Antonov

[Kalaehina]

Wow, had to work today, but boy did I get a surprise. My work base is less then a mile from the airport so I get to see planes taking off and landing all day. Growing up with an Air Force KC135 mechanic as a Dad made me know different types of aircraft and some of the unique engine noises each makes-747, C5, 737s etc... So this morning I just got out of a vehicle when I hear an engine I don't recognize, a new sound for me, I turn around and there in the blue Hawaii sky is the worlds largest airplane, I think it's called the Antonov 225. Geez, this thing was huge! I see 747s all day, and a few times even C5s so I had somewhat of a scale to go by..... :--) ... ... that's exactly what I looked like..... :--) . Glad I had the chance to see it in person, just wish I knew it was here ealier. My Dad didn't even know it was here (he does ground support on a military base, that has a civilian contract, he's retired from the AF). Simply amazing! Like seeing a skyscraper fly, unreal! Oh well just had to express my excitement.

 

[Jengle]

Never seen one of those, but have seen lots of C-5s and 747s. I was always amazed that something that huge could lift itself and its cargo off the ground at all. And I understand aerodynamics, and how it works, but still, WOW!!!

 

[snowracer69]

ya mean one of these?



#ad




Largest gross-weight rating of any aircraft in the world. I believe it's somewhere around 1. 2 million pounds!



Have seen the AN224 (4 engines, not quite as impressive as the 225) fly into Klamath Falls, OR to pick up a pair of Sikorsky sky cranes, but this was before Medford re-did their runway so they could handle the weight of such a monster. Impressive to say the least, that something like that flys! Imagine, just for a second, how far the wing-tips move on a take-off roll... . a B52's move 18ft vertically from the start of the take-off roll to when it actually lifts off the ground.



One of my friends' Dad's flys 747-400's for Northwest... last I heard he was flying 5 days a month and making $175k/year. Anyway, when people ask him what he does for a living all he says is he drives an 18-wheeler. Once he had a true truck driver ask him and the guy asked him what weight he normally runs and he said "oh, somewhere around 750,000-800,000 lbs on a normal haul. " Took the guy a few minutes to realize he wasn't FOS.



Josh



EDIT: Just to add, did anybody hear about the new engines being put on the 777? They hold a new world record for static thrust of something along the lines of 125,000 lbs of thrust, and also for longest time running in the red, or whatever they call it when they run at max N1 and temps and all that stuff.



Ok, sorry, I like to talk airplanes, can ya tell? Oo.

 

[klenger]

Look at the landing gear on that thing!!! I understand that Russian aircraft are built very rugged because their runways are so bad.

 

[Eventer]

I was living in Wichita, KS in the late 1980's when Boris Yeltsin came to town. I was 5 miles north of McConnell AFB when I saw it fly over with Boris in it. An awesome looking and sounding aircraft.

 

[Rob Thomas]

Heres a link to some good pics of it... ... . http://www.air-and-space.com/Antonov An-225 Mriya.htm

 

[Kalaehina]

Man, Nextel gotta hurry up and make a camera phone (I think it's scheduled to come out this November), that was the perfect scenario to have a camera phone!

 

[JR2]

That smaller version of that plane we in AK last week hauling 8 rail road cars from Hawaii to Chicago... 8 cars, 80K lbs each... holy cow.

 

[Kalaehina]

Interesting .

 

[Andy Perreault]

Originally posted by snowracer69

ya mean one of these?

There is only one of these that exists in the world. It was originally intended to haul the Soviet space shuttle that they never finished building (or maybe they did finish it, but it never went into space). I saw a show (on the History or Discovery channel) about this plane. It sat for years in disrepair after the collapse of the Soviet Union. It was then refurbished and it has been put to use for oversized charter operations worldwide. I wonder how much it costs to charter it?

Andy

 

[MGordon]

EDIT: Just to add, did anybody hear about the new engines being put on the 777? They hold a new world record for static thrust of something along the lines of 125,000 lbs of thrust, and also for longest time running in the red, or whatever they call it when they run at max N1 and temps and all that stuff.

You mean this one?



http://www.geae.com/engines/commercial/ge90/index.html

 

[JR2]

You can go to www.airfoyle.co.uk/ and read all about them. This is the company that owns/rents the planes now.