aeroflot Trying to Stay Afloat at the Cost of Passenger Safety and Comfort

russia’s leading airline, aeroflot, will increase the number of economy-class seats on its aircraft by reducing the number of seats in business-class cabins. According to the plan, this will allow the airline to carry up to 230,000 additional passengers per year.

The “modernization” will affect 22 Boeing 737-800 and 7 Airbus A320 aircraft. According to engineers’ calculations, after this modification, “the increase in seating capacity for aeroflot’s narrow-body fleet will amount to 214 seats”.

This situation has arisen due to international anti-russian sanctions, which have completely blocked the supply to russia of new modern civilian aircraft, spare parts for them, as well as their servicing and modernization. Airlines are forced to ground aircraft and even dismantle them for spare parts. To date, the majority of passenger aircraft in the russian civilian fleet are Western-made. According to the most optimistic forecasts by” rosaviatsiya”’s head dmitry yadrov, by 2030, approximately 109 foreign aircraft will be taken out of service in russia.

The increase in seating capacity on russian commercial aircraft at the cost of passenger comfort, is taking place against the background of the already announced rise in airfare prices in the rf this year. So far, the talk is of a 10–15% increase, but the forecasts for the end of the year are bleak. The country, acting as a filling station, conveniently forgets about its own citizens when it comes to filling the state budget for the war against Ukraine.