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Or to be more precise, what were they supposed to do? They flew their own Beech Bonanza from Nome, Alaska, to Anadyr, Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, Russia (in the eastern tip of the country). They claimed to have gotten the proper visa.

Here's the video in question. I cued it up to 19:53 where they start to talk about what happened.

Now, Anadyr is on the south bank of an inlet. The airport is on the north side, and they're connected with a ferry: At 25:48 the narrator explains that if you cross the water to enter Anadyr, that's what needs special permission. Does any of that make sense?

What really happened? And was it a trivial violation as they made it sound, or is it a serious violation that would prejudice future attempts to enter Russia?

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  • Somewhat related: Mathias Rust's flight that landed on the Red Square in 1987. The number of rules and regulations violated on that day was staggering: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathias_Rust
    – JonathanReez ♦
    Jan 12, 2020 at 1:23

1 Answer 1

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Beyond the passport and Russian visa that most people need to enter Russia generally, there are two additional separate permits required to visit the Chukotka region, which is normally closed to nonresidents:

  • The rasporyazheniye (распоряжение), which permits entry into the region (only foreigners require this permit, Russians do not), and
  • The propusk (пропуск), which permits crossing the regional border and going to specific locations in the region (everyone needs this permit).

I also watched this video last week, and I already knew that this region was rather difficult to get into. From the limited detail in the video, I can't be entirely sure which of the two permits they were missing.

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  • By "region" do you include both Anadyr and the airport across the inlet, in the same region? Or are the two of those separate enough to require a permit to go between them i.e. using the ferry?
    – Harper - Reinstate Monica
    Jan 12, 2020 at 23:17
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    @Harper-ReinstateMonica "region" means the Chukotka Autonomous Region, as stated on the official website. Your other question is a lot more into the weeds of Russian law than I was really intending to go; the map shows me that the airport is outside the city limits, so I suspect that probably means one permit allowed them to go to the airport and they needed both permits to go into the city. For people who want to travel there, I expect the difference doesn't mean much; only making sure to have both permits is the important part.
    – Michael Hampton
    Jan 12, 2020 at 23:37

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