Over the past weeks the Russian Airforce suffered a string of accidents at various locations and of various types. The rate of seven crashes in seven weeks are too high in order to point to just bad luck. On Friday the 24th of July the Russian Minister of Defense, Sergei Shoigu, ordered an investigation in order to find the cause of this problem, indicating that a deeper problem might be the cause of these crashes.
Since the beginning of June several crashes have occurred. The following list shows that these accidents are occurring in various regions and involve several different type of planes.
- June 4: Mig-29 fighter crashes in the Astrakhan oblast.
- June 4: SU-34 bomber crashes in the Voronezh oblast. The SU-34 is a new plane, introduced in march 2014.
- June 8: Tu-95 Bear bomber suffers an engine fire.
- July 3: Mig-29 fighter crashes in the Krasnodarsk oblast. All Mig-29 fighters have been grounded until the cause of the accident could be determined.
- July 6: Su-24 bomber crashes in the Khabarovskiy oblast.
- July 14: Tu-95 Bear bomber crashes in the Khabarovsk oblast in the Far East. This crash forces Russia to ground all of its strategic bombers for inspection.
- And recently an Antonov An-12 military transport was reported to have crashed.
It is clear that there is a deeper reason for these crashes to occur and they are not related to a specific aircraft type nor a specific region. We can thus exclude that a design flaw or one bad maintenance center would be the cause. Thus a deeper and more systemic reason will most likely be the cause.
Russia has been stepping up its air force flights and trainings since the crisis in Ukraine. The frequency of flying sorties have been unseen since the Cold War and this puts an higher strain on maintenance of the aircraft and this is where the deeper cause can be found .
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| With the crash of two Tu-95 bombers Russia has cancelled all strategic bomber patrols for inspection |
For years Russia suffers to find skilled technical personnel to perform maintenance. This is not a new phenomenon as even in the Cold War skillful personnel was usually a couple officers and maintenance manuals nothing more than cook books telling how to replace things instead of explaining how something works and how it could be repaired.
This situation is now getting combined with an air force that is made up by aging aircraft that are flying more and more sorties thus putting a heavy strain on the equipment. Maintaining and repairing these aging aircraft becomes more difficult because most spare parts are old as well.
It seems that Russia is having trouble in maintaining its fleet of aging aircraft. The additional strain created by the increase of flying sorties has currently reached a threshold where planes can no longer be maintained and repaired without the guarantee that they fly safety.
Unless Russia decreases the rate of sorties, giving personnel on the ground more time for more extensive maintenance and repair, these kind of accidents will continue to happen and thus further undermine the effectiveness of the Russian Air Force.
