BEIJING, Feb. 20(Xinhuanet)-- The HU 7952 flight of the Chinese mainland-based Hainan Airlines landed Sunday night at the Capital International Airport here, ending the non-stop charter flight service across the Taiwan Straits for this year's Lunar New Year holidays.

More than 10,000 Taiwan businesspeople and their families in the mainland took the special charters to return home for the Lunar New Year which fell on Feb. 9, flying directly across the Taiwan Straits for the first time in 56 years.

Twelve airlines from the mainland and Taiwan offered 48 round-trips during the temporary service, which began on Jan. 29 with an Air China's flight heading for Taipei, the first mainland's civil airliner flying to the island in 56 years.

For most of the Taiwanese travelers, who normally must fly an extra four hours through a third destination such as Hong Kong when traveling from the mainland back home, the success of the charter flights has raised their hopes for direct air links across the Straits.

"Charter flights shorten the geographical distance and save time. But more importantly, they bridge a psychological gap," said Zhuang Zongyu, a Taiwanese businessman."We hope we can have direct charters not only for holidays, but for normal times as well."

Air China said it would donate all its revenue from eight charter flights to organizations that strive to facilitate cross-Straits exchanges.

"I don't know any Taiwanese, but I'm particularly happy at seeing them going back home more conveniently," said mainlander Tan Congwang.

Although charter flight service this year may help ease tension across the Straits to some extent, experts say that direct air links are still a long way off.

"The charter flight service is only an economic matter. It cannot bear the political task of improving the cross-Straits relations," said Zhang Guanhua, a research fellow with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

With the Taiwanese people voicing their strong hopes to better cross-Straits ties through the charter flight service,"the Taiwan authorities should consider carefully how to take its next step," he said.