China-Bound Airlines Now Forced to Route Around Russian Airspace

Russia has retaliated to European bans on flights through their airspace, putting a retaliatory ban of their own on 36 countries. 

The bans include those selected by the Russian Federal Agency for Air Transport. The United Kingdom, a bevy of Eastern European countries, and larger western states like Germany, Spain, Italy, and France all made the list of those banned from operating flights in Russian airspace. flights may apply for a special authorization should they seek passage through Russian airspace. When last week's sanctions left something to be desired by a range of companies and nations around the world, a series of bans on Russian aircraft, airlines, and companies went into effect, leading to a shakeup of flight routes as flight planners moved to accommodate the changes. Bans in the last week began small, like the British/Russian ban that brought relatively small changes to flight paths for UK-India flights. 

The new bans, however, will have a much greater impact on European airlines trying to fly to cities throughout Asia. Skirting around the enormous expanse of Russia will incur far more time, fuel, and cost as airlines now re-route through different, lesser-used, and less equipped airports. Diverting a large quantity of China-bound European flights to airports unaccustomed to the high traffic are bound to create stacking issues in everything from wait times to fuel costs, especially with the compounding uncertainty in gas prices. It remains to be seen how long the sanctions will stay in place, with many moving parts in play as the conflict continues. Whether operators will expect conditions to last long enough to begin investing in expansion for their new routes, or they hold out hoping for a quick solution, only time will tell. 

FMI: http://government.ru/en/