At 11:10 am on November 29th, Flight VN696 of Vietnam Airlines carrying 189 passengers from Nha Trang landed at the Three Gorges Airport in Yichang on time. With the arrival of the flight, the number of international flights at Yichang Three Gorges Airport came to 294 with the passenger throughout of 50,009 people in 2018. This was the first time that the passenger throughout exceeded 50,000 people since the opening of Yichang airport in 2007, marking the big stride of the internalization of Yichang Three Gorges Airport.

　　It is understood that the international passenger throughout of 50,000 people per year is a prerequisite for an airport to be upgraded to an international one. This traffic indicator is also a requirement for the expansion of Yichang Three Gorges Airport.

　　In addition, the airport will be qualified to operate duty-free shop to better meet the multi-level needs of inbound and outbound passengers when the passenger throughput exceeds 50,000 people per year. At present, Yichang Three Gorges Airport has already discussed preliminary cooperation with China Duty Free Group. It is expected that the idea of taking flights from the airport and shopping in the airport duty-free shop will be realized in 2019. Yichang Three Gorges Airport will become the first branch airport in Hubei Province to set up a duty-free shop.(Reporter Wang Ying, correspondent Wang Tingting)