Plane deicing cost 30-folded in heavy snowfall in Almaty

Treatment of one Air Astana plane with deicing fluid cost $90 thousand during heavy snowfall on December 1, coordinator of the company’s land service department Maksim Avdeyev told Tengrinews.kz. That day the company spent 30 thousand liters of fluid, while normally 300-1,000 liters are enough per one airplane. This sharply increased the costs because of the bad weather. One liter of deicing liquid costs 450 tenge ($3). According to Avdeyev, ice deposits or snow on the leading edge or the upper surface of a wing decrease its ascentional power by up to 30 percent and increase the frontal resistance by 40 percent. In the worst case scenario, the stabilizer gets blocked and the plane becomes impossible to control. “If we don’t take step to protect planes from ice, it will grow very quickly along with the air flow, significantly increase the flight weight and may cause serious consequences,” the company’s representative added. The procedure of cleaning the plane off snow and ice takes from 10 minutes to 1 hour. The flights to all directions were delayed in Almaty airport on December 1. By Roza Yessenkulova