India, Sept. 29 -- Ping Ping and Fu Shuang flew into Atlanta on September 27 aboard a dedicated Boeing 777 dubbed the 'FedEx Panda Express', after a journey of about 16 hours from Chengdu. China has sent the two giant pandas to Zoo Atlanta for a 10-year stay, nearly two years after the city returned its previous pandas to China.

The flight came days after Chinese President Xi Jinping announced the move during his visit to the US. Xi called the giant panda an "envoy of friendship" between the Chinese and American people. The timing has drawn attention because the pandas come after a period of strained US-China relations, with the two countries still negotiating over trade, technology and other disputes.

The practice is known as panda dip...