Jetalliance East has reported monthly charter utilisation of around 70-80 hours for each of its two Citation aircraft, and that both have operated without any problems in the extreme sub-zero temperatures (-40˚C) of western Siberia.

Igor Chunikhin, ceo, says: "We're extremely happy with the performance of the CJ3 and Sovereign. The dispatch reliability is very high.

"Around 70 percent of our traffic on the aircraft is within Russia, with top destinations including Saint Petersburg, Kazan and Krasnodar, as well as locations important for the mining, basic commodities and energy industries. When flying into western Europe, the most popular destinations for our passengers are Paris and Chambéry in France. About 80 percent of our passengers are flying on business.

"We're already discussing adding new Citations to the fleet as soon as possible." Jetalliance East launched operations in November 2010, based at Moscow Sheremetyevo airport, and so became the first commercial operator of Cessna aircraft in Russia.

Cessna vp of international sales Trevor Esling says: "The Jetalliance East line maintenance service capability proves useful not only for the company's Citations but also for others operating in Russia."

Jetalliance East also operates Russian-built aircraft including Tupolev Tu-134s and Yakovlev Yak-42s, but the company is said to be keen to phase these out during next year.