World’s Largest Aircraft Bombed By Russia In Ukraine

The world’s largest aircraft, 225 Mriya by Antonov Company has been destroyed by Russian forces in Ukraine. 225 Mriya has been voted as the most-loved aircraft by the Soviets and reports have indicated that the aircraft has been hit beyond retrieval.

The plane had a wingspan of 88 meters (289 feet) and a length of 84 meters (276 feet) making it the longest aircraft in existence. Its cargo hold, at 43 meters long (141 feet), was longer than the distance of the world’s first powered plane flight, completed by the Wright Brothers in 1903, at 37 meters (121 feet).

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‘The Russians destroyed An-225 ‘Dream’, it will be restored at the expense of the occupant The invaders destroyed the plane but they can’t destroy our common dream. She will surely be reborn. ‘Our task is to make these costs covered by the Russian Federation, which caused deliberate damage to Ukrainian aviation and freight aviation sector.” said Ukroboronprom boss Yuri Gusev.

It said estimations put the cost of restoring the plane at more than $3billion in a timeframe of more than five years. Analysts are saying that the plane might never be restored given that now it cannot be moved to safety and that vandals might take advantage.

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There were only one, 225 Mriya in the world. It was built by the Kyiv-based Antonov company, which came up with the design. It first took flight in 1988 and has been in service ever since. Construction was begun on a second plane, but it was never finished.

The aircraft is so huge that the landing gear system has 32 wheels. In 2001, the An-225 was modified, with a reinforced floor, to increase its maximum gross weight from 600 tons to 640 tons. In 2009, the An-225 carried the heaviest single cargo item ever sent through the air: a 417,000-pound generator for a gas power plant in Armenia.

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The Antonov An-225, originally developed specifically to transport the Buran spaceplane, was an enlargement of the successful Antonov An-124.

The Antonov An-225 was designed to airlift the Energia rocket’s boosters and the Buran space shuttle for the Soviet space program.

It was developed as a replacement for the Myasishchev VM-T. The An-225’s original mission and objectives are almost identical to that of the United States’ Shuttle Carrier Aircraft.