MOSCOW, October 3 – Novosti. One of the two Russian Boeing 737 MAX aircraft (both owned by the S7 airline) flew out of Russia, a company representative told Novosti.
S7 has previously applied to the Russian authorities for permission to return part of the aircraft to foreign lessors. The S7 press service reported that the company plans to return two Boeing 737-8 MAX vessels to the lessor “due to the lack of a type certificate in Russia and, accordingly, the impossibility of its operation.” Transport Minister Vitaly Savelyev noted that a special commission had been set up to determine permits for the export of aircraft. At the end of the summer, it became known that the Russian government allowed S7 to export two Boeing 737 MAX aircraft from the country.
“Flew,” a company spokesperson said in response to a question about the first of two aircraft. When the second plane leaves the country, she did not specify.
S7 was the only operator of this type of aircraft in Russia. Other airlines also had orders, but they did not have time to receive the planes.
Flights of the Boeing 737 MAX were suspended in 2019 in the US and many other countries after two such airliners crashed. In October 2019, a group of international experts identified significant shortcomings in the certification of the aircraft made by the company and the US regulator FAA . In particular, according to experts, important information about the maneuvering correction system (MCAS) was not presented to the FAA in full, and the regulator itself granted excessive authority to Boeing in the certification process.
The United States lifted the ban on the use of the Boeing 737 MAX in November 2020, after which a number of other countries approved the resumption of operation of these aircraft. In early February, the Federal Air Transport Agency reported that the certification of the updated Boeing 737 MAX for flights in Russia continues. However, then new problems arose in Russian aviation: due to Western sanctions, in particular, the supply of foreign aircraft to the country is prohibited.
