136-759: The Ilyushin Il-76 ( Russian : Илью́шин Ил-76 ; NATO reporting name : Candid ) is a multi-purpose, fixed-wing, four-engine turbofan strategic airlifter designed by the Soviet Union 's Ilyushin design bureau as a commercial freighter in 1967, to replace the Antonov An-12 . It was developed to deliver heavy machinery to remote and poorly served areas. Military versions of the Il-76 have been widely used in Europe, Asia and Africa, including use as an aerial refueling tanker and command center. The Il-76 has seen extensive service as
272-587: A codeshare agreement with Aerolineas Argentinas . In December 2020, the company sold its 51% stake in Aurora to Sakhalin Region Development Corporation for ₽1. In February and March 2022, as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine , Aeroflot and other Russian airlines were banned from the airspace of many countries and several routes were cancelled as a result. Russian airlines were added to
408-649: A constitutional referendum on whether to adopt Russian as a second official language. According to the Central Election Commission, 74.8% voted against, 24.9% voted for and the voter turnout was 71.1%. Starting in 2019, instruction in Russian will be gradually discontinued in private colleges and universities in Latvia, and in general instruction in Latvian public high schools. On 29 September 2022, Saeima passed in
544-641: A low-cost carrier . The Aeroflot fleet , excluding subsidiaries, includes 171 airplanes: 112 Airbus planes and 59 Boeing planes. The company plans on making the Yakovlev MC-21 its flagship plane, with deliveries expected to start in 2025 or 2026. On 17 January 1921, the Sovnarkom of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic published "About Air Transportation". The document signed by its chair Vladimir Lenin set out
680-510: A new education law which requires all schools to teach at least partially in Ukrainian, with provisions while allow indigenous languages and languages of national minorities to be used alongside the national language. The law faced criticism from officials in Russia and Hungary. The 2019 Law of Ukraine "On protecting the functioning of the Ukrainian language as the state language" gives priority to
816-481: A commercial freighter for ramp-delivered cargo, especially for outsized or heavy items that cannot be carried by other means. It has also been used as an emergency response transport for civilian evacuations as well as for humanitarian aid and disaster relief around the world. Thanks to its ability to operate from unpaved runways, it has been useful in undeveloped areas. Specialized models have also been produced for aerial firefighting and zero-G training. The aircraft
952-435: A distance of 1,000,000 kilometres (620,000 mi), carrying 14,000 passengers and 127,500 kilograms (281,100 lb) of freight, on a route network extending to 5,000 kilometres (3,100 mi). Ukrvozdukhput merged with Zakavia in 1925. Dobrolyot was transformed from a Russian to an all-Union enterprise on 21 September 1926 as a result of Sovnarkom resolutions, and in 1928 Dobrolyot was merged with Ukrvozdukhput, making it
1088-602: A distance of 321,500 kilometres (199,800 mi). The 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , held in 1956, included plans for Aeroflot services to be dramatically increased 3.8 times, with a target of 16,000,000 annual passengers by 1960. To meet these goals, Aeroflot introduced higher capacity turbojet and turbine-prop aircraft on key domestic routes, and on services to Aeroflot destinations abroad. A major step for Aeroflot occurred on 15 September 1956 when
1224-556: A formula with V standing for the nucleus (vowel) and C for each consonant, the maximal structure can be described as follows: (C)(C)(C)(C)V(C)(C)(C)(C) Aeroflot PJSC Aeroflot – Russian Airlines ( Russian : ПАО «Аэрофло́т — Росси́йские авиали́нии» , PAO Aeroflot — Rossiyskiye avialinii ), commonly known as Aeroflot ( English: / ˈ ɛər oʊ ˌ f l ɒ t / or / ˌ ɛər oʊ ˈ f l ɒ t / ; Russian : Аэрофлот , transl. "air fleet" , pronounced [ɐɛrɐˈfɫot] ),
1360-558: A hard or soft counterpart, and the distinction is a prominent feature of the language, which is usually shown in writing not by a change of the consonant but rather by changing the following vowel. Another important aspect is the reduction of unstressed vowels . Stress , which is often unpredictable, is not normally indicated orthographically , though an optional acute accent may be used to mark stress – such as to distinguish between homographic words (e.g. замо́к [ zamók , 'lock'] and за́мок [ zámok , 'castle']), or to indicate
1496-479: A language that "belongs to the European cultural space". The financing of Russian-language content by the state will cease, which the concept says create a "unified information space". However, one inevitable consequence would be the closure of public media broadcasts in Russian on LTV and Latvian Radio, as well as the closure of LSM's Russian-language service. In Lithuania , Russian has no official or legal status, but
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#17330857219131632-572: A lesser extent the languages to the south and the east: Uralic , Turkic , Persian , Arabic , and Hebrew . According to the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California , Russian is classified as a level III language in terms of learning difficulty for native English speakers, requiring approximately 1,100 hours of immersion instruction to achieve intermediate fluency. Feudal divisions and conflicts created obstacles between
1768-711: A major reorganisation during which most of the Soviet aircraft were replaced by Western-built jets; concerns over fuel consumption rather than safety concerns were cited for such a move. Airbus A319s and A320s for short-haul flights in Europe; and Boeing 767s and Airbus A330s for long-haul routes; were gradually incorporated into the Aeroflot fleet . Aeroflot began working with the US travel technology firm Sabre Corporation in 1997, and in 2004 signed an agreement to use Sabre's software as its new computer reservation system , further extending
1904-607: A minority language under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities . 30% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 2% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. In Azerbaijan , Russian has no official status, but is a lingua franca of the country. 26% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 5% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. In Georgia , Russian has no official status, but it
2040-643: A priority in the immediate postwar years to expand services from Moscow to the capital of each of the Republics of the Soviet Union , in addition to important industrial centres on the country and transferred to Aeroflot many Lisunov Li-2s , which became the backbone of the Aeroflot fleet . The Ilyushin Il-12 entered service on Aeroflot's all-Union scheduled routes on 22 August 1947, and supplemented already existing Li-2 services. The original Ilyushin Il-18 entered service around
2176-516: A qualitatively new entity can be said to emerge—the general language of the working class... capitalism has the tendency of creating the general urban language of a given society. In 2010, there were 259.8 million speakers of Russian in the world: in Russia – 137.5 million, in the CIS and Baltic countries – 93.7 million, in Eastern Europe – 12.9 million, Western Europe – 7.3 million, Asia – 2.7 million, in
2312-698: A response to the Revolution of Dignity , the company announced rerouting of flights to avoid flying over Ukraine. Also, in March 2014, Aeroflot 's IATA airline designator ″SU″ was adopted by its subsidiary Rossiya. In September 2015, Aeroflot agreed to acquire 75% of Transaero Airlines for the symbolic price of ₽1, but abandoned the plan after failing to come to terms on a takeover. Aeroflot instead took over several of Transaero's aircraft by assuming its leases after Transaero ceased operations in December 2015, introducing
2448-679: A result of the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact , and they continued until the opening of the Eastern Front in World War II in 1941. Under the third five-year plan, which began in 1938, civil aviation development continued, with improvements to airport installations being made and construction of airports being commenced. In addition to the expansion of services between the Soviet Union 's main cities, local routes (MVL) were also expanded, and by 1940, 337 MVL routes had operations on
2584-615: A scheduled basis. Serial production of the Lisunov Li-2 (license-built Douglas DC-3) commenced in 1939, and the aircraft became the backbone of the Aeroflot fleet on mainline trunk routes. The day after Operation Barbarossa , the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany , on 22 June 1941, the Sovnarkom placed the Civil Air Fleet under the control of Narkomat , leading to the full-scale mobilisation of Aeroflot crews and technicians for
2720-527: Is Belarusian, among ethnic Belarusians this share is 28.5%; the highest share of those who speak Belarusian at home is among ethnic Poles — 46.0%. In Estonia , Russian is spoken by 29.6% of the population, according to a 2011 estimate from the World Factbook, and is officially considered a foreign language. School education in the Russian language is a very contentious point in Estonian politics, and in 2022,
2856-475: Is a co-official language per article 5 of the Constitution of Kyrgyzstan . The 2009 census states that 482,200 people speak Russian as a native language, or 8.99% of the population. Additionally, 1,854,700 residents of Kyrgyzstan aged 15 and above fluently speak Russian as a second language, or 49.6% of the population in the age group. In Tajikistan , Russian is the language of inter-ethnic communication under
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#17330857219132992-401: Is a high degree of mutual intelligibility between Russian, Belarusian and Ukrainian , and a moderate degree of it in all modern Slavic languages, at least at the conversational level. Russian is written using a Cyrillic alphabet. The Russian alphabet consists of 33 letters. The following table gives their forms, along with IPA values for each letter's typical sound: Older letters of
3128-593: Is a post-posed definite article -to , -ta , -te similar to that existing in Bulgarian and Macedonian. In the Southern Russian dialects , instances of unstressed /e/ and /a/ following palatalized consonants and preceding a stressed syllable are not reduced to [ɪ] (as occurs in the Moscow dialect), being instead pronounced [a] in such positions (e.g. несл и is pronounced [nʲaˈslʲi] , not [nʲɪsˈlʲi] ) – this
3264-647: Is an East Slavic language belonging to the Balto-Slavic branch of the Indo-European language family . It is one of the four extant East Slavic languages, and is the native language of the Russians . It was the de facto and de jure official language of the former Soviet Union . Russian has remained an official language of the Russian Federation , Belarus , Kazakhstan , Kyrgyzstan , and Tajikistan , and
3400-485: Is being used less frequently by Russian-speaking typists in favor of the extension of Unicode character encoding , which fully incorporates the Russian alphabet. Free programs are available offering this Unicode extension, which allow users to type Russian characters, even on Western 'QWERTY' keyboards. The Russian language was first introduced to computing after the M-1 , and MESM models were produced in 1951. According to
3536-613: Is called yakanye ( яканье ). Consonants include a fricative /ɣ/ , a semivowel /w⁓u̯/ and /x⁓xv⁓xw/ , whereas the Standard and Northern dialects have the consonants /ɡ/ , /v/ , and final /l/ and /f/ , respectively. The morphology features a palatalized final /tʲ/ in 3rd person forms of verbs (this is unpalatalized in the Standard and Northern dialects). During the Proto-Slavic (Common Slavic) times all Slavs spoke one mutually intelligible language or group of dialects. There
3672-518: Is more spoken than English. Sizable Russian-speaking communities also exist in North America, especially in large urban centers of the US and Canada, such as New York City , Philadelphia , Boston , Los Angeles , Nashville , San Francisco , Seattle , Spokane , Toronto , Calgary , Baltimore , Miami , Portland , Chicago , Denver , and Cleveland . In a number of locations they issue their own newspapers, and live in ethnic enclaves (especially
3808-564: Is odd") – чу́дно ( chúdno – "this is marvellous"), молоде́ц ( molodéts – "well done!") – мо́лодец ( mólodets – "fine young man"), узна́ю ( uznáyu – "I shall learn it") – узнаю́ ( uznayú – "I recognize it"), отреза́ть ( otrezát – "to be cutting") – отре́зать ( otrézat – "to have cut"); to indicate the proper pronunciation of uncommon words, especially personal and family names, like афе́ра ( aféra , "scandal, affair"), гу́ру ( gúru , "guru"), Гарси́я ( García ), Оле́ша ( Olésha ), Фе́рми ( Fermi ), and to show which
3944-402: Is recognized as a minority language under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities . Russian is the language of 9% of the population according to the World Factbook. Ethnologue cites Russian as the country's de facto working language. In China , Russian has no official status, but it is spoken by the small Russian communities in the northeastern Heilongjiang and
4080-569: Is sometimes considered to have played a significant role in the formation of modern Russian. Also, Russian has notable lexical similarities with Bulgarian due to a common Church Slavonic influence on both languages, but because of later interaction in the 19th and 20th centuries, Bulgarian grammar differs markedly from Russian. Over the course of centuries, the vocabulary and literary style of Russian have also been influenced by Western and Central European languages such as Greek, Latin , Polish , Dutch , German, French, Italian, and English, and to
4216-576: Is spoken by 14.2% of the population according to an undated estimate from the World Factbook. In 2005, Russian was the most widely taught foreign language in Mongolia, and was compulsory in Year 7 onward as a second foreign language in 2006. Around 1.5 million Israelis spoke Russian as of 2017. The Israeli press and websites regularly publish material in Russian and there are Russian newspapers, television stations, schools, and social media outlets based in
Ilyushin Il-76 - Misplaced Pages Continue
4352-610: Is still commonly used as a lingua franca in Ukraine , Moldova , the Caucasus , Central Asia , and to a lesser extent in the Baltic states and Israel . Russian has over 258 million total speakers worldwide. It is the most spoken native language in Europe , the most spoken Slavic language , as well as the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia . It is the world's seventh-most spoken language by number of native speakers , and
4488-537: Is the flag carrier and the largest airline of Russia. Aeroflot is headquartered in the Central Administrative Okrug , Moscow , with its hub being Sheremetyevo International Airport . The Federal Agency for State Property Management , an agency of the Government of Russia , owns 73.77% of the company, with the rest of the shares being public float . During the time of the Soviet Union , Aeroflot
4624-518: Is the stressed word in a sentence, for example Ты́ съел печенье? ( Tý syel pechenye? – "Was it you who ate the cookie?") – Ты съе́л печенье? ( Ty syél pechenye? – "Did you eat the cookie?) – Ты съел пече́нье? ( Ty syel pechénye? "Was it the cookie you ate?"). Stress marks are mandatory in lexical dictionaries and books for children or Russian learners. The Russian syllable structure can be quite complex, with both initial and final consonant clusters of up to four consecutive sounds. Using
4760-461: The 2011 Lithuanian census , Russian was the native language for 7.2% of the population. In Moldova , Russian was considered to be the language of interethnic communication under a Soviet-era law. On 21 January 2021, the Constitutional Court of Moldova declared the law unconstitutional and deprived Russian of the status of the language of interethnic communication. 50% of the population
4896-966: The Apollo–Soyuz mission, which first flew in 1975. In March 2013, Russian was found to be the second-most used language on websites after English. Russian was the language of 5.9% of all websites, slightly ahead of German and far behind English (54.7%). Russian was used not only on 89.8% of .ru sites, but also on 88.7% of sites with the former Soviet Union domain .su . Websites in former Soviet Union member states also used high levels of Russian: 79.0% in Ukraine, 86.9% in Belarus, 84.0% in Kazakhstan, 79.6% in Uzbekistan, 75.9% in Kyrgyzstan and 81.8% in Tajikistan. However, Russian
5032-449: The Boeing 747 and Boeing 777 to the Aeroflot fleet and allowing the company to cancel some of its jet orders. Subsidiaries Rossiya Airlines, Donavia and Orenair combined operations in late March 2016. Orenair 's AOC was cancelled by Russian authorities in late May 2016 ( 2016-05 ) . Donavia and Orenair were declared bankrupt in 2017. In June 2018, the company signed
5168-413: The Constitution of Tajikistan and is permitted in official documentation. 28% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 7% used it as the main language with family, friends or at work. The World Factbook notes that Russian is widely used in government and business. In Turkmenistan , Russian lost its status as the official lingua franca in 1996. Among 12% of the population who grew up in
5304-583: The Il-78 , around 50 aircraft having been produced. A variant of the Il-76 also serves as a firefighting waterbomber . Its airframe was used as a base for the Beriev A-50 'Mainstay' AEW&C (airborne early warning and control) aircraft; around 25 aircraft were made. Another application for the type was found in Antarctic support flights and for conducting simulated weightlessness training for cosmonauts (akin to
5440-572: The Russian invasion of Ukraine . Management of the company is appointed by the Russian government due to its ownership stake. The headquarters of Aeroflot are on Arbat Street , Arbat District , Central Administrative Okrug , Moscow. The Federal Agency for State Property Management , an agency of the Government of Russia , owns 73.77% of the company, with the rest of the shares being public float . The company owns airline subsidiaries Pobeda and Rossiya Airlines . In September 2018, Aeroflot served 146 destinations in 52 countries. In 2022,
5576-660: The Soviet Air Force ); atmospheric research; and remote area patrol . It operated hundreds of helicopters and cargo aircraft in addition to civil airliners. It also operated the Soviet equivalent of a presidential aircraft and other VIP transports of government and Communist party officials. Aeroflot was also responsible for such services as ice patrol in the Arctic Ocean and escorting of ships through frozen seas; oil exploration; power line surveillance; and transportation and heavy lifting support on construction projects. For
Ilyushin Il-76 - Misplaced Pages Continue
5712-613: The Tupolev Tu-104 jet aircraft entered service on the Moscow- Omsk - Irkutsk route, marking the world's first sustained jet airline service. The airline began international flights with the type on 12 October 1956 under the command of Boris Bugayev with flights from Moscow to Prague . The aircraft placed Aeroflot in an enviable position, as airlines in the West had operated throughout the 1950s with large piston-engined aircraft. By 1958,
5848-527: The Ukrainian language in more than 30 spheres of public life: in particular in public administration , media, education, science, culture, advertising, services . The law does not regulate private communication. A poll conducted in March 2022 by RATING in the territory controlled by Ukraine found that 83% of the respondents believe that Ukrainian should be the only state language of Ukraine. This opinion dominates in all macro-regions, age and language groups. On
5984-694: The United States Census , in 2007 Russian was the primary language spoken in the homes of over 850,000 individuals living in the United States. Russian is one of the official languages (or has similar status and interpretation must be provided into Russian) of the following: The Russian language is also one of two official languages aboard the International Space Station – NASA astronauts who serve alongside Russian cosmonauts usually take Russian language courses. This practice goes back to
6120-578: The Yakovlev Yak-40 regional jet began operations on short-haul services. That same year, the Il-62 inaugurated the long-delayed service between Moscow and New York, which finally began in July and was operated by Aeroflot and Pan Am jointly. According to the book The Aeroflot Story: From Russia With Luck : "This business relationship became an acrimonious affair in which both parties complained it had been wronged by
6256-626: The international sanctions during the Russian invasion of Ukraine , Aeroflot migrated to a Russian-based passenger service system , began sourcing aircraft parts via obscure trading companies, free-trade zones and middlemen in countries that have not imposed sanctions on Russia such as United Arab Emirates and China, and placed orders for Russian-made jets such as the Yakovlev MC-21 to reduce its dependence on foreign-made jets. In September 2023, Aeroflot paid $ 645 million to acquire 17 aircraft and five spare jet engines that were leased to Aeroflot and owned by AerCap and were stranded in Russia upon
6392-664: The list of air carriers banned in the European Union for safety reasons because planes were re-registered in Russia and no longer had foreign airworthiness certificates. The U.S. Department of Commerce banned companies from servicing Boeing planes operated by Aeroflot, Aviastar , Azur Air , Belavia , Rossiya and Utair . Manchester United F.C. cancelled its sponsorship agreement that made Aeroflot its official carrier since July 2013. Sabre Corporation and others removed access by Aeroflot to their computer reservation systems and global distribution systems . In response to
6528-650: The "Vomit Comet" used by NASA). Beriev and NPO Almaz also developed an airborne laser flying laboratory designated A-60 , of which two were built, much of this project's details remaining classified. It was announced in 2010 that the production of a modernized Il-76, the Il-76MD-90A (also known as project Il-476 during the design stage), would begin; a proposed new production line would be located in Aviastar 's facility in Ulyanovsk , Russia, and be operated in cooperation with
6664-461: The 1990s, modernized variants also equipped with Soloviev D-30 turbofan engines were developed (MF, TF), with a cargo compartment 20 m (66 ft) long by 3.4 m (11 ft) wide by 3.4 m (11 ft) tall; these larger variants were not produced in significant quantity due to the financial difficulties being experienced by the Russian Air Force, which was the primary operator of
6800-508: The 20th century, Russian was a mandatory language taught in the schools of the members of the old Warsaw Pact and in other countries that used to be satellites of the USSR. According to the Eurobarometer 2005 survey, fluency in Russian remains fairly high (20–40%) in some countries, in particular former Warsaw Pact countries. In Armenia , Russian has no official status, but it is recognized as
6936-465: The Belarusian society the Russian language prevails, so according to the 2019 census 6,718,557 people (71.4% of the total population) stated that they speak Russian at home, for ethnic Belarusians this share is 61.4%, for Russians — 97.2%, for Ukrainians — 89.0%, for Poles — 52.4%, and for Jews — 96.6%; 2,447,764 people (26.0% of the total population) stated that the language they usually speak at home
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#17330857219137072-481: The Central Administration of International Air Traffic (Russian: Центральное управление международных воздушных сообщений ) (TsUMVS) was established within the framework of IATA , and became the sole enterprise authorised to operate international flights. Abroad, the airline was known as Aeroflot Soviet Airlines. In 1976, Aeroflot carried its 100 millionth passenger. Its flights were mainly concentrated around
7208-510: The Civil Air Fleet, and after the war were placed into regular service across the Soviet Union. Whilst civil operations in European Russia west of the front line, which ran from Leningrad to Moscow to Rostov-on-Don , were prevented from operating because of the war, services from Moscow to the Urals , Siberia , Central Asia, and other regions which were not affected by the war, continued. By
7344-519: The Great and developed from the Moscow ( Middle or Central Russian ) dialect substratum under the influence of some of the previous century's Russian chancery language. Prior to the Bolshevik Revolution , the spoken form of the Russian language was that of the nobility and the urban bourgeoisie. Russian peasants, the great majority of the population, continued to speak in their own dialects. However,
7480-698: The Il-76, followed by Ukraine and India, Belarus' TransAVIAexport Airlines is the largest civilian operator. As of July 2024, the Aviation Safety Network has tracked 137 incidents involving Il-76 series aircraft resulting in the 1,158 fatalities. 99 have been written off in crashes and other accidents. Some of the most notable incidents can be found here. Data from Ilyushin , Aviadvigatel , Volga-Dnepr Airlines . General characteristics Performance Armament Related development Aircraft of comparable role, configuration, and era Related lists Russian language Russian
7616-578: The Institute of Russian Language of the Russian Academy of Sciences, an optional acute accent ( знак ударения ) may, and sometimes should, be used to mark stress . For example, it is used to distinguish between otherwise identical words, especially when context does not make it obvious: замо́к ( zamók – "lock") – за́мок ( zámok – "castle"), сто́ящий ( stóyashchy – "worthwhile") – стоя́щий ( stoyáshchy – "standing"), чудно́ ( chudnó – "this
7752-411: The Middle East and North Africa – 1.3 million, Sub-Saharan Africa – 0.1 million, Latin America – 0.2 million, U.S., Canada , Australia, and New Zealand – 4.1 million speakers. Therefore, the Russian language is the seventh-largest in the world by the number of speakers , after English, Mandarin, Hindi -Urdu, Spanish, French, Arabic, and Portuguese. Russian is one of the six official languages of
7888-413: The Russian EMERCOM agency was deployed to Chile to assist firefighters. The assignment took 39 days. All Il-76 transport aircraft in service with the RF Aerospace Forces were to receive anti-missile systems, and aircraft reconfiguration started in spring 2019. Military and civil operators in 38 countries have operated more than 850 Il-76 in large numbers. While Russia is the largest military operator of
8024-807: The Russian alphabet include ⟨ ѣ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ е ⟩ ( /je/ or /ʲe/ ); ⟨ і ⟩ and ⟨ ѵ ⟩ , which both merged to ⟨ и ⟩ ( /i/ ); ⟨ ѳ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ ф ⟩ ( /f/ ); ⟨ ѫ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ у ⟩ ( /u/ ); ⟨ ѭ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ ю ⟩ ( /ju/ or /ʲu/ ); and ⟨ ѧ ⟩ and ⟨ ѩ ⟩ , which later were graphically reshaped into ⟨ я ⟩ and merged phonetically to /ja/ or /ʲa/ . While these older letters have been abandoned at one time or another, they may be used in this and related articles. The yers ⟨ ъ ⟩ and ⟨ ь ⟩ originally indicated
8160-458: The Russian principalities before and especially during Mongol rule. This strengthened dialectal differences, and for a while, prevented the emergence of a standardized national language. The formation of the unified and centralized Russian state in the 15th and 16th centuries, and the gradual re-emergence of a common political, economic, and cultural space created the need for a common standard language. The initial impulse for standardization came from
8296-534: The Soviet Union, but the airline also had an international network covering five continents: North and South America, Europe, Africa and Asia. The network included countries such as the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Spain, Cuba, Mexico and the People's Republic of China. Aeroflot service between the Soviet Union and the United States was interrupted from 15 September 1983 until 2 August 1990, following an executive order by U.S. President Ronald Reagan revoking Aeroflot's license to operate flights into and out of
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#17330857219138432-400: The Soviet Union, denoting the importance of the operation of holiday aircraft services to Aeroflot. Statistics for the same year showed Aeroflot operating an all-Union route network extending over 400,000 kilometres (250,000 mi), and carrying 36,800,000 passengers. By 1966, Aeroflot carried 47,200,000 passengers over a domestic route network of 474,600 kilometres (294,900 mi). For
8568-421: The Soviet aircraft industry to make it less dependent on foreign built aircraft; in 1930, 50% of aircraft flying services in the Soviet Union were of foreign manufacture. Expansion of air routes which had taken shape in the late 1920s, continued into the 1930s. Local (MVL) services were greatly expanded in Soviet Central Asia and the Soviet Far East , which by the end of the second five-year plan in 1937
8704-405: The Soviet era can speak Russian, other generations of citizens that do not have any knowledge of Russian. Primary and secondary education by Russian is almost non-existent. In Uzbekistan , Russian is the language of inter-ethnic communication. It has some official roles, being permitted in official documentation and is the lingua franca of the country and the language of the elite. Russian
8840-430: The Soviet war effort. Prior to the invasion, the Aeroflot network extended over 146,000 kilometres (91,000 mi), and amongst the longest routes being operated from Moscow were those to Tbilisi (via Baku ), Tashkent and Vladivostok . Aeroflot aircraft, including PS-35s and PS-43s, were based at Khodynka Aerodrome in Moscow; and important missions undertaken by Aeroflot aircraft and crews included flying supplies to
8976-567: The Tashkent works. At that point, the construction of two Il-76MD-90A prototypes had begun at the Ulyanovsk facility. The first Il-76MD-90A was rolled out at Aviastar's Ulyanovsk plant on 16 June 2014. On 29 April 2015, it was reported that the Russian Aerospace Forces received the first Il-76MD-90A built at the Ulyanovsk plant "Aviastar-SP" from the 2012 contract for 39 aircraft. The Russian Ministry of Defence (MoD) received its first serial production Ilyushin Il-76MD-90A airlifter on 2 April 2019. As of late-2023, 27 aircraft are ordered to be delivered in
9112-403: The United Nations. Education in Russian is still a popular choice for both Russian as a second language (RSL) and native speakers in Russia, and in many former Soviet republics. Russian is still seen as an important language for children to learn in most of the former Soviet republics. In Belarus , Russian is a second state language alongside Belarusian per the Constitution of Belarus . 77% of
9248-469: The United States following the downing of Korean Air Lines Flight 007 by the Soviet Air Force. Flights resumed in April 1986. At the start of the 1990s, Aeroflot reorganised again giving more autonomy to territorial divisions. R. E. G. Davies , former curator of the Smithsonian Institution , claims that by 1992 Aeroflot had over 600,000 people operating over 10,000 aircraft. Once the world's largest carrier , Aeroflot did not restrict its operations to
9384-442: The airline itself came under control of Russia, the largest of the CIS republics, and was renamed Aeroflot – Russian International Airlines (ARIA) . In 1992, Aeroflot was divided into approximately 400 regional airlines informally known as Babyflots , which included BAL Bashkirian Airlines , KrasAir , Moscow Airways and Tatarstan Airlines , with Aeroflot keeping the international routes. In 1994, Aeroflot
9520-429: The airline was of Leon Trotsky . The basic objectives were the organisation of airmail, cargo and passenger lines, aviation related solutions of national economic problems (for example, aerial photography of localities) and also the development of the domestic aircraft industry. Dobrolyot constructed airports and weather stations. Artist Alexander Rodchenko developed the corporate identity and advertising strategy of
9656-404: The basic regulations on air transport over the territory of the RSFSR. The document was significant as it was the first time that a Russian state had declared sovereignty over its airspace . In addition, the document defined rules for the operation of foreign aircraft over the Soviet Union's airspace and territory. After Lenin issued an order, a State Commission was formed on 31 January 1921 for
9792-550: The besieged cities of Leningrad , Kyiv , Odessa and Sevastopol . During the Battle of Stalingrad , between August 1942 and February 1943, Aeroflot operated 46,000 missions to Stalingrad, ferrying in 2,587 tonnes (5,703,000 lb) of supplies and 30,000 troops. Following the defeat of the Wehrmacht , 80 Junkers Ju 52 /3ms were captured from the Germans, and were placed into the service of
9928-403: The broader sense of expanding the use of Russian alongside or in favour of other languages. The current standard form of Russian is generally regarded as the modern Russian literary language ( современный русский литературный язык – "sovremenny russky literaturny yazyk"). It arose at the beginning of the 18th century with the modernization reforms of the Russian state under the rule of Peter
10064-514: The bulk of the Canadian Forces equipment into Afghanistan was flown in using civilian Il-76s. In 2006, the Russian Air Force had about 200 Il-76s. Civilian users in Russia have 108. In 2004, a Chinese People's Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) Il-76 carried out a flight mission in Afghanistan, and later in 2011, PLAAF Il-76s were sent to Libya to evacuate Chinese citizens. The two missions were
10200-421: The company from 51% to 100%; soon afterwards, Aeroflot-Nord was created following the buyout of Arkhangelsk Airlines . In December 2009, after it filed for bankruptcy, Aeroflot-Cargo merged into Aeroflot. In November 2011, Rostec , a state agency, merged five airlines it owned - Vladivostok Avia , Saravia , Rossiya Airlines , SAT Airlines and Orenair - into Aeroflot, acquiring an additional 3.5% of
10336-465: The company in a ₽2.5 billion deal. Saravia was then sold to private investors. In September 2013, Aurora (originally called Taiga) was created, combining Vladivostok Air and SAT Airlines . In June 2013, at the World Airline Awards which took place at the 50th Le Bourget air show, Aeroflot was awarded the international prize as the best air carrier in Eastern Europe. In October 2013,
10472-517: The company introduced an affiliated low-cost carrier (LCC), Dobrolet . It started operations in June 2014; however, it ceased on 4 August 2014 ( 2014-08-04 ) due to EU sanctions over the airline launching flights to Crimea . In late August 2014, Aeroflot announced the launch of Pobeda , a new LCC to replace Dobrolet using aircraft transferred from Orenair. It started operations from Vnukovo Airport in December 2014. In March 2014, as
10608-471: The company. He designed posters encouraging citizens to buy stock in Dobrolet and also designed the "Winged Hammer and Sickle" logo. A capital of 2 million gold rubles was authorised to fund its early projects and this was later augmented by funds derived from the issuance of shares, which were initially offered to Soviet enterprises at the cost of one gold ruble each. Those who bought 25,000 shares were given
10744-562: The country. There is an Israeli TV channel mainly broadcasting in Russian with Israel Plus . See also Russian language in Israel . Russian is also spoken as a second language by a small number of people in Afghanistan . In Vietnam , Russian has been added in the elementary curriculum along with Chinese and Japanese and were named as "first foreign languages" for Vietnamese students to learn, on equal footing with English. The Russian language
10880-432: The early 2000s, the airline hired British consultants for rebranding. From the start, plans were afoot to replace the hammer and sickle logo, a symbol of Soviet communism; despite this the logo was not scrapped, as it was the most recognisable symbol of the company for over 70 years. A new Aircraft livery and uniforms for flight attendants were designed and a promotional campaign launched in 2003. Its fleet has undergone
11016-607: The end of 1924 the subdivision had carried 480 passengers and 500 kilograms (1,100 lb) of mail and freight, on a total of 210 flights. In March 1924, Dobrolyot began operating flights from Sevastopol to Yalta and Yevpatoriya in Crimea . Dobrolyot's route network was extended during the 1925–1927 period to include Kazan and regular flights between Moscow and Kharkov were inaugurated. Dobrolyot flights to Kharkov connected with Ukrvozdukhput services to Kiev , Odessa and Rostov-on-Don . In 1925, Dobrolyot operated 2,000 flights over
11152-566: The end of the war, Aeroflot had flown 1,595,943 special missions, including 83,782 at night, and carried 1,538,982 men and 122,027 tonnes (269,023,000 lb) of cargo. At the end of World War II , the Soviet government repaired and rebuilt essential airport infrastructure, and it strengthened the Aeroflot units in the European part of the Soviet Union. In 1945, Aeroflot carried 537,000 passengers, compared with 359,000 in 1940. The government made it
11288-727: The expansion of the Red Air Fleet, and it is this date which was officially recognised as the beginning of civil aviation in the Soviet Union. On 9 February 1923, the Council of Labour and Defence passed a resolution to create the Civil Air Fleet of the USSR . After a resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , the Enterprise for Friends of the Air Fleet (ODVF)
11424-413: The factory and the industrial plant their local peasant dialects with their phonetics, grammar, and vocabulary, and the very process of recruiting workers from peasants and the mobility of the worker population generate another process: the liquidation of peasant inheritance by way of leveling the particulars of local dialects. On the ruins of peasant multilingual, in the context of developing heavy industry,
11560-451: The final reading amendments that state that all schools and kindergartens in the country are to transition to education in Latvian . From 2025, all children will be taught in Latvian only. On 28 September 2023, Latvian deputies approved The National Security Concept, according to which from 1 January 2026, all content created by Latvian public media (including LSM ) should be only in Latvian or
11696-482: The formation of Deruluft in Berlin on 11 November 1921, as a joint venture between the Soviet Union and Germany. The company, whose aircraft were registered in both Germany and the Soviet Union, began operations on 1 May 1922 with a Fokker F.III flying between Königsberg and Moscow. The service was initially operated twice a week and restricted to the carriage of mail. On 3 February 1923, Sovnarkom approved plans for
11832-487: The freight that was airlifted. As Afghan rebels were unable to shoot down high-flying Il-76s, their tactics were to try and damage it on takeoff or landing. Il-76s were often hit by shoulder-launched Stinger and Strela heat-seeking missiles and large-calibre machine gun fire, but because the strong airframes were able to take substantial damage and remain operational, the aircraft had a remarkably low attrition rate during this period of conflict. Building on that experience,
11968-617: The generation of immigrants who started arriving in the early 1960s). Only about 25% of them are ethnic Russians, however. Before the dissolution of the Soviet Union , the overwhelming majority of Russophones in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn in New York City were Russian-speaking Jews. Afterward, the influx from the countries of the former Soviet Union changed the statistics somewhat, with ethnic Russians and Ukrainians immigrating along with some more Russian Jews and Central Asians. According to
12104-480: The government bureaucracy for the lack of a reliable tool of communication in administrative, legal, and judicial affairs became an obvious practical problem. The earliest attempts at standardizing Russian were made based on the so-called Moscow official or chancery language, during the 15th to 17th centuries. Since then, the trend of language policy in Russia has been standardization in both the restricted sense of reducing dialectical barriers between ethnic Russians, and
12240-488: The height of the 1970 summer holidays season, the airline was carrying approximately 400,000 passengers per day, and 90% of passengers were being carried on propeller-turbine and jet aircraft. In March 1970, Aeroflot had amassed a route network that was 600,000 kilometres (370,000 miles) long, a quarter of which covered international destinations. At this time, the carrier had agreements with 59 countries but it only served 54 of them, including 55 destinations. In January 1971,
12376-561: The latter tasks, Aeroflot used, in addition to smaller helicopters, the Mil Mi-10 flying crane capable of lifting 11,000 to 14,000 kilograms (24,000 to 31,000 lb). Hauling of heavy cargo, including vehicles, was performed by the world's largest operational helicopter, the Mil Mi-26 . Its unusual eight-blade rotor enabled it to lift a maximum payload of 20 tons. The medium- and long-range passenger- and cargo aircraft of Aeroflot were also part of
12512-467: The name "Aeroflot" was officially adopted for the entire Soviet Civil Air Fleet. The Communist Party of the Soviet Union Congress in 1933 set out development plans for the civil aviation industry for the following five years, with air transportation becoming one of the primary means of transportation in the Soviet Union, linking all major cities. The government also implemented plans to expand
12648-516: The northwestern Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region . Russian was also the main foreign language taught in school in China between 1949 and 1964. In Kazakhstan , Russian is not a state language, but according to article 7 of the Constitution of Kazakhstan its usage enjoys equal status to that of the Kazakh language in state and local administration. The 2009 census reported that 10,309,500 people, or 84.8% of
12784-484: The number of destinations was significantly reduced after many countries banned Russian aircraft as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine . It currently operates service to/from Armenia , Azerbaijan , Belarus , China , Cuba , Egypt , Hong Kong , India , Iran , Kazakhstan , Kyrgyzstan , Maldives , Mauritius , Seychelles , Sri Lanka , Thailand , Turkey , United Arab Emirates , Uzbekistan , and Vietnam . Aeroflot only has codeshare agreements with
12920-497: The number of passengers carried in 1961 skyrocketing to 21,800,000. Further expansion came in 1962 when both the Tupolev Tu-124 and Antonov An-24 entered regular service with Aeroflot on various medium and short-haul routes. By 1964, Aeroflot operated direct flights from Moscow to 100 cities, from Leningrad to 44 cities, and from Kyiv to 38 cities. The airline also operated direct flights from Mineralnye Vody to 48 cities across
13056-508: The only civil aviation airline in the Soviet Union. In 1932, its name was changed to Transaviatsia and later that year, all civil aviation activities were consolidated under the name of Grazhdansky Vozdushny Flot (Civil Air Fleet), known as Aeroflot . Responsibility for all civil aviation activities in the Soviet Union came under the control of the Chief Directorate of the Civil Air Fleet on 25 February 1932, and on 25 March 1932
13192-515: The other hand, before the war, almost a quarter of Ukrainians were in favour of granting Russian the status of the state language, while after the beginning of Russia's invasion the support for the idea dropped to just 7%. In peacetime, the idea of raising the status of Russian was traditionally supported by residents of the south and east . But even in these regions, only a third of the respondents were in favour, and after Russia's full-scale invasion , their number dropped by almost half. According to
13328-455: The other three languages in the East Slavic branch. In many places in eastern and southern Ukraine and throughout Belarus, these languages are spoken interchangeably, and in certain areas traditional bilingualism resulted in language mixtures such as Surzhyk in eastern Ukraine and Trasianka in Belarus. An East Slavic Old Novgorod dialect , although it vanished during the 15th or 16th century,
13464-472: The other. Pan Am accused the Soviets of illegally siphoning away Moscow-to-New York passengers, whilst in turn; Aeroflot accused US consular officials in Russia of having steered passengers to Pan Am flights." In 1968, the company opened its first office in the United States. By 1970, the last year of the five-year plan period, Aeroflot was operating flights to over 3,500 destinations in the Soviet Union, and at
13600-446: The parliament approved a bill to close up all Russian language schools and kindergartens by the school year. The transition to only Estonian language schools and kindergartens will start in the 2024-2025 school year. In Latvia , Russian is officially considered a foreign language. 55% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 26% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. On 18 February 2012, Latvia held
13736-453: The peasants' speech was never systematically studied, as it was generally regarded by philologists as simply a source of folklore and an object of curiosity. This was acknowledged by the noted Russian dialectologist Nikolai Karinsky , who toward the end of his life wrote: "Scholars of Russian dialects mostly studied phonetics and morphology. Some scholars and collectors compiled local dictionaries. We have almost no studies of lexical material or
13872-612: The period 1951–1955, emphasised Aeroflot expanding night-time operations, which vastly improved aircraft utilisation. By 1952, 700 destinations in the Soviet Union received regular flights from Aeroflot. On 30 November 1954, the Ilyushin Il-14 entered service, and the aircraft took a leading role in the operation of Aeroflot's all-Union services. The number of passengers carried in 1955 increased to 2,500,000, whilst freight and mail carriage also increased, to 194,960 and 63,760 tons, respectively. By this time, Aeroflot's route network covered
14008-581: The period of the eighth five-year plan, which ran from 1966 to 1970, Aeroflot carried a total of 302,200,000 passengers, 6.47 billion tons of freight and 1.63 billion tons of mail. During the five-year plan period, all-Union services were extended over an additional 350 routes; an additional 1,000 MVL routes were begun, and 40 new routes were opened up with all-cargo flights. In 1967, the Ilyushin Il-62 and Tupolev Tu-134 were introduced, and in September 1968
14144-496: The period up to 2028 and 20 had been built, 6 in 2023. The first aircraft was delivered to the Soviet Air Force in June 1974 and subsequently became the main Soviet strategic transport aircraft. From 1976, it was operated by Aeroflot . Between 1979 and 1991, Soviet Air Force Il-76s made 14,700 flights into Afghanistan, transporting 786,200 servicemen and 315,800 tons of freight. The Il-76 carried 89% of Soviet troops and 74% of
14280-455: The population aged 15 and above, could read and write well in Russian, and understand the spoken language. In October 2023, Kazakhstan drafted a media law aimed at increasing the use of the Kazakh language over Russian, the law stipulates that the share of the state language on television and radio should increase from 50% to 70%, at a rate of 5% per year, starting in 2025. In Kyrgyzstan , Russian
14416-418: The population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 67% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. According to the 2019 Belarusian census , out of 9,413,446 inhabitants of the country, 5,094,928 (54.1% of the total population) named Belarusian as their native language, with 61.2% of ethnic Belarusians and 54.5% of ethnic Poles declaring Belarusian as their native language. In everyday life in
14552-492: The post-Soviet era, dropping from 5,400 planes in 1991 to 115 in 1996. In 1995, Boris Berezovsky played a key role in a management reshuffle that led to Nikolai Glushkov becoming CFO of the company. The two were later accused of embezzling $ 700 million from the airline, laundering the money through two Swiss companies, Forus and Andava. In 2010, CHF51 million in frozen assets in Swiss bank accounts were returned to Aeroflot. In
14688-475: The pronunciation of ultra-short or reduced /ŭ/ , /ĭ/ . Because of many technical restrictions in computing and also because of the unavailability of Cyrillic keyboards abroad, Russian is often transliterated using the Latin alphabet. For example, мороз ('frost') is transliterated moroz , and мышь ('mouse'), mysh or myš' . Once commonly used by the majority of those living outside Russia, transliteration
14824-466: The proper pronunciation of uncommon words or names. Russian is an East Slavic language of the wider Indo-European family . It is a descendant of Old East Slavic , a language used in Kievan Rus' , which was a loose conglomerate of East Slavic tribes from the late 9th to the mid-13th centuries. From the point of view of spoken language , its closest relatives are Ukrainian , Belarusian , and Rusyn ,
14960-524: The purpose of civil aviation planning in the Soviet Union. As a result of the commission's plans, Glavvozdukhflot (Russian: Главвоздухфлот (Главное управление воздушного флота) , Chief Administration of the Civil Air Fleet) was established, and it began mail and passenger flights on the Moscow- Oryol - Kursk - Kharkov route on 1 May 1921 using Sikorsky Ilya Muromets aircraft. This was followed by
15096-615: The relationship with Sabre in 2010. On 29 July 2004, a new corporate slogan was adopted: "Sincerely Yours. Aeroflot". In April 2006, Aeroflot became the tenth airline to join SkyTeam , and the first air carrier in the former Soviet Union to do so. The company announced plans to increase cargo operations. It registered the Aeroflot-Cargo trademark in 2006. Aeroflot became the sole shareholder of Donavia —a domestic airline then-named Aeroflot-Don —in December 2006, when it boosted its stake in
15232-797: The reported first steps of PLAAF developing long-range transportation capability. Syrian Air Force Il-76s, operating as civil Syrianair aircraft, have been reportedly used to ship weapons, money, and other cargo from Russia and Iran to Syria, according to a defected Syrian military pilot. Since the start of the war, in April 2011 (and up to July 2012), around 20 military flights have been conducted to and from Tehran , via Iraqi airspace. Further information exposes that since around 2012, Syrian Il-76s have regularly flown to Moscow's Vnukovo Airport to fetch shipments of Syrian banknotes that have been useful to Bashar al-Assad 's government to survive international sanctions . On 30 January 2017, an Il-76 firebomber of
15368-491: The respondents), while according to the 2002 census – 142.6 million people (99.2% of the respondents). In Ukraine , Russian is a significant minority language. According to estimates from Demoskop Weekly, in 2004 there were 14,400,000 native speakers of Russian in the country, and 29 million active speakers. 65% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 38% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. On 5 September 2017, Ukraine's Parliament passed
15504-594: The right to use a plane from its fleet. Within a year, capital expanded from 2 million rubles to 5 million rubles. The airline primarily used aircraft made by Junkers . Regular flights by Dobrolyot from Moscow to Nizhniy Novgorod commenced on 15 July 1923. In 1923, an agreement was signed establishing a subdivision of Dobrolyot based in Tashkent , operating to points in Soviet Central Asia . Services between Tashkent and Alma Ata began on 27 April 1924, and by
15640-514: The route network covered 349,200 kilometres (217,000 mi), and the airline carried 8,231,500 passengers, and 445,600 tons of mail and freight, with fifteen percent of all-Union services being operated by jet aircraft. Aeroflot introduced the Antonov An-10 and Ilyushin Il-18 in 1959, and together with its existing jet aircraft, the airline was able to extend services on modern aircraft to twenty one cities by 1960. The Tupolev Tu-114 , then
15776-493: The same time as the Il-12, and was operated on routes from Moscow to Yakutsk , Khabarovsk , Vladivostok, Alma Ata, Tashkent, Sochi , Mineralnye Vody and Tbilisi. By 1950, the Il-18 was withdrawn from service, replaced by Il-12s. MVL and general aviation services received a boost in March 1948, when the first Antonov An-2s were delivered and entered service in Central Russia . Development of MVL services over latter years
15912-537: The strategic air transport reserve, ready to provide immediate airlift support to the armed forces. Short-range aircraft and helicopters were available for appropriate military support missions. After the Dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, service expanded significantly. Up until that time, Aeroflot had been the only establishment providing air services throughout the Soviet Union, but with its breakup Aeroflot branches of these countries began their own services, and
16048-675: The survey carried out by RATING in August 2023 in the territory controlled by Ukraine and among the refugees, almost 60% of the polled usually speak Ukrainian at home, about 30% – Ukrainian and Russian, only 9% – Russian. Since March 2022, the use of Russian in everyday life has been noticeably decreasing. For 82% of respondents, Ukrainian is their mother tongue, and for 16%, Russian is their mother tongue. IDPs and refugees living abroad are more likely to use both languages for communication or speak Russian. Nevertheless, more than 70% of IDPs and refugees consider Ukrainian to be their native language. In
16184-459: The syntax of Russian dialects." After 1917, Marxist linguists had no interest in the multiplicity of peasant dialects and regarded their language as a relic of the rapidly disappearing past that was not worthy of scholarly attention. Nakhimovsky quotes the Soviet academicians A.M Ivanov and L.P Yakubinsky, writing in 1930: The language of peasants has a motley diversity inherited from feudalism. On its way to becoming proletariat peasantry brings to
16320-640: The transportation of passengers, but monopolised all civil aviation activities within the Soviet Union . Apart from passenger transportation that covered a domestic network of over 3,600 villages, towns and cities, activities undertaken by the airline that were labelled as "non-transport tasks" included air ambulance ; aerial application ; heavy lifting for the Soviet Space Agency ; offshore oil platform support; exploration and aeromagnetic survey for natural resources; support for construction projects; transport of military troops and supplies (as an adjunct to
16456-770: The two. Others divide the language into three groupings, Northern , Central (or Middle), and Southern , with Moscow lying in the Central region. The Northern Russian dialects and those spoken along the Volga River typically pronounce unstressed /o/ clearly, a phenomenon called okanye ( оканье ). Besides the absence of vowel reduction, some dialects have high or diphthongal /e⁓i̯ɛ/ in place of Proto-Slavic * ě and /o⁓u̯ɔ/ in stressed closed syllables (as in Ukrainian) instead of Standard Russian /e/ and /o/ , respectively. Another Northern dialectal morphological feature
16592-631: The type. From 2004 onwards, a number of aircraft in commercial service were modernized to the Il-76TD-90VD version; this involved the adoption of the newly developed PS-90 engine to comply with European noise limitations. In 2005, the People's Republic of China placed an order for 34 new Il-76MDs and four Il-78 tankers. In June 2013, Russian military export agency Rosoboronexport announced an order by China for 12 Il-76MD aircraft. The Il-76 has also been modified into an airborne refuelling tanker , designated
16728-506: The use of the language has some presence in certain areas. A large part of the population, especially the older generations, can speak Russian as a foreign language. However, English has replaced Russian as lingua franca in Lithuania and around 80% of young people speak English as their first foreign language. In contrast to the other two Baltic states, Lithuania has a relatively small Russian-speaking minority (5.0% as of 2008). According to
16864-690: The world's ninth-most spoken language by total number of speakers . Russian is one of two official languages aboard the International Space Station , one of the six official languages of the United Nations , as well as the fourth most widely used language on the Internet . Russian is written using the Russian alphabet of the Cyrillic script ; it distinguishes between consonant phonemes with palatal secondary articulation and those without—the so-called "soft" and "hard" sounds. Almost every consonant has
17000-483: The world's largest airliner, entered service with the Soviet carrier on 24 April 1961 on the Moscow- Khabarovsk route; covering a distance of 6,980 kilometres (4,340 mi) in 8 hours 20 minutes. The expansion of the Aeroflot fleet saw services with modern aircraft being extended to forty one cities in 1961, with fifty percent of all-Union services being operated by these aircraft. This fleet expansion also saw
17136-644: Was 35,000 kilometres (22,000 mi) in length out of a total network of 93,300 kilometres (58,000 mi). The agreement between the Soviet Union and Germany relating to Deruluft expired on 1 January 1937 and wasn't renewed, which saw the joint venture carrier ceasing operations on 1 April 1937. On that date Aeroflot began operations on the Moscow to Stockholm route, and began operating the ex-Deruluft route from Leningrad to Riga utilising Douglas DC-3s and Tupolev ANT-35s (PS-35s). Flights from Moscow to Berlin, via Königsberg, were suspended until 1940, when they were restarted by Aeroflot and Deutsche Luft Hansa as
17272-449: Was attributed to the An-2, which was operated by Aeroflot in all areas of the Soviet Union. Aeroflot's route network had extended to 295,400 kilometres (183,600 mi) by 1950, and it carried 1,603,700 passengers, 151,070 tonnes (333,050,000 lb) of freight and 30,580 tonnes (67,420,000 lb) of mail that year. Night flights began in the same year, and the fifth five-year plan, covering
17408-453: Was conceived by Ilyushin in 1967 to meet a requirement for a freighter able to carry a payload of 40 tonnes (88,000 lb) over a range of 5,000 kilometres (2,700 nmi; 3,100 mi) in less than six hours, able to operate from short and unprepared airstrips, and capable of coping with the worst weather conditions likely to be experienced in Siberia and the Soviet Union's Arctic regions. It
17544-405: Was first introduced in North America when Russian explorers voyaged into Alaska and claimed it for Russia during the 18th century. Although most Russian colonists left after the United States bought the land in 1867, a handful stayed and preserved the Russian language in this region to this day, although only a few elderly speakers of this unique dialect are left. In Nikolaevsk, Alaska , Russian
17680-421: Was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 19% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. According to the 2014 Moldovan census , Russians accounted for 4.1% of Moldova's population, 9.4% of the population declared Russian as their native language, and 14.5% said they usually spoke Russian. According to the 2010 census in Russia , Russian language skills were indicated by 138 million people (99.4% of
17816-481: Was formed in imitation of the Russian Merchant Navy Volunteer Fleet, Dobroflot , formed in 1878. According to its charter, it was formed "for the development of the civil air fleet within the USSR by organizing air lines for the transportation of passengers, mail and cargo, aerial photography and other areas of air fleet application based on the domestic aviation industry". The idea to create
17952-556: Was founded on 8 March 1923. In February and March 1923, resolutions of the Council of Labour and Defence and the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union created civil aviation services in the Soviet Union , including the formation of 3 airlines: Dobrolyot in March 1923, Ukrvozdukhput in April 1923, based in Kharkov , and Zakavia in May 1923, based in Tiflis . Dobrolyot
18088-538: Was intended to replace the Antonov An-12 . Another project design for a double-decked 250-passenger airliner was cancelled. The Il-76 first flew in March ;1971 ( 1971-03 ) . Production of Il-76s was allocated to the Tashkent Aviation Production Association in Tashkent , Uzbekistan , then a republic of the Soviet Union . Some 860 of the basic transport variants were manufactured. In
18224-448: Was one of the largest airlines in the world . In 1992, following the dissolution of the Soviet Union , Aeroflot was divided into approximately 400 regional airlines informally known as Babyflots and was restructured into an open joint-stock company . It has a market share in Russia of approximately 39%. Including subsidiaries , the company carried 47.3 million passengers in 2023. Aeroflot also owns Rossiya Airlines and Pobeda ,
18360-458: Was registered as a joint-stock company and the government sold off 49% of its stake to Aeroflot employees. In the 1990s, Aeroflot was primarily focused on international flights from Moscow. However, by the end of the decade Aeroflot started an expansion in the domestic market. In 2000, the company name was changed to Aeroflot – Russian Airlines to reflect the change in the company strategy. The Aeroflot fleet shrank dramatically in
18496-402: Was the sixth-most used language on the top 1,000 sites, behind English, Chinese, French, German, and Japanese. Despite leveling after 1900, especially in matters of vocabulary and phonetics, a number of dialects still exist in Russia. Some linguists divide the dialects of Russian into two primary regional groupings, "Northern" and "Southern", with Moscow lying on the zone of transition between
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