While Kirby made a comment out of the goodness of his heart and having fear for the American citizen, he had no such words for his new best friends at Emirates, who have also been using Russian airspace and operating all their west coast flights via Russian Airspace.
Unlike many carriers elsewhere, Australian airlines aren't banned from flying over Russia. It's instead a precautionary move by Qantas, and one that adds around an hour to the flight time in each direction – depending on wind and other factors.
Aeroflot and British Airways operate direct flights to St Petersburg from London Gatwick Airport (LGW) and London Heathrow (LHR) respectively. These airlines also operate direct flights to Moscow from London Heathrow.
Airlines that fly from London to MoscowAeroflot fly direct to Moscow–Sheremetyevo from London-Heathrow and British Airways fly to Moscow–Domodedovo. easyJet will be offering direct flights from Gatwick to Moscow-Domodedovo. A number of airlines offer indirect flights to Moscow from London.
Direct flights are currently operating from Moscow and other major Russian cities to Turkey, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Thailand, India, and other destinations. European and North American airspace remains closed.
This suspension was extended until further notice on 24 February 2022, following the closure of Ukrainian airspace. In light of the current situation in the region, we've decided to suspend our flights to and from Russia and our flights through Russian airspace until further notice as of 26 February 2022.
It joined Italy, Norway, France, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Iceland, Belgium, Ireland, the Netherlands, Spain and North Macedonia, which indicated on Sunday that they would move to close their airspace to Russian flights.