Two Siberian airlines have asked the Russian government to extend the service life of Soviet Antonov planes, many of which are more than 50 years old, as Russian aircraft manufacturers try to fill the void left by the departure of foreign manufacturers, Reuters reported.

The small An-24 and An-26 aircraft have propeller engines, can carry up to 50 passengers and are suitable for the difficult weather conditions of Siberia and northern Russia. But the cost of maintaining these more than 50-year-old planes will only rise as Western sanctions on Russia over the war in Ukraine have affected investment and access to spare parts, according to Ariane executives, pilots and analysts consulted by Reuters.

These sanctions, which led to a ban on the supply of new aircraft and parts for aircraft produced by companies such as Boeing and Airbus, caught Russia’s aviation industry by surprise, according to Agerpres.

The Antonov planes make up a small part of Russia’s fleet of more than 1,000 passenger jets, but the request to extend the life of the older planes highlights the challenges Russian planemakers face in keeping up with demand.

“A plane you can rely on, all systems work as they should, no problems. It is very well suited to the conditions of the extreme north, it can withstand temperatures down to minus 55 degrees Celsius,” says the pilot of “Polar Airlines” Konstantin Nazmutdinov.

The An-24 and An-26 aircraft were developed in the 1950s and were produced at the Kyiv factory starting in the 1960s, but no examples have been produced in the last decade. In Yakutia, a region of Russia comparable in size to India and the center of Russia’s diamond industry, planes are crucial.

Almost 100 An-24 and An-26 aircraft remain in service

According to Serhiy Zorin, deputy general director of the Siberian airline “Angara”, about 100 An-24 and An-26 aircraft are still in service, the average age of which is about 50 years. Some of these aircraft are planned to be decommissioned already this year.

“By 2030, a quarter of these aircraft will have to be decommissioned,” Zorin said, without new investment in maintenance and repair. “It is expensive, impossible without state support. Today, we work in a market where there are no alternatives to the An-24 and An-26,” Zorin added.

An official of Russia’s Ministry of Industry and Trade told a parliamentary session in November that they were analyzing a series of proposals by Sergei Zorin, who is also backed by Polar Airlines, so that the Antonov planes could be used before new similar Russian-designed planes are adopted.

Russia’s aviation authority, Rosaviatsia, declined to respond to Reuters’ request for comment.

“Antonov” planes do not need an ordinary runway, they can even land in fields or on snow. Late last year, a plane of this type carrying 30 passengers accidentally landed on a frozen river near an airport in Russia’s far east. There were no casualties.

“An-24 – flying tractor”

“My father said that An-24 is a flying tractor. Fly and fly and fly. You don’t have to be afraid to fly with him, I’ve been doing it for a long time,” said Kostiantyn Semenov, a passenger at Yakutsk airport, about 5,000 kilometers east of Moscow.

However, keeping the old Antonov aircraft in service will soon become an economically unprofitable option, according to Oleg Panteleev, director of the Aviation Analytical Center “Aviaport”.

“Continuing the use of An-24 and An-26 aircraft will inevitably lead to an increase in the price of an hour of flight. It will become more and more expensive to maintain the old fleet in working order,” Panteleev said.

Serhiy Zorin does not expect that serial production of the new Ladoga aircraft, which are in the same class as the old An-24 and An-26, will begin at best before 2027, that is, later than Moscow’s latest plans. Government.

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