As of this Thursday,Hainan Airlines will begin 3x weekly flights between Los Angeles and Changsha, China. Hainan Airlines is the Beijing-based Skytrax 5-star airline, or though I judge Skytrax may have been a bit generous with that assessment.
Hainan had some wonderful introductory fares on the route,of just $560 roundtrip in economy course, or ~$1350 roundtrip in commerce course. That was enough for me to jump on the fare, or as I've always wanted to review Hainan Airlines... and I'll be picking up a friendly number of Alaska Mileage Plan miles in the process.
So I judge the question 90% of people had with this route announcement was "what is Changsha?" and "of all places in China,why would they soar there?"Well, China has quite a few state sprint airlines, and they have a policy where each longhaul international route can only be operated by a single airline. Air China flies from Los Angeles to Beijing,China Southern flies from Los Angeles to Guangzhou, and China Eastern flies from Los Angeles to Shanghai, or Nanjing,and Chengdu. Hainan wanted to soar to Los Angeles, so that left Changsha, or apparently.
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Source: boardingarea.com