AirBridgeCargo Airlines, LLC (), part of Volga-Dnepr Group, was the largest

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

cargo airline Cargo airlines (or air freight carriers, and derivatives of these names) are airlines mainly dedicated to the transport of air cargo, cargo by air. Some cargo airlines are divisions or subsidiaries of larger passenger airlines. In 2018, airli ...

, with its head office in

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

. It operated scheduled cargo services on routes between Russia, Asia, Europe and North America, covering more than 30 destinations worldwide. All flights connected to their hub at

Sheremetyevo International Airport Sheremetyevo International Airport (, , Internal code: ШРМ) is one of four international airports that serve the city of Moscow. It is the busiest airport in Russia and the post-Soviet states, as well as the ninth-busiest airport in Euro ...

and

Krasnoyarsk Krasnoyarsk is the largest types of inhabited localities in Russia, city and administrative center of Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia. It is situated along the Yenisey, Yenisey River, and is the second-largest city in Siberia after Novosibirsk, with a p ...

. It was forced to suspend all operations in the wake of sanctions against Russia as of March 2022.

History

The company entered the scheduled cargo market on 1 April 2004, when the first AirBridgeCargo branded

Boeing 747 The Boeing 747 is a long-range wide-body aircraft, wide-body airliner designed and manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes in the United States between 1968 and 2023. After the introduction of the Boeing 707, 707 in October 1958, Pan Am ...

made its inaugural commercial flight on route from Beijing to Luxembourg. As of March 2022, AirBridgeCargo was forced to suspend all operations due to sanctions against Russia which rendered the entire fleet unusable.aircargonews.net - VDG confirms suspension of AirBridgeCargo and Atran operations
21 March 2022 In July 2022, the airline announced it would comply with sanctions and prepare to return 14 leased aircraft - which made up the majority of its fleet - to its lessors.aircargonews.net - AirBridgeCargo applies to return freighters to lessors
1 July 2022 In March 2023, it became known that the company planned to resume flights using

Ilyushin Il-96 The Ilyushin Il-96 () is a Russian Four-engined jet aircraft, four-engined jet long-haul Wide-body aircraft, wide-body airliner designed by Ilyushin in the former Soviet Union and manufactured by the Voronezh Aircraft Production Association in R ...

aircraft. Volga-Dnepr had begun searching for pilots with appropriate training. However, by late 2023 these plans were abandoned, with two Il-96 formerly stored and already prepared for AirBridgeCargo being delivered to Sky Gates Airlines instead.

Destinations

Prior to the suspension of all services, ABC had been present in Asia, Europe and North America. It operates a scheduled freighter route network of 37 destinations as of November 2019, focused on Europe, Asia and the United States.airbridgecargo.com - Our network
retrieved 27 February 2021

Fleet

Current fleet

As of March 2024, AirBridgeCargo currently no longer operates any aircraft after returning their fleet to its lessors.

Former fleet

AirBridgeCargo formerly operated the following aircraft:

Accidents and incidents

* On September 11, 2012, an AirBridgeCargo Boeing 747-8F experienced a major engine malfunction that spread a significant amount of metallic debris on the runway. Like in a similar event during pre-flight taxi tests, the low pressure turbine shaft separated and moved the low pressure turbine (by design to avoid turbine overspeed) backwards braking on surrounding hardware. * On July 31, 2013, an AirBridgeCargo Boeing 747-8F experienced core engine icing that caused engine malfunctions and damage to three engines near Chengdu, China, while en route to

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

; the aircraft landed safely at its destination. Boeing and General Electric would later work on software changes to mitigate the effects of core engine icing.

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Airbridgecargo Airlines Companies based in Moscow Airlines established in 2003 Cargo airlines of Russia Russian companies established in 2003