What is the cause of numerous tragedies? How and why do many of our aviators die far from their homeland, in remote, godforsaken corners of the planet? According to Russian specialists, the matter is that more and more people from CIS countries are forced to work in third-world countries under conditions that do not meet basic safety requirements.
In the “aviation cover”
Historically, Africa and Asia became the zone of our aviation interests. The USSR leadership sought to direct the countries of these very regions along the Marxist-Leninist path of development. Pro-Soviet regimes received technical assistance from Moscow, including airplanes and helicopters. This is how long-term ties were established. The country that received products of the domestic aviation industry found itself dependent on the supplier: spare parts, maintenance, crews, ground equipment and communication facilities – all came from the USSR. Moreover, the penetration scheme was roughly the same: first combat aircraft, then dual-purpose aviation, then civil aviation.
In 1991, the Soviet Union collapsed, the CPSU ceased to exist, and the socialist path of development finally went out of fashion. However, the aircraft supplied to former Soviet satellites remained. Someone had to fly them. And into this niche rushed... No, not Western specialists: switching from a Boeing to a Tu is not so easy! Guest-worker pilots from the former USSR countries, primarily from Russia and Ukraine, flocked to Africa and Asia. Especially since they often could not find work at home.
“If before 1991 the flight personnel of the Soviet air fleet numbered 69,000 people, then after the collapse of the USSR it shrank to 19,000,” says Miroslav Boychuk, president of the Russian Flight Crew Union. “The reason is the decline in air traffic. Therefore, most pilots found themselves, in professional terms, in the ‘aviation cover,’ that is, without flights and, accordingly, without means of subsistence.”
Supply and demand met. But the work front for the “Russians” (as people from the former USSR are called around the world) turned out to be specific. The fact is that most of the cargo flows, for example in African countries, are served by national carriers, while large world-famous companies handle passenger traffic.
Our pilots, as a rule, get the hardest, most thankless and most dangerous work, which even locals do not always agree to. This is the so-called force-majeure segment of the market. This, by the way, was also facilitated by the unpretentiousness of our compatriots both in everyday life and in financial matters (compared to Western pilots), their readiness to work sometimes in combat conditions.
Caught in the Net
You can get a job in Africa or Asia as early as tomorrow. An “Itogi” correspondent easily found an online advertisement for a vacancy for an aircraft commander on an An-26 aircraft at a Ukrainian airline operating in the UAE, and decided to offer himself as such a specialist.
“Our airline signs a contract with you for flights to Bangladesh,” said the HR manager, who introduced himself as Yuri. “We lease the aircraft and crew to the company you will be working for.” Under the terms of the contract, if you are hired, the customer pays for a one-way ticket from Moscow to the place of work, accommodation in a hotel of no lower than “three-star” category or a rented apartment.
Daily expenses are $15. The contract is usually concluded for a period of six months. The customer guarantees 60 flight hours per month, payment of $25 per hour in cash. On average, a monthly salary can range from $1,700 to $2,500, depending on workload and qualifications. The applicant must have copies of a passport and birth certificate, as well as a medical expert commission’s conclusion. When asked what would need to be transported, Yuri replied: consumer goods within the country. He also assured that the equipment was in good condition. But, as experience shows, both may turn out to be false...
Pilots often find work abroad through word of mouth, that is, they learn about vacancies from acquaintances and, at their own risk, set off to conquer unknown countries. This is exactly how aircraft commander Sergei Kurakov, who served for a long time in the Samara region flight squadron, found a job. Once, at one of the terminals in Ukraine, a technician approached his crew and offered work on an An-12 in Sudan. When Sergei was laid off from his native air squadron, he remembered that technician.
“The risk, of course, was there,” says Sergei Kurakov. “We got our foreign passports and visas ourselves, and bought tickets to Sudan with our own money... We flew to Khartoum, found the office of the cargo company, went to the management, having armed ourselves in advance with various documents certifying professional competence. ‘Guys, do you know how to fly an An-12?’ the manager asked us in poor English. ‘We do.’ ‘Well, then you’ll fly tomorrow.’”
“And our ordeals began across all the African dumps,” says Sergei Kurakov. “We had to live almost in dugouts, we ate half-starved. All crew members contracted malaria several times. But we flew constantly. True, in force-majeure conditions.”
To be continued.
Dmitry Serkov,
Igor Nadezhdin.