Hopefully this will be the end of Malaysia Airlines, with it suicidal kamikaze pilots, killing Australians and other non-Malaysian passengers.

One consolation: Chinese airlines have dropped 85% of business and over $20 billion to date. Their economy overall is not that flash at the moment, signalling that we will need to be looking elsewhere to replace the third of our exports that some people are worried about. We now have economic as well as security reasons to given the Commos the flick.

Probably very temporary, and remedied by an increased uptake in freight some of which could be refrigerated and supported by altitude, and some aeration in transit?

Or replaced by electrification and rapid rail with connecting submersible, nuclear powered, roll on roll off, fast ferries taking whole, Destination embedded Customs examined and guaranteed by them, sealed (welded) shut, trains? All the drug dog and Xray examination could be concluding before loading were allowed? And from secure loading portals. And allow fresh food exports expansion, via that more secure loading model?

This combined and connected transport model could quite massively reduce handling and with that, opportunities for contraband/drug smuggling etc-etc!

And given that connected surface freight forwarding model replaces aircraft? Could quite massively reduce delivery and turnaround times?

In any event, that could be a good outcome for the climate and international trade?
Alan B.

ttbn,

It's good that you touched on the point about the impact that the pandemic is going to have on China.

I reckon it is going to put China back about 60 years and I can't see it ever becoming a major economic powerhouse again as especially Western nations begin to restructure their economies and trading arrangements to become largely independent on supplies of manufactures from China.

I don't think Chinese is going to be the flavour of the month post-pandemic. Especially if it's Wuhan Bat Soup, with or without COVID-19!

Mr. O,

Gordon Chang predicted in 2001 that China could collapse within the decade. The rot became obvious to the world with the virus in November 2019, but the CCP was hiding real problems well before that. Eight months to the end of the decade. Here's hoping!

Game set and match for environmentalists.

The pandemic has been a blessing for them. Many polluting industries are staggering, airlines. Vehicle and factory emissions plumiting. Fresh air appears from nowhere as a consequence. CO2 levels will fall. We head towards a perfect world. Thank you little Covid -19 virus.

Dan