On May 23, at the working meeting at the State Council of the Republic of Komi, where the issues of air transport service to the population were discussed, the Director General of Komiaviatrans airlines, Yuri Skripin, announced that the carrier would stop using L-410 turboprop planes.
He said that the company has managed to improve its financial situation, stabilize its debt load, and increase revenues. “A significant role in this was played by a subsidy from the regional budget of 1 billion 800 million rubles, the allocation of which was approved by deputies at the end of 2021. In addition, the company is optimizing its staff: reducing administrative staff and recruiting pilots and technical specialists,” said the head of the airline.
According to him, traffic on domestic routes has increased – the airline carried 27,000 passengers on L-410 and An-24 aircraft in 2022.
“However, this year the use of L-410s had to be abandoned due to sanctions and a shortage of spare parts. “Komiaviatrans is looking for alternative ways to supply, and is also negotiating with the Ural Civil Aviation Plant to localize production,” said Yuri Skripin.
He explained that since March 2023, due to the general geopolitical situation and sanctioning pressure, the company was unable to ensure the airworthiness of L-410 aircraft to the full extent; as a result, flights with these aircraft were initially limited, and in April they were actually halted. Leasing for two of the four planes is almost over, with another L-410 taking over from Komiaviatrans in a month, and the last one in a year.
“We are interested in putting them on the wing, they could provide our intermunicipal transportation in full, except for Vorkuta. We are looking for various options for L-410, first of all we need money, and there are problems with spare parts. Suppliers do not work directly with the factory in the Czech Republic, we are trying to find workarounds,” IA BNA quoted Yuriy Skripin as saying.
Vladimir Kotov, deputy minister of economic development and industry of Komi Republic, explained that in the mid-term perspective it is planned to use domestically produced aircrafts. The republic is also in the process of selling Embraer aircraft, but it too has been hampered by sanctions.
In August 2020, Vladimir Uiba, the acting head of Komi, announced that the Brazilian Embraer ERJ 145 had driven the Komi Airline company into bankruptcy, and they would be replaced by domestically produced An-24s.
According to the Federal Air Transport Agency, the airline has one L-410 UVP-E20, two An-24RV, three Mi-8MTV-1, and 11 Mi-8T. The republic acquired the first three L-410 aircraft on lease in 2013 and another one in 2014. The cost of each was $6 million. By 2022, only one aircraft remained airworthy.
