Transit flights over Russia drop 59% in 2022 - Rosaviatsia

MOSCOW. March 14 (Interfax) - The number of flights transiting Russian airspace, which had provided Aeroflot with trans-Siberian overflight fees prior to the sanctions, plummeted 59% in 2022, Alexander Neradko, head of the Federal Air Transport Agency (Rosaviatsia), said in a report at the agency's board meeting.

"There were 79,652 flights that transited the airspace of the Russian Federation [in 2022]. This was a decline of 59% compared to 2021. The highest volume of flights was recorded on August 26, 2022, with 5,390 aircraft directed in a 24-hour period against 6,285 in 2021," according to the report published on Rosaviatsia's website.

Russian air traffic controllers directed 1.4 million flights overall operating within the country's airspace in 2022, a decline of 13% year-on-year. This was because of the reduced number of flights owing to the restrictions placed on the operations of 11 domestic airports in the central and southern parts of the country; a number of countries closing airspace to Russian airlines; as well as Russia's counter measures regarding airlines from 36 "unfriendly" countries.

Foreign airlines flew so-called trans-Siberian routes over Russia in order to reduce flight time between Europe and Asia prior to the sanctions being imposed against Russia last year owing to the events in Ukraine. Russia had been collecting overflight fees for the convenience since the 1970s, with Aeroflot as the main beneficiary of the overflight fees that totaled hundreds of millions of dollars per year, according to some estimates.

Chinese airlines are currently the only ones that operate flights along trans-Siberian routes.

The Transport Ministry previously estimated that the 19 foreign airlines forced to circumnavigate Russian territory incur additional costs of $37.5 million weekly, which entails raising airfare and costs for transporting goods, the ministry said.