Overview
- Huan Huan and Yuan Zi, both 17, left Paris–Charles de Gaulle on a roughly 12-hour China Airlines cargo flight bound for Chengdu.
- French Gendarmerie escorted the journey from Beauval to the airport, with a send-off that included a Chinese embassy representative and France’s ecology minister Monique Barbut.
- A French veterinarian, a Chinese veterinarian and a specialist keeper are accompanying the pandas, who are traveling in climate‑controlled crates set to 20°C.
- Beauval will keep their twin daughters, Huanlili and Yuandudu, born in 2021, under the existing loan as the parents return under China’s ownership policy.
- The pair arrived in France in 2012, produced three cubs including the first panda born in the country, and will receive specialized care at the Chengdu research base.