Perhaps mindful of this, airlines make in-house risk assessments beyond the patchwork of information they are fed by the various national authorities and international bodies. British Airways, for example, chose to reroute flights around eastern Ukraine back in March. Some 75 other carriers, however, were still sending about 400 flights a day into harm’s way until the loss of Flight 17.
To date, nothing has changed. The Iraqi CAA still insists that its airspace is safe from the forces of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, despite the fact that ISIS fighters – who have freedom of movement between the two countries – have overrun army positions in eastern Syria. The Syrian government forces, like Ukraine’s rebels, have Buk missile systems supplied by Russia.
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