Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the European Union has slapped an embargo on Russian jets in retaliation. Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission’s vice president for external relations, announced the step earlier: “We are closing off EU airspace to aircraft that are owned, registered, or controlled by Russia.”
All such flights, including the private jets of the super-rich, will be unable to land in, take off from, or fly over any European Union country from now until further notice. Over the weekend, the United Kingdom announced a similar action.
Aeroflot, the Russian flag airline, has announced that it would stop all flights to European destinations until further notice, while competitor S7 Airlines has said that it will cancel all flights to European destinations until at least March 13th. Several European nations have already begun restricting their airspace in preparation for the decision to close their airspace.
Germany said that the ban will be in effect for three months. Due to the invasion, commercial planes have also begun to avoid the airspace above the countries of Ukraine, Moldova, and Belarus.
Delta Air Lines, based in the United States, said that it will discontinue its flight booking relationship with Aeroflot.
Avoiding Russia would add between 15 minutes and an hour to Virgin Atlantic’s flights between the United Kingdom and India and Pakistan, the airline claimed.
Qantas, the Australian airline, has announced that it would take a longer route between Darwin and London in order to avoid flying over Russia. Canada also said on Sunday that it will prohibit Russian planes from entering its airspace starting immediately.
