Nude calendars, ads and attendants

DANGER ZONE? An image from the Aeroflot calendar.

Airlines regularly come under fire for their advertising and marketing tactics, but two Russian airlines have pushed the boundaries of good taste with their latest promotions.

Russia's largest airline, Aeroflot, has raised eyebrows with a new calendar that features naked flight attendants posing with aircraft.

The calendars will reportedly be distributed to VIP members of the airline's loyalty program but have been leaked onto the internet ahead of their release.

The leak comes just days after Russian low-cost airline Avianova launched an advertisement which features flight attendants stripping off to bikinis to wash a plane.

Airline calendars featuring scantily clad flight attendants are nothing new.

Irish carrier Ryanair has regularly courted controversy with its annual flight attendant calendar, while cabin crew of troubled Spanish airline Air Comet released a nude calendar to draw attention to their unpaid wages.

Last week US carrier Spirit Airlines came under fire for ads featuring bikini models covered in sunscreen that critics said made light of the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster.

But Aeroflot's calendar goes a step further by featuring far more explicit images than its predecessors.

And while Aeroflot may be pushing the boundaries of good behaviour with its marketing, the airline has been attempting to improve the behaviour of its passengers.

Earlier this year, Aeroflot banned the sale of alcohol in economy class on some routes.

The move came after several mid-air incidents involving drunken fights and other bad behaviour.

Aeroflot said it had targeted specific routes that were infamous for binge drinking by passengers and that the number of incidents on board planes had dropped as a result.

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