The Soviet flying beast that never really took off
(CNN) — The
only surviving prototype of this unusual plane now sits dilapidated in a
field near Moscow, but it was once the hope of the Soviet Union against
US submarine attacks.
The
Bartini Beriev VVA-14 -- the letters are an acronym for "vertical
take-off amphibious aircraft" and 14 was the number of engines -- was
designed to take off from anywhere without a runway and to be capable of
sustained flight just above the water surface.
Designed
in the 1960s, the aircraft was a response to the Polaris ballistic
missiles. The United States introduced them in 1961 on its submarine
fleet as part of its nuclear deterrent. In the mind of its designer,
Robert Bartini, the amphibious VVA-14 would be the perfect machine to
seek and destroy the missile-carrying submarines.
The
plan, however, didn't pan out. Only two of the proposed three
prototypes were ever built, and only one was ever flown. When Bartini
died, in 1974, the project died with him, and the second prototype was
dismantled.
The
first, mostly intact, was sent in 1987 to the Central Air Force Museum
near Moscow, but something went wrong with the delivery. The aircraft
was looted and damaged, and it hasn't been repaired since.
Three-headed dragon
The VVA-14 was desiged to take off vertically from water or land.
Courtesy Andrii Salnikov
"The
VVA-14 was a flying boat that was supposed to take off from water or
land vertically, and then fly like a regular plane at altitude," says
Andrii Sovenko, a Soviet aviation historian. In 2005, Sovenko met
Nikolai Pogorelov, the deputy of Robert Bartini during the design phase
of the plane.
"According
to Pogorelov, Bartini was a visionary who had an unusual mind and
character. It seemed that he was not from his time, but from some other
era -- someone even called him an alien. Without a doubt, Bartini has
left a mark in Soviet aircraft building. However, he became famous
mainly for his ideas and concepts, and only a few of those actually
became reality," says Sovenko.
Bartini,
who left his home in Italy for the Soviet Union in 1923 after the rise
of the Fascists, had envisaged several different versions of the VVA-14,
including one with inflatable pontoons to land on water and another
with folding wings that could be operated from ships at sea.
The first prototype took to the air in 1972. It was later fitted with the pontoons and tested afloat.
"This
aircraft did not have lifting engines or any equipment for searching
for submarines. It was intended only for studying the characteristics of
horizontal flight and testing the aircraft systems. In total, from 1972
to 1975, it performed 107 flights with over 103 flight hours," says
Sovenko.
The
odd looks earned it the nickname Zmei Gorynich, after a dragon from
Russian folk tales. "When looking at it from the ground, the VVA-14
caused understandable associations with Zmei Gorynych: she also had, as
it were, three heads, as well as relatively small wings," said Sovenko.
A short second life
The Soviet military abandoned the project after they realized its effectiveness would be limited.
Courtesy Andrii Salnikov
The
second prototype was supposed to receive the engines for vertical take
off, but they were never fitted to the almost completed plane, because a
suitable engine type was never developed. This doomed the project, and
the aircraft was disassembled.
Bartini
tried to pump new life into the VVA-14 by turning into an ekranoplan, a
type of aircraft that uses ground effect to glide close to a surface
like water at high speed like a hovercraft does. The resulting tests,
performed just after Bartini's death, informed the development of other
such aircraft, making the USSR the undisputed leader in the field.
Despite this coda, however, the project was out of steam.
"I
think the Soviet military very quickly realized that the effectiveness
of the VVA-14 as an anti-submarine aircraft would have been low. It
could only carry a very small number of missiles and the technical
challenges of creating such an unusual vehicle were very large.
Ultimately, the military relied on more conventional aircraft for the
job," says Sovenko.
After
it was retired, the original prototype was transferred by barge from
Taganrog in southern Russia, where it had been built and tested, to a
small town near Moscow, Lytkarino. Unloaded ashore, it was left
unattended and partially destroyed and dismantled.
Later
transported via helicopter to nearby Monino at the Central Air Force
Museum, the aircraft remains badly damaged to this day.
"Indeed,
some fragments of the original prototype have been in Monino for 33
years, in the form of scrap metal. Why the museum administration will
not take measures to restore this very interesting aircraft, I don't
know," says Sovenko.
Missing parts
Russia's Central Air Force Museum says the cost of restoring the aircraft would be about $1.2 million
Courtesy Andrii Salnikov
The
Central Air Force Museum is mostly open air, so much like the other
aircraft in its collection -- the largest in the world for Soviet planes
-- the VVA-14 has been sitting outdoors. Tucked away in a peripheral
area of the exhibit, it's conspicuously missing its wings.
Parts of them and of the airframe appear to be lying next to it, as can be seen on Google Maps.
Alexander Zarubetsky, the museum's director, confirmed to CNN Travel that several components of the plane are missing.
"In
2012, representatives from the Taganrog aircraft plant, where the
VVA-14 was built, promised to help in the search for spare parts for the
VVA-14, but the lack of funding did not allow these wishes to be
realized," he says.
He
adds that, if funding were to be secured, the cost of restoration would
be around $1.2 million, and that it would take between one and two
years if performed by aviation specialists directly at the museum.
If the VVA-14 had fully been completed and tested, Sovenko says, it would have been a truly unique aircraft.
"It
could have taken off and landed both horizontally and vertically, and
on both land and on water. It could have stayed afloat for a long time
as a ship and conducted anti-submarine warfare. And of course, it could
have flown like a regular plane too," he says.
"This versatility was its most unusual and outstanding quality. However, the VVA-14 never truly reached its full potential."
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