liang Jun, Vice President of Hainan Airlines Co., CEO of Basic Industries Pision. And according to him, as the world’s most credible, authoritative, professional and prestigious rating agency for aviation, the evaluation of SKYTRAX for airports was the same to the hotel star rating system. And there were only 16 airports around the world have won the official Four-Star Airport Certification by SKYTRAX.
　　According to Wang Hong, during the two years to prepare for the SKYTRAX four-star airport, Yichang Sanxia Airport has learned from many excellent international airports to renovate and transform18 major projects and over 240 small projects with an investment of more than 34 million RMB, some of which have even reached the five-star standard. Meanwhile, Yichang Sanxia Airport integrated some elements of geographical features and cultural features of Yichang, including Yichang agricultural product, Three Gorges picture stone, scenic pictures of Three Gorges and Yangtze River Piano to enhance its competitive advantages of fine and differentiated service.
　　In November, 2013, Edward, Chairman of SKYTRAX inspected Yichang Sanxia Airport and said that the transformed Yichang Sanxia Airport was a “passenger-friendly” airport which fully reflected the cultural features of Yichang. On April 23 this year, the Yichang Sanxia Airport received the final inspection from SKYTRAX. And on April 29, SKYTRAX officially announced that Yichang Sanxia Airport had passed the audits successfully, which also set a new record for the airport with the minimum passenger throughput since the establishment of SKYTRAX and Yichang Sanxia Airport became the only one four-star airport with the passenger throughput of less than 5 million people.  (Reporter: Yan Xiaodong, Correspondent: Yang Yuanyuan)