Vel, jeg har tidligere her på bloggen skrevet om den UAE A380 som måtte vente over Varangerhalvøa før den fikk fortsette nordover og så østover før den kom inn på kurs mot destinasjonen i Emiratene. Tipper flygerne regnet godt på fuel, men alternativet kunne være å lande i Norge. Ekstremt kostbart. Nå er det russernes egne sivile flygere som klager. (Red.)
A NordStar Boeing 737 passenger jet at Alykel airport
in northern Russia. Photo: Thomas Nilsen
Pilots fear flights will run low on fuel
over sudden airspace closure
Drone attacks north to the Kola
Peninsula have several times in the last few weeks caused aviation authorities
to shut down airspace on immediate notice, forcing civilian passenger planes to
stay on stand-by in circles or fly a long detour.
By
Thomas Nilsen
August 27, 2024
This Monday it happened again.
Both international and domestic airliners were shortly after noon ordered to
stay out of the airspace on central and southeastern Kola Peninsula.
For unknown reasons, the
airspace between the White Sea and the military airfield Olenya became closed.
Olenya is the
military airport south of Murmansk that last week was attacked by
at least one Ukrainian long-distance drone.
As reported by the Barents
Observer, Emirates route from San Francisco to Dubai was forced to circle over
Norway’s Varanger area as Russia suddenly closed the airspace over the Kola
Peninsula last Monday. At the time, the public was not informed about the
ongoing drone attack against Olenya.
Authorities in Murmansk kept
the information secret until a video showing the drone as it was shot
down appeared on social media two days later.
On Monday August 26, another
Emirates flight - this time from Los Angeles to Dubai - entered Russian
airspace from Finnish Lapland, but was soon ordered to change course to avoid
the area closed for traffic, the plane’s path on FlightRadar24 showed.
Now, pilots with Russian
airline Pobeda blow the alarm bell, news outlet Nexta informs on Twitter (X). One of the pilots filed a
complaint with the police, saying the company’s planes are required to fly with
a minimum amount of fuel to save costs.
The pilot says such
restrictions do not take into account that sometimes planes need to avoid
thunderstorms and for that reason flies longer distances than the shortest
route.
A main fear is not being able
to reach the destination before fuel runs out.
Pobeda’s planes, consisting of
a fleet of Boeing 737, are now flying with fuel for just 30 minutes longer than
route plans, Nexta says the pilot informed.
In the event of a drone
attack, fuel will not last for making a second round, according to the pilot’s
warning.
Pobeda is one of several
airliners with daily flights to Murmansk.
When the airspace over the
entire Murmansk region was shut down last Monday, a commercial flight from
Moscow to Apatity was forced to fly in circles over the White Sea as air
defense systems were activated over the Kola Peninsula.
Well aware of the
MH17 flight that was shot down by a Russian supported anti-aircraft
missile over Ukraine in 2014, flight controllers are nowadays fast to order
civilian aircraft to stay out of areas when air-defense systems are
activated.
Russia’s war on Ukraine has
reached the country’s own far northern region of Murmansk.
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