Seven Russian airlines were granted the right to carry goods in airplane cabins, Russia’s civil aviation regulator, the Federal Air Transport Agency said on its website on Thursday. This reported by TASS.

Freight carriage in airplane cabins and not in luggage holds is an opportunity to use the idle fleet on the back of the record-breaking drop in passenger carriage due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The aviation regulator granted such right to Aeroflot, Rossiya, Ural Airlines, PegasFly, Nordwind, Azur Air, and Royal Flight. The list at the same time does not contain S7 air carrier, which announced the start of such flights earlier this week.

"The dramatic decline in passenger demand for air traffic has been registered. A range of Russian airlines making commercial air carriage of passengers will additionally introduce carriage of goods in the passenger cabin in absence of passengers," the regulator noted.