Imagine if you see a flying football ground
There is nothing big to fly with cargo on the earth like this mammoth Antonov An-225. The major cause of building the Antonov An-225 was neither aggressive nor humanitarian. The plane was designed as an airborne tow truck for the now defunct Soviet space shuttle program. History would divulge that the Soviet nickname for the An-225, Mriya, which is a Ukrainian term used to express the dream was more appropriate.
How big is the Antonov An-225?
The dimensions of the An-225 are astonishingly close to a football pitch from nose to end and wingtip to wingtip. It is very massive, imagine a football ground flying with more than 1.32 million pounds of cargo. Having an overall length of 275’7” with the wing span of 290’2”, it is almost 50 percent heavier than another monster C-5A. it is not a casual cargo plane with four turbofan jets, Ukrainian engineers equipped the plane with six massive ZMKB Progress Lotarev D-18T Jets, three on each side. These jet fans are individually capable of pumping out almost 52 thousand pounds of thrust.
The cabin on this cargo plane is almost 14.5 feet high from the ground, having a baggage volume of 45,909 cu ft.
How it was Developed?
The fist ever Antonov Mriya took only three and a half years in development and was first introduced to the world on Dec.21, 1988. It was the time when berlin wall was demolished forever that dissolved the Soviet Union as well. With this change in the world, the future of the Antonov was also changed when Ukraine came into being as an independent country.
Maneuverability of the plane
Antonov Mriya was not an exclusively new idea, actually it was an enlarged version of Antonov AN-124 military transporter. But the Mriya is almost 40 feet larger than the An-124.
This massive cargo carrier has a 32-wheel landing gear and surprisingly, it has 20 wheels steerable out of these 32 wheels to make the An-225 an extremely maneuverable plane. It has four steerable wheels in the nose and sixteen on the back side of the landing gear.
What engines drive this monster?
Let’s dive into the engine compartment of the plane. Antonov An-225 is a massive machine powered by a six turbofan engine layout, designed and manufactured by ZMKB Progress D-18.
What weight it has?
Antonov An-225 is a football pitch sized cargo plane and has a maximum takeoff weight of 1,410,944 lbs. the Payload capacity of the An-225 Mryia is551,150 lbs while it carries almost 98,700 gallons oof fuel to drink during its flight.
