| I must admit, the machine Greg posted up is a new one on me, but having said that, the Russians have certainly done a lot of experimentation with some very unusual designs and methods of flight...and they have always fascinated me...purely because I like Unusual aircraft designs.
Ok, not all of these were successful but a good few were extremely successful and probably way ahead of their time. Sadly a lot of those machines are just rotting away at outdoor aircraft museums now in the USSR, some of them look really ugly but it's what they did that counts.
Eg....The A90 was just a smaller version of one of Many Ekranoplans built, the biggest being the Famous Caspian Sea Monster...other variants were built all using the same principle which was proven to be very successful. Hence the recent re-interest in the designs now. The Russians on their limited budgets, proved the principle works extremely well. It is just now that they do not have such budgets to develop these machines anymore...Shame really when you look at some of the real class products that they are turning out like the latest Generation MiG and Sukhoi aircraft.
These machines are no longer ugly ducklings but very good looking aircraft with very capable performance !! and now thanks to better relations between The Eastern Bloc and The Western nations we are getting to see more of these machines and learn of their capabilites....I regularly see Mig 29's in the skies around here now (usually on Fly in Visits to RAF Valley)...you normally hear them first as they are louder than our usual air traffic..!!!
You may also remember a certain Mr Igor Sikorsky...Another Russian....I think we know the rest from there...!!
Regards........Mark.
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