USA-Russia Flights Coming Soon?
Intro
For the past few years, flights between the USA and Russia have been permanently banned, including multiple foreign carriers (including all US carriers) not being able to use Russian Airspace. Well, I get the feeling that this is soon to change, as relations seem to be on the rise.
I want to say, this is nothing political, just sharing my opinion about the aviation side of things here.
The Details
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs from Russia met with the Director of the Foreign Ministry Department of North America in Istanbul on February 27th, 2025. Well, some details have come out of the meeting and it seems that Russia is asking to restore flights to the USA. In addition, multiple countries closed their airspace to Russian aircraft, in turn causing Russia to reciprocate.
With Russian airspace being closed, this has caused a lot of airlines to pay for extra fuel in order to operate certain routes. Looking at the image above, this specific American Airlines took 16 hours and 55 minutes due to having to go south of Russia. Compared with the Air India flight that does operate through Russian airspace, the AA flight was 1 hour and 51 minutes longer...
My Thoughts
Honestly speaking, if the conflict between Russia and Ukraine comes to an end, I can see this happening without a doubt. I would imagine that within weeks to months, Aeroflot will be offering daily flights again to many destinations in the US. In addition, I could see United Airlines re-launching Newark to Moscow as well.
Now, once again, I am not saying this politically. I am offering my opinion on the aviation side of things...
Final Thoughts
Sources have spread some light that initial talks have been started about Russia-USA flights resuming. While this might be a decent way off, I could see this happening sometime in the future (sooner rather than later). Without discussing politics, what do you think?
Comments