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Engines for Russia's new Superjet-100 airliner have failed to receive certification as they have several significant flaws, a business daily said on Tuesday. The Superjet-100 project is a family of medium-haul passenger aircraft developed by the Sukhoi aircraft maker in cooperation with the US and European aviation corporations, including Boeing, Snecma, Thales, Messier Dowty, Liebherr Aerospace and Honeywell. Russian deputy industry and trade minister Denis Manturov, who heads the commission to monitor Superjet's production, prepared a report unveiling the current problems and obstacles in the way of certification, the paper said.

Russia's much-anticipated regional passenger aircraft, the Sukhoi Superjet, should be given flight certification by the summer, officials reportedly said Wednesday. The Superjet, produced by Russian airline maker Sukhoi in association with Italy's Alenia Aeronautica, has been widely seen as Russia's chance to gain a competitive foothold in the international passenger airline market. The jet, which seats 75 to 95 people, has a range of about 4,000 kilometers (2,500 miles) and is priced at $29 million a piece. Superjet is designed compete against other regional craft such as the Embraer E-Jets and the Bombardier CRJ program. Locally, it will replace Russia's...

An Aeroflot Airbus A330-200, registration VQ-BBF performing flight SU-334 (dep Oct 7th) from Havana (Cuba) to Moscow Sheremetyevo (Russia), was enroute overhead the Atlantic at FL350 about 320nm southeast of New York, when the crew talking very good English reported a passenger (German citizen) had become sick and requested to divert to New York's JFK Airport, but changed their diversion destination to Toronto,ON (Canada) just before reaching the top of descent into JFK about 120nm southeast of JFK. The airplane landed safely on Toronto's runway 24R about 2.5 hours after the first decision to divert and about 4.5 hours after...

Aeroflot, the Russian airline that evokes images of terrible food, rickety planes and indifferent service, has announced it will renew its fleet in an attempt to drag the brand into the 21st Century. But along with the goals of improving service and safety comes one that could offend some passengers. The airline plans to make its female flight attendants more attractive. Vitaly Savelyev, the company's new CEO, said all new stewardesses would be "very striking, very eye-catching girls", who would not exceed Russian size 48 – roughly a British size 12, the Independent reports. The airline also announced a change...

Passengers complained about the pilot of a Russian Boeing 737-500 being drunk before it crashed in the Urals killing 88 people, air investigators confirmed yesterday. One woman even sent a text message to a friend in Britain shortly before take-off of the Aeroflot-Nord service from Moscow to Perm, saying: 'The voice of our captain - he sounds like a completely drunk man.' As alarming, it was revealed in the official crash report that the pilots lacked the adequate training on the Boeing aircraft, with the co-pilot Rustam Allaberdin not speaking any English and being unable to read the plane's manual....

Indonesia Update In a South Jakarta courtroom this week, a Singaporean terror suspect admitted that he was part of a plot to hijack an Aeroflot aircraft from Bangkok and crash it into Singapore’s Changi International Airport. Mohammad Hasan bin Sayanudin, alias Fajar Taslim, was testifying against two other terrorist suspects. All three are charged with killing a Christian high school teacher in South Sumatra province during 2007. They are also charged with plotting to kill two Catholic priests in 2005 and to carry out a bombing of a café in West Sumatra. According to Sayanudin, those who were part of...

The passengers of Aeroflot Flight 315, a packed Boeing 767 out of Moscow for New York's JFK Dec. 28, staged a coup, demanding that a pilot be removed from the flight after hearing his severely slurred preflight announcement. Reports state that the 55-year-old captain's words, spoken in Russian, were barely intelligible and became worse when he switched to English. Some passengers claimed they couldn't tell what language he was speaking. Passengers who relayed their concerns to cabin crew were at first rebuffed and told to sit quietly or deplane. But passenger concern spread and ultimately Aeroflot representatives came aboard the...

Passengers who suspected their pilot was intoxicated were astonished to be told by the airline that 'it's not such a big deal' to be drunk and in charge of a plane. The incident began as Captain Alexander Cheplevsky started his pre-flight welcome message while Aeroflot Flight 315 from Moscow to New York prepared for take-off. The passengers - who included a reporter for the Moscow Times and reality TV show host Ksenia Sobchak - were shocked that the pilot was barely intelligible in his native Russian and completely indecipherable when he switched to English.

A passenger plane has crashed near the central Russian city of Perm, Russian emergency officials say. The Boeing-737 was en route from Moscow and had 88 passengers and crew on board. All are feared dead. Communications with the plane were lost as it was making a landing approach, officials say. The wreckage was later found outside Perm, which is located in the Urals. Rescuers are at the site. The cause of the crash is not known. The plane burst into flames upon impact, officials say. "According to the latest information, the airplane fell into a ravine near the city limits,"...

A court on Tuesday issued a new arrest warrant for exiled tycoon and Kremlin critic Boris Berezovsky, a move likely to increase tensions between Moscow and London over Britain's refusal to extradite him. The Basmanny District Court issued the warrant on charges that Berezovsky stole some $13 million from the SBS-Agro banking giant. The previously unknown case surfaced late last month. Berezovsky already is on trial in absentia for allegedly embezzling millions of dollars from the Russian flagship airline Aeroflot.

Russian state-controlled airline Aeroflot signed a landmark deal with US jetmaker Boeing on Saturday to buy 22 Boeing 787 Dreamliner jets. Aeroflot CEO Valery Okulov said the price of the contract was a “commercial secret,” though the list price of the planes puts the value of the contract at over three billion dollars (2.2 billion euros). The long-awaited agreement was a breakthrough for Boeing, which neared a deal on the sale in 2006 before tensions between Washington and Moscow appeared to scupper it. It was not a snub to Boeing’s European rival Airbus, however, as Aeroflot intends to formalise an...

MOSCOW - OAO Aeroflot, eastern Europe's largest airline, plans to buy 22 Airbus SAS A350 XWB planes valued at $4.4 billion to renew and expand its fleet, picking jets from the European planemaker over Boeing Co.'s 787 Dreamliner. State-controlled Aeroflot plans to sign a firm order in the next few weeks, Deputy Chief Executive Officer Lev Koshlyakov said today. The $4.4 billion figure is based on list prices. The A350 XWB is Airbus' sixth attempt to come up with a rival to Boeing's 787. Airbus' difficulties in developing a competing model has put the plane five years behind the 787...

MOSCOW -- Talks on a multibillion-dollar deal for Russian state flag carrier Aeroflot to buy 22 Boeing 787s are on hold, and frosty relations between Russia and the U.S. could be to blame, a Russian airline official said Thursday. ... Copyright © 2007, Chicago Tribune

Boeing has lost a huge potential order from Russian state-owned airline Aeroflot for 22 787 Dreamliners, company sources said. The deal was all but sealed last June, requiring only the approval of the Russian government. Worth $3.2 billion at list prices, it would have been about $2.2 billion with standard discounts as estimated by aircraft-valuation firm Avitas. But steadily worsening political relations between the U.S. and Russia have killed it and given Airbus a big, though still-unannounced, win for its A350 rival to the 787. In an August interview, Sergei Koltovich, Aeroflot's head of fleet planning, said "both Boeing and...

LONDON/MOSCOW, May 8 (Reuters) - Russian airline Aeroflot's (AFLT.RTS: Quote, Profile, Research) decision to delay a $3 billion plane order amid chilled U.S.-Russian relations has sparked speculation it will pick Europe's Airbus (EAD.PA: Quote, Profile, Research) over U.S. rival Boeing Co. (BA.N: Quote, Profile, Research). U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney criticised Moscow's commitment to democracy and its policy on energy reserves last week, adding to friction caused by Washington's tough stance on Russia's bid to enter the World Trade Organisation (WTO). The 51-percent government owned airline is set to retaliate by deciding to buy 22 of the Airbus A350 model...

Aeroflot BOD focused January 31 on the strategic program for the aircraft fleet that extends up to 2010. According to the program, the planes constructed in time of the former Soviet Union will be ultimately withdrawn from the operation and U.S. Boeing 787 Dreamliner has been chosen as the number one long-distance plane of Aeroflot. Actually, the package offer made by Boeing to Aeroflot provides for delivery of MD-11 freight carries along with Boeing 787. Aeroflot needs MD-11 to replace the DC10-40F currently available in its fleet. Although no details of the deal have been officially disclosed so far,...

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Flagship Russian carrier Aeroflot, which tendered for long-haul aircraft in July, wants to buy 22 Boeing planes worth more than $2.5 billion, business dailies Kommersant and Vedomosti reported Tuesday. Kommersant quoted sources at the airline as saying a contract could be signed in March. It said Aeroflot had recently amended the tender and could buy as many as 28 aircraft instead of 22. Vedomosti quoted Aeroflot sources as saying the company had decided in favor of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft.

FOR years it was a symbol of the cold, grey face Russia showed to the outside world, with cramped planes, a terrible safety record and frowning stewardesses.But now the Russian airline Aeroflot insists it has changed its spots - with a little help from a British PR firm. In a makeover of ambitious proportions, the airline has spruced up its planes, service and reliability, and insists the old service-with-a-scowl is a thing of the past. The task was not an easy one. Until now, Aeroflot has had a well-deserved reputation as a Communist-era theme park with clunky planes that nobody...

MOSCOW - Drunken passengers often give air crews trouble, but Russia's leading airline on Tuesday reported an "unprecedented" reversal: A passenger was assaulted by intoxicated flight attendants. Two crew members on a domestic Aeroflot flight beat up a passenger who had complained that the flight attendants were drunk, airline spokeswoman Irina Dannenberg said. The passenger, identified only as A. Chernopup, was aboard a recent flight from Moscow to the Siberian city of Nizhnevartovsk, Dannenberg said. She said the crew belonged to another airline, Aviaenergo. Seeing that the crew were intoxicated and were not fulfilling their duties, Chernopup asked to be...

Controller Linked To Crash Murdered... Random Act Or Revenge... On Tuesday, an air traffic controller who worked for Skyguide, the Swiss airspace agency, was stabbed to death in his home in Kloten, near Zurich. The victim had been the sole controller on duty in July 2002 when two airplanes collided in Swiss airspace over Lake Constance, killing 71 people, many of them Russian schoolchildren. He was a 36-year-old Danish citizen, a father of three, and was never publicly identified in connection with the crash. Police said a dark-haired man in his 50s rang the doorbell at the controller's home....