This Russian plane has racked up $93K in parking fees at Pearson airport

“To save you doing the math,” GTAA spokesperson Ryan White, wrote to the Star in an email, “it works out to $1,065.60 for each 24-hour period.”

Given that it’s been grounded since late February, that amounts to nearly $93,000, not including HST.

While it’s unclear whether Volga Dnepr Group, the Russian aviation company that owns the flying behemoth, has paid anything so far — or, if the GTAA has even attempted to send it a bill — what we do know for sure is that the Canadian government has no plans to let this jet leave its “slot” on Canadian soil anytime soon.

“The aircraft is unable to depart in Canadian territorial airspace as it would be in violation of the Notice to Airmen (NOTAM),” Transport Canada said, in an email to the Star. “The NOTAM remains in place, and there are no plans to make revisions or change the NOTAM at this time.”

As part of its sanctions against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine earlier this year, Canada joined the rest of the west in closing its skies to all “Russian-owned, chartered or operated aircraft, including in the airspace above Canada’s territorial waters,” on Feb. 27, Transport Canada wrote to the Star in an email.

That includes almost anything that flies, regardless of where it was registered, chartered, leased, directly or indirectly, the email said, as well as any and everyone who operates those flying things, if they hold an “Air Operator Certificate issued by Russian Federation authorities.”

The Antonov An-124 Ruslan arrived in Canada on the same day sanctions were announced and has remained parked at Pearson ever since.

Neither the GTAA nor Transport Canada will say what happened to the pilot or the passengers. In an email to the Star, Elena Boykova, marketing communications specialist for the Volga-Dnepr Group, declined to comment for this article.

At the moment, Transport Canada said, this plane is the only aircraft impacted right now by the ban. In March, it said it fined two pilots and a Russian national after a plane landed in Yellowknife. Transport Canada said they had broken Canadian aviation regulations. The plane however, according to the transportation agency, was able to leave Canada because it was not Russian-owned.

Designed by Oleg Antonov in the 1970s, the Antonov An-124 is a “heavy strategic military transport airplane,” according to the Antonov website, and took its first flight in 1982. Right now, the site says, it is “the world’s largest production transport airplane” in existence.

With wings that stretch 73.3 metres wide — a football field is about 91 metres wide — the Antonov An-124 jets (there are several in existence) are designed to carry 150 tonnes, according to the plane’s specs on the Antonov website. The average car, according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, weighs about 1.8 tonnes.

While other cargo jets can carry giant packages, such as helicopters and satellites, the Antonov An-124, the Antonov site says, can carry them whole. They do not need to be broken down into parts before being ferried across the sky, the website says. In 1994, plane enthusiasts watched as it swallowed “an entire GM Diesel Division locomotive being shipped to Dublin, Ireland,” according to an article in the Hamilton Spectator at the time.

In 2012, animal handlers at the Toronto Zoo considered the Antonov to fly three of its elephants to their new home, an 80-acre sanctuary in California, in its belly. The elephants — which on average can weigh up to seven tonnes — eventually left Canada by truck, the Star wrote at the time, because the aircraft wasn’t available when the elephants were finally cleared to leave.

For now, this particular jet is hemmed inside a secured area on an unused portion of Pearson’s airfield, according to White, and continues to rack up an ever-larger bill, by the minute.

The GTAA’s current aeronautical fee schedule says that invoices are sent out twice annually, with an “exemption granted to carriers with less than 10 slots per person.” It is unclear whether or not that is applicable to this particular cargo jet.

The GTAA does not publicly disclose the terms of its “commercial dealings with other entities,” White wrote to the Star in an email, “so I’m unable to provide more information on that topic.”