Wendover Found the Winners of Russia’s Closed Skies. They Couldn’t Fly.

Wendover Productions' March 2022 video makes a compelling case that Russia's invasion of Ukraine would fracture international aviation. But its most interesting predictions concerned who would benefit from that disruption. It identified Northern Pacific Airways as a potential Pacific equivalent of Icelandair and suggested Russian and Chinese aircraft manufacturers could capture demand abandoned by Boeing and Airbus.

Four years later, the most prominently identified startup has ceased operations, Russia's aircraft manufacturers remain far behind production targets, and China's COMAC still depends on foreign technology. The video understood the damage caused by closing an aviation market. It was considerably less rigorous about who could actually exploit the resulting opportunities.

The Anchorage opportunity that never took off

Wendover described Northern Pacific Airways as a potential beneficiary of Russia's airspace restrictions. Its proposed business was straightforward: connect North American and Asian cities through Anchorage, using Boeing 757 aircraft.

The video calculated that a Boston–Anchorage–Seoul itinerary could take approximately 18 hours, potentially beating Delta's alternative connection through Detroit by an hour. It concluded that the startup's business model had moved from widespread skepticism to being "potentially feasible."

There was one enormous omission: the aircraft needed regulatory approval to operate the proposed Pacific routes.

ETOPS, or Extended-range Twin-engine Operational Performance Standards, is the safety certification governing certain long-distance operations by twin-engine aircraft, particularly routes where suitable diversion airports are far away.

The closure of Russian airspace changed the available Pacific routing. Northern Pacific's Boeing 757s needed additional FAA approval to operate the alternative overwater routes.

This was not a theoretical concern discovered years later. In August 2023, Alaska's KTUU reported that Northern Pacific had still not launched its Asia services because its aircraft lacked the necessary approval for the alternative routing.

The aviation publication ch-aviation subsequently documented the regulatory problem: the airline faced a difficult sequence in which it could not apply for ETOPS until it started flying, while it could not begin the Asian regulatory process until it had FAA authority.

Most revealingly, Northern Pacific's chief executive, Thomas Hsieh, explained the problem in a January 2026 bankruptcy-court declaration. The company had been unable to conduct its Pacific flights because it lacked ETOPS certification, which the declaration said required a minimum of 24 months to obtain.

The video had considered whether the 757 could reach European airports. It failed to investigate the certification barrier affecting the Pacific business model it was presenting as a potential winner.

A shorter route on a map is not an airline service. It must be legally operable, properly certified and commercially sustainable.

The startup became a financial casualty

Northern Pacific did not simply postpone its Asia hub. It never established it.

Its first scheduled commercial service, launched in July 2023, connected Ontario, California, with Las Vegas. The airline subsequently added Reno and Nashville, rather than the Asian destinations that defined its original business plan.

In early 2024, it abandoned scheduled passenger operations and pivoted towards charter flights.

The financial commitments behind the original ambition were substantial. Its parent company, FLOAT Alaska, invested approximately $6 million in an Anchorage airport terminal and lounge renovation. FlyCoin, an affiliated airline-loyalty venture, lent Northern Pacific $28 million raised from FlyCoin investors to accelerate and launch the transpacific operation.

Yet the Pacific hub never materialized.

The company's eventual failure had several causes, and blaming everything on Russian airspace restrictions would be inaccurate.

Hsieh's bankruptcy declaration identifies:

• A cryptocurrency-market downturn that damaged the affiliated FlyCoin venture.
• The loss of approximately 80% of pilot positions within a year as larger airlines recruited personnel.
• Competition from Aleutian Airways in Alaska.
• A cash burn of approximately $5 million per month across the wider debtor group.
• Loss-making charter operations that failed to provide a sustainable replacement business.

The final collapse was particularly revealing. The company's sports-team charter agreement generated losses on every flight. On November 25, 2025, a payment of $315,187.50 from its charter partner was not received, leaving the company unable to meet future payroll obligations.

New Pacific ceased operations the following day, laying off 115 employees. The affiliated companies subsequently filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on January 26, 2026.

This is not a story of a successful startup that merely missed its opportunity. It is a story of an airline that never established the international network on which its original investment thesis depended.

An empty aircraft market does not create aircraft manufacturers

The video's other proposed beneficiaries were Russia's domestic aircraft manufacturers and China's COMAC.

Its argument was that removing Boeing and Airbus from the Russian market could create an opening for Sukhoi, Irkut and eventually China's C919.

Wendover did acknowledge that COMAC would need an aircraft independent of components from countries sanctioning Russia. That qualification was important. But the underlying manufacturing problem deserved considerably more attention.

Aircraft manufacturing cannot be expanded simply because competitors disappear. Engines, avionics, materials, engineering expertise, certification and thousands of individual components must all be available.

Reuters reported in August 2025 that Russia had added just 13 new commercial aircraft to its fleet since 2021, compared with 52 in 2021 alone. The government's 2024–2025 delivery target had been reduced from 171 aircraft to 21, and Russian manufacturers had delivered only one of 15 planned commercial jets in 2025 by August.

The domestically produced MC-21 also faced a serious disadvantage: its all-Russian version was heavier and less fuel-efficient than the version using imported components, reducing its attractiveness to airlines.

China's position was hardly straightforward either.

In September 2025, COMAC reportedly reduced its 2025 C919 delivery target from 75 aircraft to 25 because of supply-chain bottlenecks. The aircraft relied on components from 48 US suppliers, 26 European companies and 14 Chinese entities, according to estimates cited by ch-aviation.

The problem remained visible in April 2026. The South China Morning Post reported that COMAC was still assessing supply-chain vulnerabilities, particularly its dependence on foreign engines and other critical components, alongside workforce shortages.

The irony is difficult to miss. Russia needed aircraft independent of Western technology, while China's most promising commercial aircraft still depended on substantial Western technological inputs.

Removing Boeing and Airbus from a market does not automatically make their competitors capable of replacing them.

The original warning was not entirely wrong

There is an important distinction between the video's central warning and its predictions about beneficiaries.

Russia's aviation industry really has faced prolonged maintenance and fleet problems. In October 2026, Euronews reported that 130 of the 673 aircraft operated by Russia's 11 largest airlines were out of service, approximately 19%, compared with a normal downtime rate of around 10%.

Outside the Aeroflot group, 93 of 322 aircraft were reportedly idle.

That is consistent with the video's warning that aircraft cannibalization, maintenance shortages and prolonged isolation would progressively weaken the fleet.

But it also illustrates why the analysis needed greater precision. Russia's aviation difficulties did not automatically produce successful replacement airlines or manufacturers.

The consequences of an industry losing access to established suppliers are not necessarily an opportunity for whoever happens to be geographically convenient or theoretically capable of building an alternative.

They may simply produce a shortage that nobody can economically or technically resolve.

Closing verdict

Wendover correctly identified the extraordinary disruption caused by Russia's invasion and the international aviation industry's response.

Its weakness was treating newly available routes and market demand as evidence of commercial opportunity without adequately examining the operational requirements.

Northern Pacific Airways never became the Pacific's Icelandair. Russia's aircraft manufacturers did not suddenly acquire the ability to replace Western production. COMAC could not simply remove its dependence on foreign technology.

The distinction matters. Aviation is not just geography and aircraft ownership. It is certification, engineering, maintenance, financing, production capacity and the ability to operate safely over decades.

Wendover showed readers where the opportunities might appear. It did not establish that the supposed beneficiaries could actually deliver them.

An empty sky is not a business opportunity when nobody has an aircraft capable of flying the route.

References

1. The Sanction-Fueled Destruction of the Russian Aviation Industry — Wendover Productions, March 23, 2022. Original work under examination, particularly its Northern Pacific Airways and aircraft-manufacturing predictions.

2. Declaration of Thomas Hsieh in Support of Chapter 11 Petitions and First Day Relief — US Bankruptcy Court, District of Delaware, January 26, 2026. The company's CEO's sworn declaration documents the ETOPS obstacle, financing, operating losses, route changes and eventual shutdown.

3. Northern Pacific Airways delays plans to fly from Asia to Anchorage — KTUU / Alaska's News Source, August 29, 2023. Establishes that the proposed Asian service remained unlaunched because FAA approval for alternative overwater operations had not been obtained.

4. US's Northern Pacific Airways completes certification — ch-aviation, July 10, 2023. Documents the airline's actual first scheduled route and the ETOPS regulatory obstacle.

5. Russia’s struggle to build commercial jets reflects deeper industrial malaise — Reuters, August 8, 2025. Provides aircraft delivery figures, revised production targets and evidence of Russia's continuing manufacturing difficulties.

6. COMAC trims C919 deliveries in 2025 — ch-aviation, September 29, 2025. Documents the C919's reduced delivery target and dependence on foreign suppliers.

7. Maker of China’s C919 jet weighs supply chain weaknesses amid delivery delays — South China Morning Post, April 21, 2026. Provides updated evidence of COMAC's foreign-component and workforce constraints.

8. Russia asks Vietnam for planes as illegally re-registered Western fleet falls apart — Euronews, October 7, 2026. Supplies the latest reported aircraft downtime figures, helping distinguish the video's valid fleet warnings from its weaker predictions about replacement businesses.