Honored Pilot Smirnov appreciated Canada’s regrets about the closure of Russian airspace

“Expenses exceed income, may go bankrupt”

The closure of Russian airspace has led to serious consequences for Canadian airlines, according to the news portal of the Canadian television network CTV News. According to the authors of the material, Canada greatly regretted this. Now carriers have to fly around the territory of Russia. What a detour the planes of Canadian airlines are doing now, Oleg Smirnov, a member of the Public Council of Rostransnadzor, a former deputy minister of civil aviation of the USSR, and an honored pilot, told MK.

“The sanctions imposed by Canada in the aviation unit are a “shot in one’s own foot,” says Oleg Mikhalovich. – They banned flights to them, and we responded to these sanctions in a mirror way, we also banned Canadians from appearing in our air zone. See how well they were previously arranged. They flew, say, to the southeast, to China, Pakistan, Japan, and so on, followed through the airspace of the United States, then crossed the Arctic Ocean. And after that, directly perpendicular, directly, they crossed the airspace of Russia. And now they are forced to fly around Russia. And our territory is so huge, try it, fly around it. This all translates into a few extra hours of flight. And this, accordingly, is the additional cost of kerosene, the additional load on the material part, on the aircraft engines. All this increases the cost of airlines, and they have no choice but to raise the cost of air tickets. And when airfare goes up, passenger traffic goes down. At the same time, the government puts pressure from above, demanding not to raise ticket prices, and the airlines take on all the costs. That’s why they’re up and running now. Their expenses exceed their income.

For example, Air Canada tickets from Vancouver to Hong Kong increased by 41%, while tickets from Toronto to Delhi increased by 47%.

According to the expert, Canadian airlines may go bankrupt.

“Where politics interferes with the economy, the economy fails. Canada was the first to apply these sanctions. They created difficulties for themselves, and for us. They stopped deliveries to Russia of spare parts for Boeing and Airbus. They don’t let us into Europe. Our airlines are also currently experiencing serious financial difficulties. But the state helps our airlines. Last year, for example, the government allocated 100 billion rubles to 32 of our airlines. This allowed the airlines to survive. It was impossible to fire pilots, because their training is quite expensive, it is a long process, it takes years.