A China Southern Airlines aircraft took off from Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong Province, at 4 p.m. Tuesday for Luxor, Egypt, to bring back about 220 stranded Hong Kong residents.

The flight was postponed due to applications for landing permission and approval from the countries it will fly over, said a posting on the airline's official microblog.

An earlier posting said the flight was scheduled to leave Guangzhou at 11 a.m..