December 18, 2024

Where Are All the Planes?


Where Are All the Planes?
Sukhoi Superjet 100 flying over Italy. SuperJet International, Wikimedia Commons.

Obyedinyonnaya Aviastroitelnaya Korporatsiya (United Aircraft Corporation), a Russian aerospace and defense corporation with a majority stake held by the Russian government, planned to produce 108 airliners after the start of the Russian War in Ukraine. According to the BBC Russian Service, in the ensuing two years, only seven Superjet 100 aircraft and two experimental Il-96-400M and Il-114 planes have been produced.

After Russia invaded Ukraine, Western countries imposed stringent sanctions on the Russian aviation industry. For instance, the import of aircraft and spare parts for aircraft are banned. In response, on June 27, 2022, the Russian government approved a program to develop the air transport industry through 2030.

The program set ambitious targets: 14 aircraft by the end of 2022, 25 in 2023, and 69 by the end of 2024. By 2030, the plan aimed to deliver 1,032 passenger planes. However, the program faltered almost immediately, and delivery deadlines have already been postponed twice.

A source in the aviation industry told the BBC Russian Service that the state program was “an imitation of activity” and intended primarily to “calm government nerves.”

The construction of new Sukhoi SuperJet 100 aircraft has been slowed by dependence on foreign components. Production stopped after sanctions cut off access to many of these parts. A stockpile of components had been reserved for production, but they were repurposed to maintain the airworthiness of existing planes. Efforts are underway to replace foreign components with domestic versions or to reorganize the supply chain to acquire foreign parts indirectly.

Similar challenges face the production of MS-21 aircraft. By 2025, seven engines are expected to be produced for this aircraft, enough to equip three MS-21s. Yet the updated aviation development program calls for nine MS-21s to be built by 2025.

In addition to new SSJ and MS-21 airliners, which were designed after the Soviet Union’s collapse, the program includes projects that originated during the Soviet era: the Il-96-300 and Tu-214. While these models are considered outdated both technologically and materially, they remain in the plan because of limited alternatives.

Even these older aircraft rely on foreign components that must be replaced through import substitution, the BBC Russian Service reported.

You Might Also Like

Ghost of Economy Future
  • December 15, 2024

Ghost of Economy Future

Russian analysts give their forecasts for what the economy might look like in early 2025.
Like this post? Get a weekly email digest + member-only deals

Some of our Books

Faith & Humor
December 01, 2011

Faith & Humor

A book that dares to explore the humanity of priests and pilgrims, saints and sinners, Faith & Humor has been both a runaway bestseller in Russia and the focus of heated controversy – as often happens when a thoughtful writer takes on sacred cows. The stories, aphorisms, anecdotes, dialogues and adventures in this volume comprise an encyclopedia of modern Russian Orthodoxy, and thereby of Russian life.

Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka
November 01, 2012

Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

In this comprehensive, quixotic and addictive book, Edwin Trommelen explores all facets of the Russian obsession with vodka. Peering chiefly through the lenses of history and literature, Trommelen offers up an appropriately complex, rich and bittersweet portrait, based on great respect for Russian culture.

White Magic
June 01, 2021

White Magic

The thirteen tales in this volume – all written by Russian émigrés, writers who fled their native country in the early twentieth century – contain a fair dose of magic and mysticism, of terror and the supernatural. There are Petersburg revenants, grief-stricken avengers, Lithuanian vampires, flying skeletons, murders and duels, and even a ghostly Edgar Allen Poe.

Woe From Wit (bilingual)
June 20, 2017

Woe From Wit (bilingual)

One of the most famous works of Russian literature, the four-act comedy in verse Woe from Wit skewers staid, nineteenth century Russian society, and it positively teems with “winged phrases” that are essential colloquialisms for students of Russian and Russian culture.

The Moscow Eccentric
December 01, 2016

The Moscow Eccentric

Advance reviewers are calling this new translation "a coup" and "a remarkable achievement." This rediscovered gem of a novel by one of Russia's finest writers explores some of the thorniest issues of the early twentieth century.

Jews in Service to the Tsar
October 09, 2011

Jews in Service to the Tsar

Benjamin Disraeli advised, “Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.” With Jews in Service to the Tsar, Lev Berdnikov offers us 28 biographies spanning five centuries of Russian Jewish history, and each portrait opens a new window onto the history of Eastern Europe’s Jews, illuminating dark corners and challenging widely-held conceptions about the role of Jews in Russian history.

About Us

Russian Life is a publication of a 30-year-young, award-winning publishing house that creates a bimonthly magazine, books, maps, and other products for Russophiles the world over.

Latest Posts

Our Contacts

Russian Life
73 Main Street, Suite 402
Montpelier VT 05602

802-223-4955