The crews of An-124 Ruslan aircraft operated by Russian air forces transported over 15 000 tons of cargo and military equipment in 2012 (+45% as compared to 2011), press-service of the Russian Ministry of Defense reports.

The aircraft have logged a total of over 2000 hours outside their national territory. The total flight time of An-124’s crews and number of flights performed by the jets of this type has increased 10 times over the last 5 years. Thecargoperformancehasincreased20 times during this period.

The fleet of An-124 aircraft performed 555 flights to 65 countries of the world and landed at 33 foreign airfields last year. Most commonly these jets performed flights to Algeria, India, UAE, Afghanistan, France and Nigeria.

The crews of An-124 aircraft carried out support of visits of Russian government delegations, peacekeeping operations in flash points and carried out transportation of aircraft to the aircraft repair plants.

An-124 Ruslan aircraft form the basis of heavy military-transport aviation of Russian air forces. It is the largest military-transport aircraft in the world. It performs transportation of large-sized military equipment and cargo in Russia and foreign countries, the Ministry of Defense noted.