Is A Plan To Restore Airport And Airline Operations In Ukraine Viable?

The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has essentially closed airspace over Ukraine to commercial flights and devastated commercial air transport activity. Perhaps optimistically, Ukraine is starting to plan for a return of airline operations. But that will require massive investment in repairing airports and runways badly damaged or destroyed by the war.

The Ukraine government and its key airports are therefore appealing to the European Union (EU) and other partners for financial support, with a view to partially reopening Ukraine airspace to commercial flights by early 2025 under the most optimistic scenario.

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Before February 2022, Ukraine had 28 certified and 14 operational airports. Six handled 98% of all Ukrainian air traffic, namely Kyiv-Boryspil (KBP), Lviv (LWO), Odesa (ODS), Kyiv Zhuliany (IEV), Kharkiv (HRK) and Zaporizhzhia (OZH).

“Some of them are destroyed,” Ukraine deputy finance minister Alexander Kava said during a panel session at ACI Europe in Istanbul earlier this year.

Kava showed photos of the damage at OZH, as well as at Kyiv Hostomel (GML), which is where Russian aircraft manufacturer Antonov was based.

“After the war ends, we will resume operation of our airports in the shortest period possible. We—the ministry of finance and the ministry of infrastructure—are doing everything possible to keep our airports ready to resume operations,” Kava said.

KBP, Ukraine’s main international gateway, handled 9.5 million passengers in 2021, roughly 62% of pre-pandemic figures. The airport was forecast to increase traffic to 12-13 million passengers in 2022, pushing it closer to full recovery, before the Russian invasion.

In the first year of the war, KBP retained all 3,615 of its employees at two-thirds of their regular salary, with around 600 required to work on a daily basis for maintenance purposes. During an impassioned address at Routes Europe 2023 in Łódź, Poland, KBP CEO Oleksiy Dubrevskyy compared the airport to a small town that could not be switched off.

However, Ukraine’s ability to fund its airports is an ever-increasing challenge. Kava said there has been some staff “optimization” at the county’s airports, to reduce expenditure. “From this year, we started to allocate funds from the state budget to support our airports because it’s already been more than two years without operation. Airports were just eating their previous profits,” he said.

RECONSTRUCTION COSTS

Kava estimated the cost of the nation’s airports’ recovery and reconstruction at $1.67 billion. The government is offering some state support, because airports will play “a crucial role” in rebuilding Ukraine after the war. However, financing the military, paying soldiers and meeting the country’s social commitments remain budgetary priorities.

“All other expenditures are minimized,” Kava said. “We would very much appreciate if the European Union and other partners would support Ukrainian airports, financially, to keep them ready to resume operation. Because we expect that after the war ends, demand to fly to Ukraine will grow significantly.”

He added that Ukraine’s passengers have not disappeared. They have moved to neighboring airports, where there has been “significant growth.” He gave the examples of Košice (KSC) in Slovakia, Rzezów (RZE) in Poland and Iasi (IAS) in Romania, where traffic rose 15%, 40% and 52% respectively in 2023. “We expect that three years after the war ends, we will reach pre-war levels of traffic in our airports,” Kava said.

Around 5.8 million Ukrainians have sought temporary refuge in other European countries, and a further 7 million have been displaced within Ukraine. While some may decide to settle in their new locations permanently, Kava said this would create VFR traffic once the war ends.

LWO was Ukraine’s second largest and busiest airport. CEO Tetyana Romanovska recalled at the ACI Europe event how her airport had been experiencing “tremendous success” during the pre-war period, growing by 50-60% and securing new routes. European LCCs Ryanair and Wizz Air had just announced bases for three and six aircraft each.

Romanovska showed a map to illustrate how western Ukraine, where Lviv is located, has been the target of far fewer attacks than the east of the country. “The west part of Ukraine is only seven minutes’ flight to Poland,” she said. “We are working very hard on opening airspace for civil aircraft during military rule.”

Under ICAO guidelines, Ukraine has completed the necessary risk assessments and performed a safety case and concept of operations (CONOPS) for potential airspace reopening. The safety case needs to be agreed with by EASA, FAA, Eurocontrol and IATA. Enhanced air defenses also need to be provided at Boryspil and Lviv, to protect aviation infrastructure.

Negotiations have also begun with insurers, lessors and airlines. Once the entire process has been completed, civil flights would be able to resume, even if the war was still ongoing, Romanovska said—a point acceded to by Kava, who said, “We hope that it will happen by the end of this year, or maybe early next year, if we follow the optimistic scenario.”

Response to the plan, however, from airBaltic, Ryanair and Wizz Air has been lukewarm.

When the conflict originally escalated, Wizz Air saw 40% of its central and Eastern European-focused network close to the war frontlines. Wizz Air had 280 Russia- and Ukraine-based staff, with 11% of its total capacity allocated to Russia and Ukraine. Three Wizz Air Airbus A320s have remained stranded in Ukraine since 2022.

“You should probably expect Wizz Air to be the first airline to go back to the market, whenever the war is over,” Wizz Air CEO József Váradi told the Aviation Club of the UK in April 2023. “We watch it with a lot of interest and with a lot of commitment.”

However, when asked about the partial reopening, Wizz Air was non-committal. Reiterating that Ukraine was a “very important” market, a Wizz Air spokesperson told ATW: “We are constantly assessing it, while keeping a close eye on the current situation. However, Wizz Air has a long-standing policy of not speculating on plans and future outcomes. Any further updates will be released in due course.”

Likewise, airBaltic’s network was hard hit when the conflict broke out. “We used to be really big in Russia and Ukraine. A fairly big portion of our traffic came from those countries. Approximately 10-15% of all traffic was from Russia and Ukraine, and we lost it overnight,” airBaltic VP network development Mantas Vrubliauskas told delegates at Routes Europe 2024 in Aarhus, Denmark, in April.

Vrubliauskas said airBaltic wanted to be the first airline to be back in Ukraine. “We are doing everything possible for this to happen,” he said at the time. “We really believe that, with Ukraine joining the European Union, that’s going to be a huge and booming market. And we want to be part of that growth.”

Responding to the news of the reopening plan, an airBaltic spokesperson reiterated the Latvian airline’s commitment to being “among the first” to return but said the “top priority” is the safety of airBaltic’s employees, passengers, aircraft and flights.

“Once it is safe to do so, airBaltic plans to launch daily flights from Kyiv, Lviv, and gradually Odesa, connecting these cities with Baltic capitals, as well as major European cities via Riga,” the spokesperson said.

In March, airBaltic CEO Martin Gauss visited Kyiv to meet with airport and government representatives. “The discussions on resuming the flights have been ongoing; however, no decisions have been made yet,” the airBaltic spokesperson said.

Ryanair Group CEO Michael O’Leary also has been to Ukraine during the conflict. In July 2023, O’Leary said he had done a two-day trip to Ukraine, visiting Kyiv, Lviv and Odesa, together with Ryanair DAC CEO Eddie Wilson and Ryanair CCO Jason McGuinness. At the time, O’Leary said he was “inspired” by the state of readiness of those airports. He also mentioned that Ukraine was looking at an “Israeli-type iron dome solution” over Lviv and Kyiv.

“We are hopeful that the European authorities would allow a limited flight resumption,” O’Leary said in 2023. “I think the best way we can support Ukraine is by leading the return to air travel. We continue to work closely with EASA and the FAA to encourage them to reopen, even if it’s only on a limited basis, to return to flight into Kyiv and Lviv.”

At the time, O’Leary said Ryanair would “charge back into Ukraine,” once the conflict ended, with plans to base up to 30 aircraft in Kyiv, Lviv and Odesa, serving 25 to 30 European cities. “We intend to return back in there within four to six weeks of being allowed to do so” he said. “We expect Ryanair will be the number one airline in Ukraine.”

However, Ryanair did not respond to a request for comment on the latest plans for reopening Ukraine airspace and airports.

An IATA spokesperson, meanwhile, made clear in a request for comment from ATW that any decision-making on the issue lay with others. “The decision to open the airspace is the decision of the Ukrainian government,” IATA’s spokesperson wrote in an email. “The decision to fly in that airspace is down to the decision of individual carriers. IATA is not involved in this process or the decision.”