How to Fix North Korea's Dangerous Airline

skytrax is considered to be the global Authority when it comes to Airline rankings and in its history it's awarded just one carrier a one star review the worst review possible that dishonor belongs to air chorio the flag carrier of North Korea now a lot of people in the aviation Community actually quite like flying this Airline as it operates a fleet of rare vintage aircraft but there's no denying that its planes are old ill-kept and unreliable safe to say flying the airline is dangerous now to be fair air choreo hasn't suffered a fatal crash since the 80s at least not that we know of but the Great Western Powers have practically banned them from buying new aircraft meaning they have to keep flying these old rickety Jets so is there anything North Korea can do to upgrade its Fleet or is catastrophe bound to strike let me explain real quick folks YouTube is still telling me less than 20 of the people watching this video are actually subscribed to the channel so make sure you hit that button and Bell so we can build the absolute best community in aviation together first let's talk about the composition of air choreo's fleet right now the airline flies some of the oldest aircraft on Earth its average jet is over 30 years old and its oldest is 43 but age alone doesn't Define a plane's airworthiness after all there are plenty of reputable airlines that operate aging aircraft Delta is one of them who flies dozens of 757s that were built in the 90s but these planes have been so well maintained that they aren't considered a safety hazard the same cannot be said for air choreo in 2006 the EU outright banned the airline from operating in its airspace citing serious deficiencies when it comes to maintenance you see air choreo is faced with a unique maintenance challenge the vast majority of its aircraft were built by the Soviets at the end of the Cold War meaning finding spare parts is quite difficult and since these parts are so rare it also makes them incredibly expensive now North Korea is one of the most impoverished Nations on Earth so they don't have the resources or ability to stockpile these parts and at the end of the day this results in an unsafe flying environment it's abundantly clear that air choreo needs to buy new planes but that's easier said than done the airline is wholly owned and operated by the state of North Korea which is known for being a bit cantankerous in the International Community this has led to strict sanctions and those sanctions extend to the purchase of new aircraft today North Korea can't do business with Boeing Airbus or Embraer the world's three biggest airplane makers now this definitely makes buy new planes much harder but it's not impossible there are three solutions that might help North Korea circumvent sanctions and upgrade its Fleet solution number one sees them turn to its greatest Ally China like North Korea China has an unsteady relationship with the West as such they've poured billions of dollars into comac its state-run airplane maker comac's ultimate goal is to reduce Chinese dependence on bowing and Airbus while also breaking their long-standing duopoly but comac is still a fairly young Enterprise and today they've only developed two aircraft the arj-21 and the c919 while both aircraft show promised they've also suffered a fair share of problems including reliability issues program delays and performance shortfalls for most Airlines these are huge red flags but for North Korea these teething issues actually present a golden opportunity you see comac hasn't been able to earn the business of a single International customer as a matter of fact these are its only customers so far and all of these airlines are owned by the Chinese government the jet maker has zero experience working with International Airlines and they need to learn to do so if they ever want to become a major player this is where North Korea comes in the country could serve as its first International testing round helping comac Iron Out The Kinks in a pretty low stakes environment and since comac would essentially be using North Korea as a beta tester they might even give them planes for free this sounds like an idyllic solution right well there's just one problem the arj and the c919 are not a hundred percent made in China both aircraft use western-built engines with the c919 using the popular leap engine that also Powers planes like the 737 Max and the A320 Neo so while North Korea could buy planes from China it couldn't buy the engines needed to actually make them fly but comac has a solution albeit an imperfect one it's currently building its first domestic turbofan dubbed the CJ 1000 that engine will power future c919s and compete with the leap however it won't enter service until 2030 at the earliest and experts agree that that timeline is overly optimistic all in all North Korea will have to wait more than a decade before this option becomes available with the risk of an accident growing each and every day North Korea needs a more immediate solution so let's set aside China for a second and explore option number two North Korea could buy Jets from Antonov While most of air choreo's fleet is old two of its planes are actually quite young these two Jets which are an-148s were built by Antonov in the early 2010s North Korea could theoretically order more of them and they'd be ready quicker than Jets from China the only problem is that Antonov is a Ukrainian company now Ukraine hasn't always imposed strict sanctions on North Korea but in recent years the countries tried to align itself with NATO not a single NATO country does business with the dprk so antonov's appetite to strike up a deal seems low to make matters worse Antonov is a bit preoccupied at the moment they are currently focused on supporting Ukraine's troops in the war against Russia now the war has affected more than just Antonov it's affected just about everyone on Earth with Supply chains already strained due to covid the invasion has pushed the global economy to the brink according to CNN there is now a 98 chance that we're on the doorstep of a recession unsurprisingly the stock market has tumbled with the S P 500 down more than 20 percent this year but while stocks are falling other asset classes are still thriving enter Masterworks today's spawn answer Masterworks is the first platform that lets you buy and sell shares of iconic pieces of art without needing millions of dollars and the returns are pretty compelling so far their investors have realized a 29 return and their latest exit which was just a few months ago saw a return of 33 now this is not Financial advice but if you'd like to learn more about Fine Art investing and how it might protect you during a recession I would encourage you to check out Masterworks and while they usually have a waiting list to join my subscribers can actually skip to the front of the line simply visit the link in the description to check it out and to support my channel speaking of Russia they are North Korea's third and last option like China Russia is an ally to the hermit Kingdom but unlike China Russia's aviation industry is mature critically that means they develop their own engines take the pd-14 for instance this engine is designed and built entirely in Russia and will power the country's newest to domestically built plane the mc21 but doing business with Russia presents its own set of challenges for one Russia wouldn't heavily discount its planes like China would as a matter of fact they'll do the opposite and command a premium ever since Russia launched its war in Ukraine it's been in a bit of an aviation crisis itself while the country does build its own Jets it also leases plenty from the West at the start of 2021 there were over 600 Boeing and Airbus planes being leased to Russian Airlines at the start of the invasion the West imposed sanctions on Russia and these sanctions demanded that these Jets be returned to their lessers Russian carriers however refused to comply as a result no aircraft lesser on Earth wants to do business with them even once sanctions are eventually lifted Russian Airlines will struggle to get their hands on Western built Jets to help combat this impending shortage Russian Playmakers will have to pick up the slack now the historical demand for russian-built jets has never been all that high meaning their operations are comparatively small with this new influx of demand these jet makers simply won't have the bandwidth to sell planes both to Russian Airlines and also to the North Koreans and Russian carriers are going to take priority as such it could be quite some time before North Korea can acquire russian-built Jets without it costing them an arm and a leg so it turns out that none of the three options are all that ideal in the best case scenario Mario air choreo may be able to get its hands on either Russian or Chinese built jets in the mid to late 2030s but at that point its Fleet will be nearing 50 years in age so is all hope lost is air choreo doomed to keep flying dangerous planes well for the time being it sure seems that way however the airline can cling to one piece of hope both tourism and domestic air travel are limited in the country and that's been doubly true during the covid pandemic so while air choreo's planes are old and poorly maintained they don't fly very often compared to American or european carriers who routinely operate single aisle Jets on up to seven flights a day North Korea's planes fly just once or twice the upshot is that they don't experience as much General wear and tear so there Still Remains a chance albeit a remote one that the airline can safely bridge the gap until newer planes can be bought so what do you guys think would you ever fly air choreo in one of their old school Soviet built Jets it honestly sounds like a really really cool experience but I personally don't know if I'd ever take the risk if you've flown to North Korea though I would love to hear about your experience be sure to leave a comment with your story down below thank you so much to my patrons for helping to make this video possible if you like what I do and want to help the channel to grow go ahead and check out this link right here and as always if you learned something new today leave a like And subscribe to keep learning and until I see you again don't forget to look up [Music] foreign

Channel: Coby Explanes

Views: 634,916

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Id: TeKoA02Jbw8

Length: 11min 58sec (718 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 14 2022