Russian airline warns of critical jet fuel shortage, says flights have lost ‘all economic rationale’

Russia is facing a critical jet fuel shortage that has made operating flights “economically pointless,” Azimuth Airlines said in a statement to the Association of Air Transport Operators, cited by the aviation Telegram channel Aviatorshchina.

In early June, the airline’s primary jet fuel supplier notified it of plans to cut deliveries by roughly a third of the contracted volume, citing “force majeure circumstances at oil refineries” and a resulting reduction in jet fuel supply on the market.

Alternative suppliers, Azimuth said, also lack the necessary fuel volumes.

Prices have spiked sharply alongside the shortage. Since the beginning of June, jet fuel prices at Russian airports have risen by an average of 17%, and in Makhachkala the price of kerosene has jumped 64%, reaching 157,000 rubles.

Under these conditions, Azimuth said, carrying out its planned flight schedule “loses all economic rationale” — on both international and domestic routes. The airline asked the association to appeal to the Energy Ministry to take measures to stabilize the situation.

Russia’s fuel crisis began in late May 2026 amid intensified Ukrainian attacks on oil refineries. As a result of the strikes, Reuters reported that gasoline production in the country fell by about 25 percent between June 15 and 21 compared with the average daily level in June 2025. Restrictions on fuel sales for cars have been introduced in central Russia, as well as in the Irkutsk, Omsk, and Novosibirsk regions, and in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug — Russia’s main oil-producing region.

Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak, speaking at a meeting with Vladimir Putin, described the situation on the domestic market as “difficult but under control,” and characterized the shortages as “periodic logistical problems in certain regions and at certain gas stations.”