SLEEPING GIANT
World’s biggest plane built by Soviets at end of the Cold War lies in pieces after it was never finished and left to gather dust for decades
THE world's biggest plane, started by the Soviets at end of the Cold War, still lies in pieces as it has been left to gather dust for three decades.
The partially built Antonov An-225 has remained hidden away – stored in a dreary Ukrainian warehouse since 1989.
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Before the gigantic cargo plane can take flight, though, there is one major hurdle for Antonov, its manufacturer, to overcome.
With the mothballed An-225 believed to be about 70 per cent complete, Antonov needs to secure a cash injection of an estimated £270million.
explains that Soviet engineers conceived the Antonov An-225 towards the end of the Cold War, “as a gigantic, gravity-defying workhorse that would help communism’s ongoing race into space and assert the East’s dominance of the skies.”
But, just one An-225 was ever completed by Antonov – the Mriya, which is so big that pilots must undergo special training.
Mriya – which means Ukrainian for "dream" – was built in 1988 for the Soviet space shuttle programme, to transport spacecraft, and is still the world’s largest and heaviest plane.
The six-engine An-225 Mriya can fly up to ten battle tanks, and, as it can transport the heaviest commercial cargo, is hired out to those wanting to fly loads of up to 250 tonnes.
Mriya can transport 30 cars, has 32 wheels and a total wing area of 905 sq m, almost twice that of a jumbo jet.
It is typically staffed by 22 people, including pilots and loading crew, all of whom are based in Kiev.
Ukrainian plane maker Antonov, known for producing the world’s biggest aircraft, was founded in 1946 and has manufactured about 30 different types of airplane.
But so far, it has failed to complete the larger An-225 which - unlike Mriya, doesn't as yet have an official name.
Its shell remains in large, jigsaw-like pieces in Antonov's Kiev warehouse, mainly due to a lack of funds, reports the .
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GRAVITY-DEFYING WORKHORSE
While the Mriya continues to shift huge quantities of cargo, its incomplete, bigger “twin”, is still eagerly awaited by An-225 fans, keen to see its completed form since construction started in 1989.
When CNN visited the warehouse storing the airplane pieces near Kiev, it described seeing the shells of a “beast of a thing”.
The Antonov An-225’s wings would span 88.4metres, once finally attached.
And the massive fuselage, if ever completed, would stretch 276 feet (84 metres), nine metres longer than the iconic Airbus A380 superjumbo double-decker passenger jet.
Construction of the second An-225 began two years before the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. And work on the aircraft ground to a halt in 1994.
CNN explains that the end of Soviet funding for the megaplane project meant that Antonov was left “in limbo”.
Also, relations between Ukraine and Russia collapsed following the annexation of Crimea in 2014 – Antonov had been importing more than 60 per cent of its plane parts from Russia.
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China told Antonov it wanted to get involved in restarting production of the massive airborne workhorse, with the aim of completing the An-225 by this year.
However, this plan hasn’t come to fruition, because it proved too difficult to take the plane parts to China.
Aviation Tribune adds that, when eventually fully built, the An-225 will contribute much to the air cargo sector, because it will be able to transport huge loads and reduce the need for multiple trips by its much smaller counterparts.
Antonov’s An-225 hopeful programme director told CNN last year: “When there is a need to solve such a problem [transporting heavy payloads] there will be a demand for the completion of the second aircraft and the investors will appear.”
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