Conflict zone (civil aviation)
Airspace over or near an armed conflict, where civil aircraft risk being shot down by mistake or deliberately, whose management falls to states, airlines and war risk insurers.
An airliner flying over a war zone is exposed to air defense systems able to reach its cruising altitude, sometimes operated by poorly trained or non-state forces. The overflown state remains sovereign over closing its airspace, but may have an interest in keeping it open to collect overflight fees. After an airliner was destroyed over a conflict zone in 2014, the International Civil Aviation Organization and the European Union Aviation Safety Agency set up information sharing on risk zones, in the form of bulletins recommending that certain airspace be avoided. For insurers, the risk falls under hull war policies and the AVN 52 extension, whose markets can cancel cover on seven days' notice and set additional premiums or geographical exclusions. The intersection of political risk and aviation risk is direct.
On July 17, 2014, Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was shot down over eastern Ukraine, killing 298 people; on January 8, 2020, Ukraine International Airlines flight PS752 was shot down by Iranian air defenses shortly after takeoff from Tehran, killing 176.
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