ULYANOVSK, Volga Region, August 3 (AVN) - The order on the production of one AN-124 Ruslan plane from the Volga-Dnieper aircraft company will be postponed, Valery Maltsev, executive director of the Aviastar-SP JSC, told the Military News Agency on Friday.
The reason for the delay is the debt of the Volga-Dnieper company to the enterprise estimated at almost RUR70m (USD2.38m).
At the same time the Polyot aircraft production enterprise which uses AN-124 planes repairs four of them at the Aviastar-SP company. The planes were supplied by the Air Force and one of them is already repaired though it will remain at the company until the debt is extinguished. The Polyot enterprise debts are almost the same as the Volga-Dnieper enterprise's ones.
Currently civil airlines which use AN-124 planes will take aircraft from the Air Force which have no money to maintain AN-112 planes at combat readiness level, Maltsev said. Former military transport planes are being modernised by the Aviastar-SP enterprise up to the level of certified AN-124-100 plane which is much cheaper for the company than supplies of the new one.
At present the Aviastar-SP enterprise has two non-completed AN-124 planes though it is ready to restore the production at any time, Maltsev added. Moreover, the enterprise is discussing possibilities of further loading of its mothballed production facilities. Particularly, the enterprise is making technical and economic documents on the serial production of 100-seat short range TU-334 plane. The enterprise is also participating in the tender on AN-70 plane production.