A direct air route between Wuhan, capital of Central China's Hubei province, and Male, capital of the Maldives, an island nation popular for tourism is opened on 3 July 2014.
The maiden flight via an Airbus A320 took off at 8 am and is expected to arrive in Male at 2:10 pm local time. The flight takes about 7 hours and flies once a week on every Thursday.
Wuhan is the seventh Chinese city to open a direct air route with the Maldives after Hong Kong, Chengdu, Chongqing, Kunming, Guangzhou and Beijing.