Aeroflot chief executive Sergei Aleksandrovsky has told Russian president Vladimir Putin that the carrier is aiming to capitalise further on new wet-lease rules.
The carrier was quick to take advantage of a change to the Russian Air Code which enabled it to lease Airbus A330s in the domestic market – taking them from leisure carrier Ifly.
But Aleksandrovsky stated, in a meeting with the Russian leader on 7 April, that Aeroflot was “working on the next phase”.
“Amendments are being made that would allow us to take aircraft from the international market under wet-leasing agreements as well,” he says.
“Which means additional fleet and, as a result, better transport accessibility in Russia.”
Aeroflot Group transported 17% more passengers last year, a total of 55 million, exceeding its target of 50 million. This figure included 43 million domestic passengers.
Aleksandrovsky says the domestic carriage indicator was the “most significant in the past decade”. He says that, as a result of network reconfiguration, 60% of the airline’s routes bypass Moscow, simplifying connections between regions.
He highlighted domestic tourism demand, not only to popular destinations such as St Petersburg and Sochi, but also to lessor-known locations like Gorno-Altaysk in south-central Russia – although he points out that the city has “infrastructure-related limitations” and a new airport is planned to allow increased capacity.
Aleksandrovsky also informed Putin of the ‘shuttle’ scheme which the carrier introduced last year.
He says it involves Yakovlev Superjet 100s – which are mostly configured with 100 seats – flying frequent services, a total of some 70 per day. Aeroflot Group has 78 Superjets.
“Among other things, it helped us boost flying hours [with the Superjet] by 50%,” says Aleksandrovsky, adding that the aircraft achieved average loads of 90%.
“This indicates that the product is in very high demand,” he states.
Aeroflot is still facing restrictions from sanctions, but Aleksandrovsky says the company is “making every effort” to develop its international network.
The carrier is operating to 20 countries including seven in Asia, six in the CIS, five in the Middle East and Africa, plus Cuba and Turkey.
Aeroflot recorded a trebling of passenger numbers to China last year, although Aleksandrovsky says: “We are facing intense competition from our Chinese colleagues, which have greater capacities than we do at present. But we are managing to hold our own.”
