The worldwide Civil Aviation Organization, the U.N.’s air-safety arm, said Friday it had been informed that a few carriers had opted to take alternative routes.
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Russian Federation says the missile strikes are part of an operation aimed against Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (Isil).
Russia’s announcement that it had fired cruise missiles from the Caspian Sea against Syrian targets-nearly 1,000 miles away-prompted the European Aviation Safety Agency to issue a safety information bulletin to airlines on October. 9.
Eurocontrol, the pan European air traffic control agency told airlines there had been no significant change within Europe but officials from the organisation and the ICAO have met to draw up contingency plans in event of further disruptions.
Prior to that, Russian ships in the Caspian Sea were considered only as a local force, but now it has become clear that Kalibr high-precision cruise missile systems, which are similar to the US Tomahawk, can be also launched from small craft, such as Buyan-M missile corvettes. If the routes end up being labeled as unsafe, up to 800 flights a day could be affected, the Wall Street Journal reported.
The agency says it has no specific recommendations at this point and was issuing the bulletin to inform airspace users about the potential hazard.
Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 over Ukraine previous year that killed the 298 people on board.
But any collision could have catastrophic consequences, and there have already been claims – denied by the Kremlin – that four of the Russian missiles have gone off course. and landed in Iran.
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The flights, which Russian Federation previously has said aren’t provocative, have prompted European militaries to launch jet fighters to identify the aircraft.
