Updated with new sanctions on September 19. The last recorded locations of aircraft were most recently updated on June 7.
More than three weeks into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Western countries are tightening sanctions on Russian oligarchs and billionaires. The latest salvo came on March 16, when the British crown dependency of the Isle of Man announced that it had deregistered 18 Russian aircraft since March 3. Forbes found that 11 of those aircraft—including Alisher Usmanov’s $350 million Airbus private jet and five helicopters owned by Roman Abramovich—are owned by sanctioned Russian billionaires.
By scouring aircraft registries and publicly available data, Forbes identified at least 25 jets and 10 helicopters linked to 15 sanctioned Russian-born billionaires. All but five of the aircraft are registered in Aruba, Austria, Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, the Isle of Man, Luxembourg, Monaco, San Marino and the U.K., all of which have implemented EU or U.K. sanctions; one was recently registered in the U.K. until it switched to Russia on February 8. Four are registered in Russia and were previously registered in Bermuda and San Marino, changing countries long before the invasion of Ukraine. Collectively, the 35 aircraft are worth at least $2 billion. Spokespersons for the aircraft registries and authorities in Bermuda, Luxembourg and the Isle of Man told Forbes that they are taking action against aircraft owned by sanctioned individuals.
On March 12, Bermuda announced that its aircraft registry had suspended certificates of airworthiness for 740 “Russian operated aircraft,” meaning they can no longer fly. At least one sanctioned billionaire, Viktor Rashnikov, owns a Gulfstream jet registered in Bermuda. A spokesperson for the Bermuda Civil Aviation Authority told Forbes that the authority “will conduct an investigation” to determine if Rashnikov owns the aircraft.
Other aircraft are in a similar state of limbo, including a Dassault Falcon 7X linked to Alisher Usmanov that’s registered in Luxembourg. According to International Civil Aviation Organization records, the jet is owned by Cyprus-based Windfel Aviation Ltd, which shares several directors and its corporate address with other companies owned by Usmanov. A spokesperson for Luxembourg’s Directorate of Civil Aviation told Forbes on March 22 that the jet’s deregistration “has been initiated but has not yet been completed.”
On March 18, the U.S. Commerce Department identified Abramovich’s Gulfstream G650 jet—registered in Luxembourg and last seen in Moscow on March 15—as one of 100 aircraft that were in “apparent violation of U.S. export controls.” The press release explains that “any person anywhere—including within Russia—risks violating” the export controls by providing “any form of service” to the aircraft, meaning it’s effectively grounded. On March 25, Grant Shapps, the U.K. Secretary of State for Transport, announced that the British government had detained two jets owned by sanctioned Russian-born billionaire Eugene Shvidler “indefinitely” after having kept them under investigation for three weeks. The planes, a Bombardier BD700 Global Express registered in Luxembourg and a Cessna Citation Latitude 680A registered in the U.K., have been grounded at airports in Farnborough and London, respectively. In a statement provided to Forbes on March 26, Shapps said that he had taken action to deregister Shvidler’s Cessna.
Abramovich is the most exposed to the new measures, with two jets registered in Aruba and another two in Luxembourg, in addition to the five helicopters deregistered in the Isle of Man. Aruba’s Minister of Transport, Ursell Arends, reportedly told local media that at least 10 aircraft registered in Aruba belong to sanctioned Russians and the government will take action against them “if necessary.” Forbes identified six of the 10, including an Airbus A319 jet owned by Viktor Vekselberg. A spokesperson for Vekselberg declined to comment, and representatives for the other billionaires mentioned in this article did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
High-net-worth individuals often own aircraft through offshore holding companies to mask their ownership. “Many owners use offshore entities and special purpose companies to make it difficult to find the “real” user of the aircraft,” said Phil Seymour, president of aviation data firm IBA.
Other sanctioned billionaires have had private jets in the recent past or have been reported to own jets, but Forbes could not verify that they still own them. Oleg Deripaska, Gennady Timchenko, Boris Rotenberg and Suleiman Kerimov were all reported to have sold their planes after being hit with sanctions back in 2014 and 2018.
Registering aircraft in offshore jurisdictions such as the Isle of Man allows billionaires to save hundreds of millions of dollars in customs and sales taxes when flying, buying or ultimately selling their jets. The websites for offshore aircraft registries openly tout a variety of benefits, ranging from zero taxes on import duties or transfers of aircraft in Aruba to no taxation at all in the Cayman Islands.
The measures taken by authorities in the Isle of Man and Bermuda are now putting those benefits out of reach. According to Jonathan Epstein, a partner at Washington, D.C.-based law firm Holland & Knight who specializes in international trade and aviation, an aircraft that has been deregistered becomes a “stateless aircraft,” meaning it no longer has a valid certificate of airworthiness. Without that, it’s not insurable and cannot fly, until it’s registered in a new country.
That means any aircraft located in countries that have sanctioned Russia are at risk of being grounded. Complicating matters further is the fact that the comprehensive sanctions bar any insurers and banks from financing or providing insurance to aircraft owned or used by Russian entities.
16 of the 35 aircraft tracked by Forbes were last recorded in France, Latvia and Monaco—all of which have implemented the EU sanctions on Russia—and the U.K. But if they aren’t in the EU or the U.K., then the aircraft could re-register elsewhere—including in Russia, where five of the aircraft were last seen. One of Abramovich’s helicopters, owned via British Virgin Islands-based Wenham Aviation Limited, deregistered from the U.K. on February 8 and registered anew in Russia. “If they’re physically in Russia, it may be that the Russians are going to re-register them,” said Epstein.
Public scrutiny of planes owned by Russian oligarchs has caused them to shift aircraft between jurisdictions in the past. A Gulfstream G650 jet owned by sanctioned billionaire Leonid Mikhelson was uncovered in the 2017 Paradise Papers investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. At the time, Mikhelson owned the jet through a complex chain of companies in Belize, the Cayman Islands and the British Virgin Islands which ultimately led to a Mikhelson-owned firm in Panama called Golden Star Aviation. The jet was recorded in the Isle of Man registry for tax purposes and entered into a trusteeship with the Bank of Utah, which registered the plane in the United States. Federal Aviation Administration records show the jet was deregistered in the U.S. on December 11, 2017, about a month after the investigation was published, and registered anew in the tiny European country of San Marino, whose aircraft registry offers benefits including an exemption on import tax.
Public aviation records show that the jet was deregistered from San Marino in 2019 and later registered in Russia. The jet is still linked to Mikhelson and is operated by a Russian private charter airline named North-West Air Company. Forbes consulted public import data that shows another jet, a Gulfstream G550, was exported to North-West in June 2021 by Golden Star Aviation, the Mikhelson-owned company identified in the Paradise Papers. The G550 had been registered in the U.S. until December 2018, when it was exported to San Marino; the jet is currently registered in Russia.
Another likely destination for these planes: the United Arab Emirates. At least six of the 35 aircraft tracked by Forbes were last seen in the U.A.E., and others recently traveled from there to Moscow. Still, even if a plane is in Dubai, the owners could be hit by secondary U.S. sanctions on local companies that assist in moving or repairing their jets. “If you have a Gulfstream sitting in Dubai, the export of that aircraft to Russia is a violation of U.S. export laws,” said Epstein. “It’s also an export violation for the repair facility that’s helping them do that.”
Another reason why repairing planes will now be more complicated: Manufacturers including Airbus, Boeing, Bombardier and Embraer have announced they will suspend business with Russian companies and individuals, making it difficult—if not impossible—for Russian owners to replace parts and keep their planes flying.
Sanctioned oligarchs can always transfer their jets and helicopters to their family members to avoid personal sanctions. In 2020, Usmanov transferred ownership of two Cayman Islands-based companies—Klaret Aviation Limited and Crystal Sky Limited—to Cyprus-based Almenor Holdings Limited, a firm ultimately owned by a trust whose beneficiary is Usmanov’s sister, Gulbakhor Ismailova. Klaret Aviation Limited owns an Airbus A340-300 jet with tail number M-IABU and Crystal Sky Limited owns an Airbus EC-175 helicopter with tail number M-DLBR. Still, Ismailova’s luck ran out when the U.K. and EU imposed sanctions on her on April 8 and April 13, respectively.
Here are the jets and helicopters owned by sanctioned Russian billionaires tracked by Forbes and their latest locations:
Craig Mercer/Actionplus/Newscom
Boeing 767 300
A collage of models owned by Abramovich—the planes pictured above are not his own.
Simon Dawson/Bloomberg
AgustaWestland AW139 helicopter
Mikhail Svetlov/getty images
Airbus A340-300
Airbus EC-175 helicopter and yacht
Andrey Rudakov/Bloomberg
Airbus A319-115