Wuhan Tianhe International Airport in Central China's Hubei Province restarted operations on Wednesday after a 76-day hiatus, with more than 11,000 passengers going in and out of the city that was hardest hit by the novel coronavirus epidemic. 

Photo: China Eastern Airlines

At 7:25am, a China Eastern Airlines flight with 49 passengers took off. It was the carrier's first flight as service resumed and the first flight leaving the re-opened airport.

On Wednesday, the carrier was scheduled to operate 30 flights from the airport to 15 cities in China's mainland. 

China Southern Airlines resumed operations with a plane to Chengdu, Southwest China's Sichuan Province. It was scheduled to have 48 flights on Wednesday, the most from Wuhan. 

Air China also had 38 flights planned in and out of the city on Wednesday. 

It was predicted that on the first day of resumed services, the airport would have 200 flights taking 11,000 passengers in and out of the city, covering more than 50 destinations across the nation, according to a file from Hubei Airports Group obtained by the Global Times. 

Data from Qunar.com showed that as of Tuesday, 25 airlines had opened ticket sales for Wuhan-related routes within the following 30 days, with 61 routes. The main destinations were Shanghai, Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Chengdu, Xi'an, Kunming and Sanya.

On January 23, Wuhan, the provincial capital of Hubei, announced unprecedented traffic restrictions, as it shut down the city's public transit system and all outbound flights and trains. Similar restrictions were soon introduced in other areas of the province to stem the spread of the virus

Except for Wuhan, all passenger and cargo flights on domestic air routes via airports in Hubei resumed from March 29.