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Russia’s premier air show has been canceled because of security concerns over recent drone attacks inside the country. The International Aviation and Space Show, known by its Russian abbreviation MAKS, is held every other year at Zhukovsky International Airport outside Moscow.
While it began as primarily an entertainment event in 1992, MAKS has become an important marketplace over the years for Russian aerospace companies hoping to secure crucial export customers.
Russia’s invasion of neighboring Ukraine has been exceptionally challenging for the country’s aerospace industry, British officials said Sunday.
“The sector is struggling under international sanctions (and) highly-trained specialists are being encouraged to serve as infantry in the Roscosmos space agency’s own militia,” UK military intelligence officials said in their latest assessment of the conflict.
The organizers also were likely aware of the potential for their reputation to be damaged if fewer international delegations attended this year’s MAKS show, British officials said on Twitter.
MAKS had been set for July 25-30. On Sunday, TASS, the official Russian news agency, confirmed that the airshow has been rescheduled for 2024.
“Preparations for the flight program have already been canceled,” a source close to the organizers told TASS.
It had been a tradition for the Russian president and the commander of the country’s aerospace forces to attend the MAKS airshow. But General Sergei Surovikin has not been seen in public since the aborted mutiny led by Wagner Group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin. He was detained following reports that he was a point of contact between Wagner and the Russian defense ministry.
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