Shandong Airlines

Is Shandong Airlines safe?

Yes. Shandong Airlines has flown since 1994 without a fatal accident or the loss of an aircraft in flight, and it says it has 31 years of safe flying behind it. It is controlled by Air China, flies about 140 Boeing 737s from Jinan, Qingdao and Yantai, and passes the IATA safety audit. We score it 82.

Two things hold the score down. In 2023 one of its 737s ran partly off the runway at Jinan, and China's regulator blamed the crew and parts of the airline's own system. And its fleet, at almost 12 years on average, is older than those of most large Chinese airlines.

What happened at Jinan in 2023?

On the night of 30 July 2023, flight SC8856, a Boeing 737-800 from Nanchang, flew an instrument approach to Jinan in heavy rain. The tower told the crew that heavy rain was falling over the middle and southern part of the runway. The captain said to continue, although the airline's own operations manual bans approaches and landings in heavy rain.

The captain was flying by hand with a head-up display. Close to the ground he lost the display's guidance, did not go around, and let the aircraft drift left. It touched down hard, about 9 m left of the centreline and 7 degrees off the runway heading. Two seconds later the left main wheels left the paved surface and ran on soft ground for about 220 m before the jet came back onto the runway and stopped. Four edge lights and the aircraft were damaged. Nobody was hurt.

The investigation by the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) East China office, which was reported in May 2024, classed it as a serious incident caused by the crew. Two findings go beyond one bad landing. The crew did not tell air traffic control at once that they might have left the runway, and the captain phoned managers while taxiing before reporting it. The report also named weaknesses in the airline's flight training, technical management, scheduling and crew dispatch, and found after the event that the captain's eyesight did not meet the medical standard.

The runway was not perfect either. Weeks earlier the regulator had ordered Jinan airport to fix low runway friction and centreline markings covered in rubber. But it is the crew's decision to keep going in heavy rain that the report puts first.

Other incidents on record

Few Shandong events reach the public record, and CAAC publishes little, so this list is short partly because of a lack of data:

• Haikou, April 2016. Both left main tyres of a 737-800 burst on landing. The aircraft stopped on the runway, which closed, and 43 arriving flights diverted.
• Nanjing, June 2025. Flight SC4667 from Qingdao to Shanghai diverted after passengers reported bangs, a burning smell and shaking from the left engine. The airline called it an aircraft fault, and the 737 landed safely.
• Xiamen, July 2025. A 737-800's nose gear steering failed as it left the runway, and it had to be towed away.

None of these hurt anyone. Jinan is the one that tells you something about how the airline runs its flight operations, and it is why serious incidents is the lowest factor here.

What does Shandong Airlines fly?

Only Boeing 737s: the 737-700, the 737-800 and the newer 737-8. The airline lists 144 aircraft on its website; Air China's interim report counted 142 at 30 June 2026, with an average age of 11.86 years. That is older than Air China's own fleet (10.16 years) and Shenzhen Airlines' (10.71). Most of the jets are 737-800s, a type with a long and solid record but an older cockpit than the A320 family.

A single type has advantages for safety: pilots and engineers work on one aircraft family. The age is the trade-off, and Shandong does not publish how many of the 144 are the new 737-8.

Who runs Shandong Airlines?

Air China holds 66% of Shandong Aviation Group, which controls the airline, and the other shareholders include Shandong Hi-Speed Group and Shandong Caijin Investment. Air China made a tender offer for the listed shares in 2023, and the B shares were later delisted from Shenzhen. Shandong keeps its own SC code, operating certificate and crews. A ticket with a CA flight number from Jinan or Qingdao may be flown by Shandong, so check the "operated by" line.

On our pages, accidents count against the airline that flew the flight under its own code. We checked: the Air China page counts no Shandong event, and this page counts none of Air China's.

How we scored it

The accident record (95) is the strength: no fatal accident and no aircraft lost in flight in 31 years. Serious incidents (66) are the weakest factor because of the Jinan findings. The fleet (72) loses points for age. Overall 82, a little above Air China (80) and below Sichuan Airlines (84).

If you fly Shandong out of Jinan or Qingdao in summer, expect delays when thunderstorms build. A diversion or a go-around in heavy rain is the crew doing what the Jinan report says should have happened.