The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), which is part of the UN structure, has given Russia a “red flag” on the page of the audit of flight safety results, the Aviation of Russia website reports .
The organization has downgraded to 77.4% its assessment of the effectiveness of the implementation of standards in the airworthiness category in the Russian Federation. “In 2022, the ICAO identified a major security concern regarding Russia’s ability to properly control aircraft under its jurisdiction,” the explanation reads.
On September 14, the 90-day period expired, which the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) assigned to the Federal Air Transport Agency to eliminate the double registration of aircraft leased by Russian airlines. In accordance with Article 18 of the Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation, the registration of an aircraft in more than one state cannot be considered valid.
In Russia, there are several hundred foreign-made aircraft with double registration – Russian and Bermuda. In March 2022, the Bermuda Civil Aviation Authority (BCAA) suspended the airworthiness certificates of Russian airlines registered in Bermuda.
In order to preserve the aircraft fleet and be able to independently maintain the airworthiness of aircraft, more than 500 of them were transferred to Russian jurisdiction. As of September 13, 560 aircraft were simultaneously in the Russian and Bermuda registries.
When foreign-registered aircraft were transferred to Russian jurisdiction, their airworthiness certificates were automatically extended until the end of this year, and only the Federal Air Transport Agency began to control airworthiness, since Russia terminated the agreement with Bermuda on transferring aircraft supervision functions to them.
Dual registration of aircraft brings with it problems related to the international recognition of the aircraft's radio license and airworthiness certificate, ICAO spokesman Anthony Philbin explained in June. He warned that if the problem was not resolved by mid-September, then a “red flag” would appear on the ICAO website opposite Russia.
An anonymous aviation expert told The Insider that such a red flag was assigned to the state of Bhutan in 2018, and now Russia has a second one. In practice, this means that all other states of the world can refuse to use their airspace for Russian aircraft due to the unsafe condition of aircraft from the Russian Federation.
“The main trigger for this ICAO decision was precisely the violation of the basic provision of the Chicago Convention (the main international agreement in the field of aviation in the world) on the inadmissibility of dual registration of aircraft. But the prerequisites for problems with flight safety in the Russian Federation have been around for a long time, as evidenced by the world-class anti-record of the Russian Federation in the number of aviation accidents and people killed in them, as statistics for the past 2021 show. These safety problems in the Russian Federation began even before the imposition of sanctions after February 2022. As a result of the sanctions, the situation with flight safety has only worsened. Therefore, not only on a formal basis, due to double registration, the ICAO made a decision about the unsafety of our aircraft. There are quite objective reasons for this. After almost all Western aircraft developers, primarily Boeing and Airbus, refused to work in the Russian Federation, almost our entire fleet of foreign aircraft (and this is at least 80% of the entire fleet of aircraft in the Russian Federation) was left unattended in terms of safety, ”said expert.
Another anonymous expert explained to The Insider that the ICAO cannot allow or prohibit anything, it can only recommend and inform. But based on this information, other countries may prohibit Russian airlines from using their airspace. Because according to ICAO standards, for any accident or catastrophe that occurred in the airspace of a country, the aviation authorities and, in general, the authorities of the country where this accident occurred, are responsible. Therefore, according to the expert, not a single country in the world would like an aircraft of a country that does not ensure flight safety at the proper level to crash in its airspace.
In addition, according to the interlocutor, for Russia it also threatens with "image losses." “When a country whose state language is one of the official languages of the ICAO does not properly ensure flight safety and aircraft operation to the extent that it receives a red flag, this is an image shame. In this case, Russia at the reputational level becomes a pariah in the global civil aviation. Russia was given three months to eliminate these shortcomings, but during this time it did not have time to do it, ”the expert explained.
At the same time, as the expert explained, the threatening situation with flight safety did not develop after February 24, it was before. Many foreign experts, including ICAO experts, even before that said that Russian aviation legislation lagged behind in comparison with the world. But, despite all the shortcomings in Russian legislation, until the moment of dual registration, Russia maintained the airworthiness and safety of aircraft at the world level. “However, the theft of other people's aircraft, which are on lease, just led to the fact that double registration appeared, and this is expressly prohibited. Since March, we have not been able to receive spare parts, our technical service and repair centers do not have access to up-to-date databases. We cannot obtain spare parts from foreign manufacturers directly. We buy unknown parts, plus aviation cannibalism, which is no longer even hidden. All this also left its mark and lowered the level of safety in the operation of aircraft,” the source said.
In early March, the Federal Air Transport Agency recommended that Russian airlines suspend all international flights due to fears of mass arrests of aircraft abroad.
The threat of stopping flights also loomed over the Russian Sukhoi Superjet 100, which, under sanctions, could replace foreign-made airliners. Russian airlines cannot repair and maintain Russian-French SaM146 engines that are installed on Superjet. This is due to the imposition of EU sanctions.
At the end of May, the Chinese authorities banned the flights of Russian Boeing aircraft due to double registration, making an exception only for transit flights. First of all, the cargo airline Aviastar-TU suffered from this ban. It is the main partner of the AliExpress marketplace, popular in the Russian Federation, as well as the Russian Post.
Aviastar-TU operates six Boeing 757s. Five of them are registered in Russia, although they were registered in Bermuda in early March. The re-registration of aircraft in Russia began after the owners of the airliners began to revoke permits for their use in leasing by Russian airlines.
In early June, an Aeroflot Airbus A330 aircraft was arrested in Sri Lanka due to the lack of permission to fly from the country's aviation authorities. The airport authorities said that the problem is related to a commercial dispute with a leasing company from Ireland, Celestial Aviation Trading Limited, which owns this airliner. She asked the court to ban the plane from leaving the country.