Russia's aviation disaster: flights are decreasing - "The process cannot be stopped"

Created: 08/18/2022, 16:35

By: Lisa Mayerhofer

The sanctions hit Russia's aviation hard - many planes cannot take off.

The huge country is urgently dependent on aviation.

Experts predict severe cuts.

Moscow – As a result of the sanctions, well-known western companies have withdrawn from Russia – there are now no McDonald's, no French luxury clothes and no more German cars in Putin's country.

But what is likely to hit Russia even harder is the decline in its aviation sector as a result of the sanctions.

Sanctions against Russia: Aviation among the hardest hit

Because: Since February 27, not only the airspace of the EU, Ukraine and the USA has been closed to Russian aircraft.

A much more massive problem for Russian airlines like Aeroflot is that the supply of aircraft and spare parts as well as maintenance services have been banned by the West.

Russian airlines almost exclusively use aircraft from western manufacturers Boeing and Airbus.

Without their technology, Russian aviation is on the verge of collapse: Despite all efforts, the country has not managed to become independent of the West in terms of aviation technology and, according to experts, will not be able to do so in the next few years either.

In addition, it is particularly difficult for Russia to circumvent sanctions in this area.

After all, spare parts and similar supplies are not obtained via detours from other countries such as China.

The reason for this is that all components carry a traceable serial number - so manufacturers would know if a component ended up in Russia despite sanctions and how it did so.

Since China is also dependent on Airbus and Boeing for aviation, the country is careful not to violate their guidelines.

Expert on Russia's aviation: "Flight supply will decrease noticeably"

This means that sooner or later fewer and fewer planes will be able to take off in Russia, since the machines are constantly being repaired, but the defects cannot be remedied.

“There is always something that breaks on an airplane.

There are problems with the engine or the hydraulics.

Sometimes a tiny part is enough and a machine can no longer start,” explains the Hamburg aviation expert Heinrich Großbongardt in the

.

He predicts: “In the next few months we will see how the number of flights will decrease noticeably.

This process cannot be stopped.”

That would hit the Russian economy and population hard, since the huge country depends on air connections for its infrastructure - other means of transport would not offer a sufficient replacement.

"Hardly any country is as dependent on its aviation as Russia," says Großbongardt of the

.

Aeroflot passenger planes stand at Sheremetyevo Airport outside Moscow.

The airline is suffering massively from the sanctions of the West.

(Archive image) © Pavel Golovkin/AP/dpa

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50 aircraft or 15 percent of Aeroflot machines are no longer taking off.

This may be due to the fact that some machines abroad - such as Germany - are stranded.

But it may also be due to the desperate measures taken by Putin's government to keep Russian aviation functioning as long as possible.

Russian aviation: New Airbus A350 as spare parts store

The lack of machines can also be due to the desperate measures taken by Putin's government to keep Russian aviation running for as long as possible.

In June, the Kremlin recommended cannibalizing planes for spare parts so Russian aviation can continue to operate until 2025.

Four industry insiders also recently confirmed to

news agency that Aeroflot is dismantling its aircraft to get parts.

Accordingly, a brand new Airbus A350 already acts as a spare parts store.

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Aviation expert Großbongardt doubts that Russian aviation will last until 2025: "I think this hope is pure wishful thinking on the part of the Russian government," he says to the

.

"You're going to have to gut a lot more planes to keep the rest aloft by 2025."

It is all the more incomprehensible for military expert Carlo Masala that the EU relaxed its sanctions on the export of aircraft technology again at the end of July: "I don't understand why we don't ground Aeroflot," he writes on Twitter.

"The sanctions work and then we take some of them back."