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 On 19 January 2015, the Red Wings airline received the first of three Sukhoi Superjet 100 regional airliners under the three-year operational leasing agreement it made with the Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Company in October 2014. The term of the agreement may be extended. On the day, the airliner (RA-89021) was ferried from Zhukovsky to the carrier’s base airport, Domodedovo.
The aircraft with MSN 95021 was built in 2012 and has been operated by the Moskovia airline since August 2013 under a leasing agreement with the Sberbank Leasing along with two more airliners of the type - the former Aeroflot-flown RA-89001 and RA-89002 manufactured in 2011. The Federal Aviation Agency pulled Moslovia's operator certificate in August 2014, and all of the latter's three Superjets went to SCAC base in Zhukovsky. After the agreement had been made with Red Wings, two of the three planes had been painted in their new user's livery in Ulyanovsk by late last year. They retained their two-class 93-seat cabin layout (eight seats in business class and 75 in economy class).
As is known, the aircraft fleet of Red Wings has comprised eight 210-seat Tu-204 medium-haul airliners until recently. Beefing up it with 93-seat Superjets will simplify the exploration of the company's new lines, on which the Tu-204s, having seating capacity is twice as big as that of the Superjets, may prove not too profitable to operate. According to Red Wings Director General Yevgeny Klyucharyov, the company has plans to drive the number of its SSJ100s up to 15, "and we stick tour strategy of operating Russian-built aircraft".
The carrier launched scheduled services on the Moscow - Makhachkala and Moscow - Grozny lines on 6 February 2015 after the addition of the new aircraft type to the operator certificate. At the same day Red Wings ferried its second SSJ100 (RA-89002) from SCAC base to Domodedovo. The airline's plans provide for having its SSJ100s flying on the lines to Ufa, Sochi, Mineralnye Vody and other Russian cities.
(Photo: Nikolai Krasnov)
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