Comment: Waking up in another world 

Appeal for peace under an An-124 in Linz (Foro: Michael David).
Appeal for peace under an An-124 in Linz (Foro: Michael David).

Comment: Waking up in another world 

Appeal for peace under an An-124 in Linz (Foro: Michael David).
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It's 10:00 am yesterday morning when my phone rings, incoming FaceTime call; where he comes from(?), from Asunción - Paraguay more than 10000km away from home soil. "War? In Europe? What's going on with you? Here it was just on the morning news."

(Almost) the whole world has been holding its breath since yesterday, even in the most remote areas, on the other side of the globe one has heard this terrible news, the now sad certainty of what has been looming for several weeks.

Something that many generations, mine included, only know from history classes, from books, films or from stories told by your grandparents is bitter reality. There are various forecasts of what the consequences for the global economy will be, some more or less gloomy. Rising oil and energy prices are already on the horizon and once again one industry is likely to be hit the hardest – aviation/tourism.

Days in advance, lessors and airlines had taken a large part of their aircraft out of what was then a crisis zone and today's war zone. While the planes of Ukraine International have been flown to Spain, among other places, the Boeings of the Ukrainian Bees are based in France.

As one of the last civilian flights, the crew of the Antonov 124 UR-82007 took off

just before midnight on the night of Monday to Tuesday, just in time, as has now been shown, from the home port of Kiev-Hostomel. When the crew reached their destination in distant Asia 11 hours later, all hell had already broken loose at home.

In a first reaction, the UK regulator first decided to state-owned Aeroflot, shortly thereafter to ban any aircraft registered in Russia from entering and overflying, the same reaction Russia followed immediately this morning. It is to be feared that this is only the beginning. A good 10 days ago, when I was sitting at the neighboring gate of a flight to Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine, it was already noticeable, an unusual calm, there was tension at the gate before departure, the travelers stared at their mobile devices even more than usual, now a few days later they are exactly these people on/in the war zone, hard to imagine.

Ukrainian crews looking at their phones with worry and anxiety, far from home, like them Antonov crews from Linz, crews stuck in Ukraine, these are all just unbelievable notions.

It is to be hoped that this unspeakable madness will be ended immediately and immediately, that the unbearable suffering must be stopped now; Or to put it in the words of Willy Brandt more than 30 years ago:

"Peace is not everything, but everything is nothing without peace"

We will also report further facts collected, but without participating in rumours, speculation or unclear facts.

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Editor of this article:

Steffen Lorenz was a flight attendant at various airlines for several decades and has been part of the Aviation.Direct editorial team since October 2021 in the areas of product tests and trip reports.
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About the editor

Steffen Lorenz was a flight attendant at various airlines for several decades and has been part of the Aviation.Direct editorial team since October 2021 in the areas of product tests and trip reports.
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Nobody likes paywalls
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Information should be free for everyone, but good journalism costs a lot of money.

If you enjoyed this article, you can check Aviation.Direct voluntary for a cup of coffee Coffee trail (for them it's free to use).

In doing so, you support the journalistic work of our independent specialist portal for aviation, travel and tourism with a focus on the DA-CH region voluntarily without a paywall requirement.

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