Air Tanzania becomes first airline to suspend flights to Russia after Zelenskyy warning

Air Tanzania has become the first airline to suspend flights to Moscow after Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned that Russia’s skies were no longer safe. The airline said the interruption would be temporary, with flights expected to resume on Monday.

The Tanzanian carrier said on Facebook that it made the decision after a “routine risk assessment of the flight route environment.” Passengers who could not travel because of the suspension were offered free rebooking for another date. Air Tanzania said it would continue monitoring the route and “act accordingly.”

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routine risk assessment of the flight route environment

Zelenskyy announced a campaign to block Russian airspace and warned airlines, insurers and others using major Russian airports that the country’s skies were becoming dangerous. He said Ukraine was not targeting civil aviation itself, but that the number of drones over Russia had to be taken into account. “Russian airspace will in fact be closed: the war unleashed by Russia is closing its skies,” he wrote on Telegram.

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act accordingly

Drone attacks disrupted airport operations in Russia for a third consecutive night. Flightradar24 recorded 21 cancellations and 235 delays at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport on Sept. 2, along with 22 cancellations and 94 delays at Vnukovo. At least 27 international flights to and from Moscow, operated by carriers including Pegasus Airlines, Turkish Airlines and flydubai, were also canceled.

By Sept. 3, restrictions affected all four Moscow airports, as well as airports in Sochi, Gelendzhik, Penza, Saratov, Yaroslavl and Nizhny Novgorod. More than 120 flights were disrupted at Sheremetyevo and Vnukovo. Flightradar24 said four Moscow airports ranked among the five airports with the most severe disruptions worldwide that day.

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Ukraine is not threatening civil aviation as such, or any civilian aircraft. There will simply be so many drones in the Russian sky that this must be taken into account. Although the Russian authorities do not properly inform people about it, Russian airspace will in fact be closed: the war unleashed by Russia is closing its skies.