U.S. Warns Staffers to Stay Off Russian Planes

Citing concerns over falling safety standards that have made Russia statistically one of the world's most dangerous places to fly, the State Department has instructed United States government employees to avoid flying domestic airlines here.


"We are essentially instructed to avoid routine travel within Russia except on a case-by-case basis," said a U.S. Embassy spokesman who asked not to be named. "Where alternate transport is feasible, they'll be taking alternate transport."


The new guidelines are another in a series of blows to Russian aviation, which has suffered a spate of bad publicity this year in the wake of two major passenger jet crashes. In April, the International Airlines Passengers' Association responded by advising travelers to avoid flying anywhere in the former Soviet Union.


"It is offensive to hear this," Yury Tarshin, head of flight operations at the Transport Ministry, said after learning of the new U.S. government policy. "It is an insult to our professional abilities."


Boris Rybak, Moscow correspondent for the U.S magazine Aviation Week and Space Technology, said the policy seemed misguided because it did not differentiate between the different domestic airlines.


"It's not right to put them all together because they are different," Rybak said. "I know dozens of local routes where you can fly without worries."


The decision was made by career diplomat Ambassador Thomas Pickering, an experienced helicopter and plane passenger who has not previously exhibited a fear of flying, U.S. officials said. They said the decision was not in response to any individual incident such as the March Aeroflot Airbus disaster that killed 75, but was based on a pattern of poor safety.


"Our ambassador has explained to the highest levels of this government several times that he is very concerned about the situation in aviation safety here," said Dennis Cooper, the local Federal Aviation Administration representative.


In its latest consular information sheet on Russia released last week, the U.S. State Department also warns private citizens about domestic aviation standards in blunt language.


"With the breakup of Aeroflot into many small airlines, travel within Russia is often unreliable," the document reads. "Domestic air travelers must often cope with unpredictable schedules and difficult conditions, including deterioration of centralized systems of maintenance, quality of service and overloading."


It remains uncertain how the policy will actually affect official U.S. travel in a country where regional airlines still hold monopolies on most local routes and long-haul trains can take days. The journey between Moscow and Vladivostok in the Far East, for example, takes eight hours by plane or a week on the train.


"There may be instances where it would be practical to fly out to another country and then fly back in when international connections are available," the U.S. Embassy spokesman said.


At the same time that the United States is cutting back on official travel, it is getting ready to launch an "unprecedented" joint effort to assist Russian aviation safety, Cooper of the FAA said. In late August, a delegation of top FAA experts will travel across Russia to study safety standards, regulation practices, and other aviation issues. The team will prepare a report and submit it to the Russian transport minister this fall, Cooper said.