On 30 September 1994, Boris Yeltsin, then President of the Russian Federation, was scheduled for an official state visit to Ireland but failed to get off his plane when it landed at Shannon Airport. The incident embarrassed the Irish government, in particular Taoiseach Albert Reynolds, who was left standing at the foot of the stairs to Yeltsin's plane, and raised questions about Yeltsin's health and fitness to serve. [1]
Boris Yeltsin had travelled to New York to address the United Nations General Assembly on 26 September 1994. [2] He then travelled to Seattle, Washington, to promote trade relations between the United States and Russia. [3] After delivering a speech, Yeltsin departed for Moscow via Shannon. The choice of Shannon was symbolic; in 1980, Aeroflot started operations there as its most western non-NATO hub in Europe. [4]
The trip was scheduled at short notice. Reynolds was in Australia on official business when he learned of the intended stopover. He cut his visit short and returned to Ireland, landing at Shannon airport just a few hours before Yeltsin's scheduled arrival. Thirty-one official vehicles waited on the runway to provide transportation to a formal reception at Dromoland Castle. The Irish Defence Forces brought in the band of the Southern Command and deployed one hundred soldiers of the 12th Infantry Battalion to serve as an honor guard. [5]
Around 12:30 p.m. IST, an aircraft bearing the Russians’ advance party landed at Shannon. The official delegation, including Reynolds, the Russian ambassador to Ireland, Nikolai Kozyrev, Bertie Ahern (the Minister for Finance), Brian Cowen (the Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications), and Willie O'Dea (Minister of State) went to the runway to greet Yeltsin's plane, which was expected ten minutes later. The assembled dignitaries waited but Yeltsin's plane did not land. Airport officials reported that it was circling over Shannon and County Clare. [6] After circling for an hour, the plane landed. However, Yeltsin did not appear when the plane's door opened. An Aeroflot official informed Kozyrev that Yeltsin was unwell and that the vice premier, Oleg Soskovets, would meet with the Irish delegation. Kozyrev was able to board the plane but was unable to see Yeltsin. Alexander Korzhakov, Yeltsin's bodyguard, told Kozyrev that Yeltsin was "very tired". Kozyrev returned to the runway and informed Reynolds that Yeltsin would not be making an appearance due to poor health. Reynolds replied, "Well now, if he is sick, there is nothing we can do about it. I am willing to talk to the Russian President's representative, but Mr. Yeltsin, my guest, is on Irish soil, and I cannot miss the opportunity to go on board the airplane for five minutes, shake the president's hand and wish him a speedy recovery." [6] The Russians rejected this suggestion. Reynolds then agreed to meet Soskovets and gave orders for a meeting to be held in the airport. The Irish government commandeered the VIP lounge of Delta Air Lines to serve as the venue. Reynolds and Soskovets held a brief meeting and Yeltsin's plane departed immediately after it concluded. [6]
The immediate reaction in Ireland was uniformly negative. Yeltsin's problems with alcohol were well-known and the national and international media assumed that he had been too drunk to disembark from the plane (although in 2010, Tatyana Yumasheva, Yeltsin's daughter, suggested that her father had suffered a heart attack on the plane). [7] [8] [9] [10] The Irish Times ran a cartoon on its front page the next day which depicted a bottle of vodka bouncing down mobile stairs while an onlooker states, "At last a message from President Yeltsin." [11] A large photo of Reynolds standing on the runway waiting for Yeltsin was printed on page three. The Irish Independent ran a photograph on its front page of Reynolds standing on the tarmac looking at his watch. Its editorial page stated, "When a statesman occupying one of the most pivotal positions imaginable neglects basic courtesy and insults his hosts, searching questions must be asked about his fitness to hold office." [12] Upon his return to Moscow, Yeltsin stated that he had merely overslept: "I feel excellent. I can tell you honestly, I just overslept. The security services did not let in the people who were due to wake me - of course I will sort things out and punish them." [13] The Irish Press criticized the lack of respect shown to Reynolds and suggested that Yeltsin's excuses be taken with "a large measure of vodka." [14]
Reynolds subsequently claimed that he had used the incident to extract favours from Yeltsin regarding the operation of Aer Rianta International in Russia. [15] Maxine David at the University of Surrey supports Reynold's assessment. She notes that in the years following the Shannon incident Russian-Irish commercial aviation links strengthened. [16]
The term "circling over Shannon" briefly became a euphemism in Ireland to describe the condition of a person who has had too much to drink. [17] Pat Rabbitte TD suggested that the incident gave a whole new meaning to the concept of Shannon as a refuelling stop.
Albert Martin Reynolds was an Irish Fianna Fáil politician who served as Taoiseach from 1992 to 1994, Leader of Fianna Fáil from 1992 to 1994, Minister for Finance from 1988 to 1991, Minister for Industry and Commerce from 1987 to 1988, Minister for Industry and Energy from March 1982 to December 1982, Minister for Transport from 1980 to 1981 and Minister for Posts and Telegraphs from 1979 to 1981. He served as a Teachta Dála (TD) from 1977 to 2002.
Shannon Airport is an international airport located in County Clare in the Republic of Ireland. It is adjacent to the Shannon Estuary and lies halfway between Ennis and Limerick. With over 1.5 million passengers in 2022, the airport is the third busiest airport in the Republic of Ireland, and the fifth busiest on the island.
Events from the year 1994 in Ireland.
Irkutsk International Airport is an international airport on the outskirts of Irkutsk, Russia, at a distance of 60 kilometers from Lake Baikal.
Sochi International Airport is an airport located in the Adler District of the resort city of Sochi, on the coast of the Black Sea in the federal subject of Krasnodar Krai, Russia. Sochi International Airport is among the ten largest Russian airports, with an annual passenger turnover of 5.2 million.
Sokol Airport, formally Vladimir Vysotsky International Airport is an airport in Sokol in Magadan Oblast, Russia. The airport is located 50 km (31 mi) north of the Magadan city center. The airport is sometimes confused with Dolinsk-Sokol air base in Sakhalin Island, which was home to the fighters that shot down Korean Air Flight 007 in 1983.
Utair is a Russian airline with its head office at Khanty-Mansiysk Airport while its hubs are at Surgut International Airport and Vnukovo International Airport. It operates scheduled domestic and some international passenger services, scheduled helicopter services, and extensive charter flights with fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters in support of the oil and gas industry across western Siberia.
Perm International Airport is an international airport located at Bolshoye Savino, 16 kilometres (9.9 mi) southwest of the city of Perm, Russia. It is the only airport in Perm Krai with scheduled commercial flights, and serves as Perm's main civilian airport, with bus and minibus services operating during the daytime to the city's main bus terminus.
A runway incursion is an aviation incident involving improper positioning of vehicles or people on any airport runway or its protected area. When an incursion involves an active runway being used by arriving or departing aircraft, the potential for a collision hazard or Instrument Landing System (ILS) interference can exist. At present, various runway safety technologies and processes are commonly employed to reduce the risk and potential consequences of such an event.
Aeroflot Flight 3352 was a regularly scheduled Aeroflot flight from Krasnodar to Novosibirsk, with an intermediate landing in Omsk. While landing at Omsk Airport on Thursday, 11 October 1984, the aircraft crashed into maintenance vehicles on the runway, killing 174 people on board and four on the ground. While a chain of mistakes in airport operations contributed to the accident, its major cause was an air traffic controller falling asleep on duty. As of 2022, this remains the deadliest aviation accident on Russian territory. It was also the deadliest aviation accident involving a Tupolev Tu-154 at the time until the crash of Aeroflot Flight 5143 nine months later; as of 2023, it still ranks as the second-deadliest accident involving a Tupolev Tu-154. The tragedy was kept secret for twenty years, until Komsomolskaya Pravda published an article in 2004.
Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin was a Soviet and Russian politician who served as the first president of Russia from 1991 to 1999. He was a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1961 to 1990. He later stood as a political independent, during which time he was viewed as being ideologically aligned with liberalism and Russian nationalism.
Aeroflot Flight U-505 crashed just after takeoff in Tashkent on 13 April 1987. Flight 505 was an early morning flight from Tashkent to Shahrisabz, both in the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic, now the Republic of Uzbekistan. The flight took off just one minute and 28 seconds after an Ilyushin Il-76, thus encountering its wake vortex. The Yakovlev Yak-40 then banked sharply to the right, struck the ground, and caught fire. All 9 people on board died.
Aeroflot Flight 415 was a domestic scheduled passenger flight operated by Aeroflot from Lviv to Sochi with a stopover in Simferopol. On 28 July 1962 the Antonov An-10 operating the route crashed near Gagra, Abkhaz ASSR, Georgian SSR, killing all 81 passengers and crew on board.
Aeroflot Flight N-528 was a regular commercial flight from Odesa to Berdyansk that crashed while attempting to land in poor weather conditions.
Oleg Nikolayevich Soskovets is a Soviet and Russian politician.
The Soskovets campaign strategy refers to the strategy devised by Oleg Soskovets for Boris Yeltsin's 1996 reelection campaign for the Presidency of Russia. This strategy served as the initial template for Yeltsin's campaign before being discarded by March 1996.
The Boris Yeltsin presidential campaign, 1996 was the reelection campaign of Russian President Boris Yeltsin in the 1996 election.
The Xerox affair was a Russian political controversy that took place during the second round of the 1996 Russian presidential election. The controversy stems from the June 19 detention of two staffers of President Boris Yeltsin's reelection campaign outside of the Russian White House. Security agents discovered $500,000 in a Xerox copy-paper box that was being carried by one of the men. It was soon discovered that the staffers had been arrested and interrogated at the behest of Mikhail Barsukov and Alexander Korzhakov, both of whom were members of Yeltsin's campaign organization and presidential administration.
Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, her husband Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh and Foreign Secretary Douglas Hurd made a state visit to Russia from 17 to 20 October 1994, hosted by the President of Russia, Boris Yeltsin. It was the first and only visit by a reigning British monarch on Russian soil.
