One of the oddest aviation stories of recent times is a Russian Aeroflot jet that has been left unused since its first day of the war in Ukraine  and it's buried at Geneva Airport. It never flew, was not maintained, and according to most reports, rats have taken up residence in it and it is slowly crumbling. But, somehow, someone is still paying the parking bill each and every month.

A Flight That Never Made It Home

The story goes back only to the invasion of Ukraine by Russia on February 27, 2022, three days after its invasion of Ukraine. That afternoon, an Aeroflot Airbus A321, with registration VP-BOE, had just landed in Geneva from Moscow with a straight shot back to home base in mind. It was just a normal trip, nothing out of the ordinary  until it wasn't.

On the ground, things were changing in real time as the aircraft taxied towards the runway for the return flight. Even before this particular plane made it to the runway, the Swiss airspace had been closed to Russian carriers, followed by others in Europe. The flight crew was forced to return to the gate of the plane. The flight was cancelled, and it happened to be a permanent cancellation!

Literally Frozen in Time

But the fact that the plane got stuck isn't particularly unusual; there were many Russian planes that were stuck abroad in the early days of the war. It's just that this particular jet has been kind of frozen in place for over 4 years now, just as it was that February afternoon.

The plane is said to have full fuel tanks, which have not yet been used. Apparently, there's food left over from that first flight in the galley, and it's been in an unventilated, unmaintained aircraft for more than four years. It's hardly surprising, then, that it's widely believed that a rat infestation developed somewhere along the way.

But the physical state of the aircraft is far from the unpleasant smell. Reportedly, cracks are starting to appear on the airframe, the plane's protective covers for the engines were never installed and there are reports of electrical system problems. Simply put, this is no time to fly this jet and it will take so much work to bring it back to an air worthy state that it is not financially beneficial.

The aircraft has been moved once only since it was left at Geneva Airport. Ground crews were forced to tow it out of its spot back in June 2022, to make way for the Swiss Air Force at a United Nations conference. Other than that one move, there hasn't been a lot of activity around the plane in the years since it was moved.

An artist is still paying to keep it there

Perhaps the most baffling aspect of this whole story is that the fees to park the planes are still being paid on a monthly basis. The costs of the bill are approximately 30,000 Swiss francs a month, or approximately $36,540 a month. If the payments have been made continuously since the aircraft's arrival, the total cost of parking this no longer useful aircraft at Geneva Airport would run into the millions of dollars already.

Why did the particular plane get trapped?

Most of the Russian planes which were forced to land abroad during the first days of the war were eventually cleared up in some way. Many of Aeroflot's planes and Russian airlines in general belonged to western leasing companies and could be seized by the leasing companies when the sanctions came into effect. Several of those planes ended up for other companies.

However, this particular A321 was in a much more specific and complex category:

• Unlike most Aeroflot jets, leased through true independent Western companies, the aircraft was leased to an Irish subsidiary of Russian leasing company GTLK.
• This financial assistance for Russia finally led to the liquidation of that Irish subsidiary, and the ownership of that aircraft came into some legal limbo.

Current sanctions explicitly foresee the prohibition of the sale, export, maintenance or overhaul of aircraft if it would serve Russian interests," said the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs of Switzerland. Russian owned planes are barred from even leaving Swiss airspace, on top of that. The only situation in which the plane could lawfully be moved is if it begins to pose a real safety or environmental risk  which could be not far down the road, given its deteriorating state.

All of this is so sad. The very sanctions imposed to keep the plane on the ground have been in effect long enough that the plane is in a state of decay such that it would be unlikely to even be able to fly if all sanctions were removed tomorrow. Eventually, it may be the only viable option to simply take the jet out for scrap.

This aircraft is a case of very bad timing in many ways. It was owned not by a neutral western lessee but by an internal Russian structure with direct Russian connections, it happened to be on the ground at the moment the establishment of sanctions, and it was only just a few minutes too late to get out of the Swiss airspace as country after country shut down their skies to Russian carriers.

The Bottom Line

This Aeroflot A321 is a strange and expensive relic of the early days of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, more than four years on. However, this jet's relationship with one of the sanctioned Russian aircraft leasing firms has consigned it to a legal limbo with the straight ban on its departure from Swiss airspace and, quite simply, too much decrepit to run even in the hands of the owner. As cracks are appearing, systems are failing and rats are taking up residence in the cabin, the only feasible solution remaining might be to completely tear the plane down! It's up to speculation if that will be in the near future or if it will be for years more.