The first charter flights across the Taiwan Strait for the Mid Autumn Festival will take off later this month, said sources with Air China Monday.

The charter flight service was only for Spring Festival, traditional Chinese New Year, in the past years. The service is now expanded to other traditional festival holidays including the Ching Ming Festival (or Tomb Sweeping Day), the Dragon Boat Festival and the Mid Autumn Festival.

Six airlines from each side will operate 24 round-trip flights between Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Xiamen and Taipei from September 29 to October 8, during which China's week-long National Day vacation also falls in.

Most airlines have prepared mooncakes for passengers to celebrate the festival.

An official with the Hainan Airline said they have sold "two thirds of the tickets". The Eastern Airline had half of its business class tickets and 70 percent of the economy class tickets ordered on the first day it began selling the tickets.

Figures provided by the Taiwan Affairs Office under the State Council show that more than 4.3 million residents from Taiwan visited the mainland between January and November last year.

The first charter flights were realized in the Spring Festival in 2003 with less than 1,300 passengers on board. In 2005 and 2006passenger numbers of the Spring Festival charter flights reached 5,877 and 27,276 respectively.

Editor: Donald