Rich Russians, of whom Russian Forbs often writes, are people with oddities, and they have money for these quirks. We have already written about the houses in which Russian billionaires live and on which yachts move around the seas and oceans. It's time to take a closer look at one more almost obligatory attribute of the oligarchs' image - their own planes.

To attribute a personal airplane to the category of fads, however, will not always be the right decision. Sometimes your own liner is needed simply because "time is more expensive than money." In addition, personal jet is often not the property of physical persons - it can be rented or owned by a corporation that provides it to the business owner.
In the fleet of Russian billionaires, there are a variety of aircraft models - from the Yak-142 to the Boeing 767-300 and army helicopters. The capacious long-haul Boeing and Airbus are used for long-distance flights. However, they are extremely expensive to maintain, and therefore less popular Falcon, Gulfstream and Bombardier are more popular with billionaires. In total, according to some data, in Russia there are about 500 private VIP-planes.

According to the VIP passengers themselves, they primarily need safety, reliability, speed and a certain level of comfort from aircraft. Oligarchs understand for what purposes they need airplanes, and equip them for the tasks and their tastes, which makes the interiors of aircraft often reflect the individuality of their owners. Someone from the rich draws a plane in the style of hi-tech, someone likes golden eastern luxury and expensive carpets, someone arranges a picture gallery from originals or a library. In addition, there are originals, in which the aircraft inside looks like a hut or a restaurant.

There are also adherents of a healthy way of life, arranging a gym with treadmills and exercise bikes on the plane. However, in the decoration there are restrictions - so, it is forbidden to install billiard tables, heavy baths, and also use fire-hazardous and bulky materials (for example, marble). In general, the individual decoration of the cabin in Switzerland usually takes one to two years and up to $ 20 million. The content of the air lock costs 3-5% of its cost per year and depends on the country of registration.

Who, how and with whom flies

A private fleet of airplanes is divided into a fleet of large airliners that are sent to fly only by permission of the dispatch services, and small aircraft departing only with notification. All of them can be both private and corporate property. There is also a lease business aviation used by businessmen and officials - however, officials often use voyage airplanes. On rented planes, flights are not cheap: the average check is one million rubles or more. There is also a price list for the most frequently booked routes: for example, the rates for renting a four-seater plane from Moscow to and fro from Courchevel are from 40,000 euros, to the Maldives from 80,000 euros, to Nice and Paris from 30,000. Euro. It is clear that all these services are not for the poor.

It is significant that almost all flying business equipment, both private and corporate, is usually registered offshore and does not pay Russian taxes, although it is based in the Russian Federation.
The cost of servicing private planes, including flights themselves, can range from $ 100,000 to several million a year. Standard for calculations: four pilots, one engineer, two or three stewardesses and one manager. By the way, about the staff: monthly salaries of pilots in business aviation are 12-15 thousand dollars, flight attendants - 2.5-5 thousand, but this money is given to them by hard work: the stewardess must have a foreign language, the basics of psychology, medical skills, understand In wines and kitchens of different peoples, and at the same time in detergents, with the help of which the salon is serviced. Ordering meals on board (popular restaurant "Pushkin" on Tverskoy Boulevard) and bringing order and cleanliness in airplanes - this is also the responsibility of the flight attendant. High loads on the body often lead to occupational diseases of flight attendants: forgetfulness due to oxygen starvation, infertility, oncological diseases, varicose, etc. That's it - either health or money. By the way, for this money and IQ require, well, appearance, of course, should be attractive, so that against the background of an expensive airplane looked adequately.

The oligarchs privatize the airports

Vnukovo-3 in Vnukovo is the largest business airport in Europe. On average, it runs 35-40 thousand private flights a year, which is 90% of all Russian business flights. The complex for servicing business-class and VIP-passengers is under a 24-hour security guard. Departures and arrivals of VIP-planes are not announced and do not appear in the timetables, and VIP-passengers fly and fly through special terminals where no one sees them. By the number of flights in a certain direction it is possible to form an opinion on what is happening in the business community. For example, compared to 2014 in the last 2016, the flights to France were reduced by 30%, the number of flights to Ukraine dropped almost to zero. But the number of flights to Malta increased from 39 to 120. Curiously, why would it?

Vnukova-3 has one more feature. This port is used by those who need to leave the country as soon as possible. It was from here not so long ago that the president of Antalbank, Magomed Mukhiyev, suspected of stealing 30 billion rubles, wanted to fly away on a rental aircraft. It seems that it was from here that the banker Borodin also started, accused of embezzling 62 billion rubles in the Bank of Moscow, as well as a number of other masters who outstripped the prosecutor's office. From there he flew off, loaded with antiques, paintings and even beehives, ex-mayor of Moscow Yuri Luzhkov. From the same airport rich people fly abroad to doctors and cosmetologists.

BTW

In 2013, Dmitry Medvedev signed a decree on the withdrawal of the state from the ownership of the airport Vnukovo. One of the main advantages of this port is its high profitability. At one time, Moscow wanted to get a port, it did not work. However, the capital of the capital has invested in it decent, and in recent years in Vnukovo-3 the state budget has been invested a lot.
Airports are strategic objects, which makes them, as a rule, in state property. However, the government of Medvedev does not think so, by deliberately passing the largest airports under the oligarchic administration. The groups of airports of Viktor Vekselberg and Oleg Deripaska have already formed.

Thus, the state loses revenues from airports and refuses in favor of the oligarchs from a strategic resource. Forbes on the privatization of Vnukov said that private shareholders will own a controlling stake, consolidated by Vnukovo International Airport (75%), in which Skoch, co-owner of USM holdings Usmanov, will hold 81%. Private traders will have an option to buy out the remaining 25-30% of the state's shares. Vnukovo can later enter USM Holdings Alisher Usmanov. The scheme is simple: in response to the investment of relatively small funds, the oligarchs will receive a huge piece of state property. This is not only the airport, but also the railway access, and the highway, and the surrounding infrastructure, and the land in the directions where the Russian business elite mainly reside: Rublyovskoye, Mozhaiskoye and Novorizhskoye shosse. What is not the continuation of collateral auctions?

Favorite airplanes of oligarchs:

1. Airbus A340-300.
Owner - Alisher Usmanov
The cost is $ 350 million.
Alisher Usmanov has several aircraft, but the Airbus A340-300 is the largest of them. $ 112 million was spent on its re-equipment. The aircraft has four engines, the range of its flight is 13,500 kilometers. In the world of such aircraft there are no more than 30. The liner is named after the father of the oligarch "Burkhan" (the yacht of the oligarch is named after his mother). The board number M-IABU in the "translation", apparently, stands for "Isle of Man, I-AB. Usmanov ".

2. Boeing 767-300ER.
Owner - Roman Abramovich
The cost is 191 million dollars.
It is known that the aircraft is registered in the offshore Aruba (Caribbean, Netherlands). The range of this Boeing flight is 11 thousand kilometers. Capacity of the liner -
245 passengers. The aircraft is sometimes called a "bandit" for the characteristic black "glasses" at the cockpit and a dark strip along the aircraft. In addition to Boeing, Abramovich also has other private planes.

3. Airbus A319 M-RBUS.
Owner - Mikhail Prokhorov
This is a large 6-year-old liner with dynamic coloring and callsign Silver Arrows. The length of the plane on which the politician and the billionaire prefers to fly is 33.8 meters, the wingspan is 35.8 meters. The cabin can accommodate up to 156 passengers. The catalog cost is 88.6 million dollars. However, the interior of the liner is most likely specially altered for the needs of the owner.

4. Airbus A319-133.
Owner - Dmitry Rybolovlev
The cost is 86 million dollars.
The liner has an onboard M-KATE number in honor of the daughter of the oligarch Catherine. In a standard airplane, up to 156 passengers can be accommodated, the business modification takes on board up to 19 people, the flight range up to 12 thousand kilometers. Dmitry Rybolovlev was one of the first to deal with securities and buy them. He is fond of collecting works of the Impressionists, lives in Monaco. The basis of his fortune is the funds received from the sale of Uralkali.

5. Airbus A319-115 CJ.
Owner - Andrey Skoch
The cost is $ 50 million.
Through his father, who is the ninth in the world and whose business is rewritten, Skoch participates in USM Holdings, the main owner of which is Alisher Usmanov. Also, Skoch owns a significant stake in Vnukovo airport. USM Holdings unites metallurgical, telecommunication and Internet assets of partners.

6. Gulfstream
Owner - Vladimir Potanin
The cost is 33 million dollars.
The aircraft is designed for 19 passengers. Its altitude is 15 kilometers, the flight range is 12,5 thousand kilometers, the speed is 850 kilometers per hour. Potanin worked in the structures of the Ministry of Foreign Trade of the USSR, established the foreign economic association Interros, sold natural resources, created ONEKSIM Bank (probably with the use of CPSU money), gave birth to the idea of ​​mortgage auctions, and through them, for small borrowed money, the Sidanko oil company, Novorossiysk Shipping Company and Norilsk Nickel. The capital was earned at Norilsk Nickel, Rosbank and on the purchase and resale of assets.

7. Bombardier BD-700 Global Express. Owner - Victor Vekselberg
The cost is $ 23 million.
Vekselberg is the founder of the Russian-American JV Renova and the aluminum holding SUAL. His fortune is estimated at 12.4 billion dollars. Viktor Vekselberg's big earnings went after purchasing the generating capacities (IES-Holding) and overstating the tariffs for the services provided and actively working with the Skolkovo Information Center, which is very generously financed by the Finance Ministry. According to Ruspres, if the Investigative Committee is actively engaged in IC, then VF. Can really urgently need an airplane. However, Viktor Vekselberg is a member of many public organizations and enjoys the support of the board of trustees of the Skolkovo Foundation, which includes Dmitry Medvedev, Vladislav Surkov and Arkady Dvorkovich, so he seems to be trusted.

8. Boeing 737-7BJ / W BBJ.
Owner - Suleiman Kerimov
The cost is $ 50 million.
The model is designed for 19 passengers, the flight range is 9300 kilometers at a speed of 850 kilometers per hour. Kerimov still has Gulfstream G-V for 35 million. The Kerimov family owns a 61% stake in Polyus (the former Polyus Gold), the largest gold producer in Russia, and the international airport of Makhachkala. In addition, Kerimov owns Nafta Moscow. In 2015, Kerimov sold the hotel "Moscow". The state did it by investing in growing stocks. Since 2008 - Member of the Federation Council from Dagestan.

9. Boeing 737-7BJ / W BBJ.
Owner - Rustam Tariko
The same jet is owned by the bank and vodka brand "Russian Standard" Rustam Tariko. Now the company Tariko "Rust" growth in sales of vodka, but the bank "Russian Standard", according to "Utronews", is unsteady. The bank owes about 70 billion rubles, the reason is debts on loans provided in foreign currency. Tariko has already sold his favorite yacht, but he still holds the plane - all of a sudden it will be needed.