Massive Antonov An-124 cargo plane impounded by Canada to be given to Ukraine.

A massive Antanov An-124 Volga Dnepr cargo plane that had been confiscated by Canadian authorities in February 2022 a few days after Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine will now be given to Ukraine, according to local sources.

The massive jet, registration RA-82078 arrived on 27th February, just four days after Russia's invasion started and the same day Canadian airspace was closed to all Russian-operated aircraft.  This meant the big An-124 had been grounded at Toronto Pearson Airport ever since.

The aircraft will now be given to Ukraine after a legal ruling by Ukrainian Courts that Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency illegally approved air-worthiness certifications for all twelve of the Antonov An-124s in the Volga Dnepr fleet.  

The matter was discussed during a meeting on 11th April 2023 between the Prime Ministers of both nations, Denys Shmyhal and Justin Trudeau which helped facilitate the transfer. 

Since the start of the conflict, Antonov Airlines has operated an active fleet of five An-124-100 aircraft which it rehomed at Leipzig - Halle Airport in Germany. It is understood RA-82078 will be transferred to the fleet within the next two months. 

According to reports,  three other Volga-Dnepr An-124 aircraft, registrations RA-82043, RA-82045 and RA-82046 are impounded in Germany and their fate is unclear although it is unlikely they will return to the skies this year.

Antonov Airlines AN-124-100-150M transports gas turbine to UK.

Photo Antonov Airlines

Antonov Airlines transported a gas turbine rotor from Abu Dhabi to the United Kingdom. The short-notice airfreight was required to secure much-needed power generation capacity in readiness for winter.

An external crane in conjunction with the onboard crane and winch of the AN-124-100-150M was used to load and unload the rotor in special frame, as well as loading equipment designed and manufactured by Antonov’s in-house engineers.

Antonov Airlines specializes in the transportation of outsized and project cargo worldwide using its fleet of seven AN-124-100s, two of them with up to 150 tonnes payload, its 60-tonne payload AN-22, and its unique 250-tonne payload AN-225, which is the largest aircraft in the world.

More than 30 years after launching as the first company to offer the AN-124 commercially, Antonov Airlines continues to deliver air cargo solutions across the aerospace, defence, energy, humanitarian, industrial, automotive, and oil and gas sectors.

Antonov Airlines is a division of the ANTONOV Company, headquartered in Kyiv, Ukraine, and a Ukrainian state-owned enterprise, which designs, develops, produces, and maintains the AN aircraft.

Cargo plane carrying weapons crashes in Greece

Photo ertnews.gr 

Residents within a two-mile radius of an aircraft crash in Greece have been told to stay indoors because of the weapons the cargo jet was carrying at the time of the disaster.

The Antonov AN-12  belonging to Meridian, one of the first private cargo airlines in Ukrainian, founded in 2003, was transporting nearly 11 tonnes of weapons made in Serbian to Bangladesh according to Serbian officials.   

The aircraft had been due to make technical stops in Jordan, Saudi Arabia and India before arriving at its final stop in Dhaka. It is understood that all eight of the crew on board the aircraft died in the crash.

Lieutenant General Marios Apostolidis, of the Northern Greece Fire Service, told local media, "The measurements at the moment have not shown anything but nonetheless instability in the field was observed. - In other words, intense smoke and heat, as well as a white substance that we do not recognise, so a special armed forces team has to inform us what it is and whether we can enter the field."

Drones were used to survey the sense on Sunday morning and members of the Greek Atomic Energy Commission, Army and various explosives experts were ready to investigate when the site is considered safe to enter.  

Thanks to ertnews.gr 

Large aviation casualty of war....

The Ukrainian-made giant Antonov-225 Mriya has been destroyed in a Russian attack on Hostomel airport near the capital, Kyiv.,  the Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba confirmed the news on social media on Sunday, "Russia may have destroyed our 'Mriya'. But they will never be able to destroy our dream of a strong, free and democratic European state."

This was the world’s largest aircraft, AN-225 ‘Mriya’ (‘Dream’ in Ukrainian). Russia may have destroyed our ‘Mriya’. But they will never be able to destroy our dream of a strong, free and democratic European state. We shall prevail! pic.twitter.com/TdnBFlj3N8

— Dmytro Kuleba (@DmytroKuleba) February 27, 2022

Follow this site here.

Great new video of ANTONOV Airlines AN-124-100 arrives to Rzeszow/ AN-225/ Offloading

Drone filming by Robert Neumann. AN-124 arriving while AN-225 is being offloaded and taxing. Thanks for the beautiful filming to Marcin Tutaj and Robert Numann.

More top stories you might be interested in.....

Follow this site here.

Antonov Airline’s AN-225 Mriya back in business......

Antonov Airline’s AN-225 Mriya has returned to the commercial market by safely transporting equipment from the Middle East to the United Kingdom, supporting a withdrawal in NATO presence from the region.

⠀

The total weight of the cargo was 23 tons, with some outsize pieces included. The An-225 was the only solution that could uplift all of the cargo in a single-aircraft solution, chartered by Air Partner.

⠀

The AN225 Mriya – the only one in the world – has cargo capacity up to 250 tonnes, cargo cabin dimensions of 43.3 m long x 6.4 m wide x 4.4 m high and is available for projects worldwide.

⠀

More top stories you might be interested in.....

Follow this site here.

ANTONOV Airlines transporting Oxygen Concentrators to India.

ANTONOV Airlines has safely transported 70 tonnes of oxygen concentrators from Tel Aviv, Israel to Delhi, India.

The 2,500 concentrators were loaded on board of AN-124-100 for urgent transporting within a short time frame.

The airline specialises in the transport of outsized and project cargo worldwide using its fleet of seven AN-124s with up to 150 tonnes payload, its 60-tonne payload AN-22, and its unique 250-tonne payload AN-225, which is the largest aircraft in the world.

More than 30 years after launching as the first company to offer the AN-124 commercially, ANTONOV Airlines continues to deliver air cargo solutions across the aerospace, defence, energy, humanitarian, industrial, automotive, and oil and gas sectors.

ANTONOV Airlines is a division of ANTONOV Company, headquartered in Kyiv, Ukraine, and a Ukrainian state-owned enterprise, which designs, develops, produces, and maintains the AN aircraft.

Follow this site here.

Volga-Dnepr Airlines returns AN-124-100 to service following recent crash.

Photo Volga-Dnepr Group

The heavy and odd-shaped cargo specialist freight carrier Volga-Dnepr Airlines has confirmed the restart of flying operations of the Antonov An-124-100 commercial operations following a crash in November grounded the fleet.

The first plane ready after the completion of technical checks and execution of service directives to a full extent was RA-82077 completing a flight from Leipzig to Shanghai on 26th December.  

The airline suspended operations after the incident on the 13th of November 2020 which saw one of the fleet suffer an uncontained engine fan disk failure of series D-18T shortly after take-off. The failure resulted in engine failure and the loss of control systems. The bulk carrier was carrying 84 tons of cargo with full fuel tanks at the time of the incident. Despite suffering engine failure and loss of control elements, the crew still managed to avert a major disaster by making a 180-degree turn, land the aircraft, managing to keep the aircraft on the runway before skidding off the end of the runway.

Pilot error blamed for Saratov Airlines An148 Crash

Russian investigators have published the final report on the February 2018 Saratov Airlines Antonov AN148 crash near Moscow, killing all sixty-five passengers and six crew onboard.

The investigators have said the pilots of the doomed aircraft forgot to switch on the heaters for the airspeed probes and this lead to excessive icing to the probe after taking off and during the initial climb. This, in turn, meant that probe wasn't working properly, giving the flight deck crew wrong airspeed readings, lower than the actual speed the aircraft was going. To increase the speed, the pilots initiated an urgent descent and because the visibility was low, the aircraft crashed into the ground in a steep dive.

Saratov Airlines An-148 crashes near Moscow

A Saratov Airlines Antonov An-148 has crashed shortly after departing from Moscow's Domodedovo airport, carrying 65 passengers and 6, there are no survivors. The flight departed at 14.27 local time on Sunday and contact was lost just four minutes into the flight. According to flight tracking the aircraft descended rapidly, at 1000m per minute.


The Saratov Airlines jet disappeared from radar minutes after take-off and crashed near the village of Argunovo, which is approximately 50 miles south-east of Moscow. The Antonov An-148 was en route to the city of Orsk in the Ural mountains.

Pieces of debris, wreckage and bodies were found spread over a large area and at least one of the flight data recorders had been found according to officials at the scene. 

The cause of the disaster is unclear at this stage and investigators and emergency crews are working at the snow-covered site. The snowy weather, mechanical failure, pilot error as well as other more sinister causes are all being considered at this stage of the investigation.

 President Vladimir Putin has expressed his condolences to the victims' families and announced an inquiry into the cause of the crash.

Saratov Airlines comes from, approximately 840km south-east of Moscow and it t was banned from operating international flights in 2015 after a surprise inspection found someone other than the flight crew was in the cockpit.

The airline changed its policy on cockpit visits and appeal the ban before resuming international charter flights during 2016.  The airline mainly operates domestic services between Russian cities, however, it has flown to destinations in Armenia and Georgia.

❗This article was written for this site by a member of our team 🙋, please do share it with your friends via social media. You are also welcome to post it or republish elsewhere on the 🌎web on the condition that you credit the author and link back to our site. Thank you.

 ♻ We care about the environment, please think twice before you hit ‘print’