ANT-22

Last crawled date: 2 weeks ago

Soviet ANT-22 was a long-range bomber reconnaissance flying-boat produced in 1934 in Tupolev's bureaux as the only aircraft. It was also known under military designation MK-1, that meant 'Morskoy Kreiser - 1' (Sea Cruiser - 1). It was constructed as the largest flying catamaran in the world. The cockpit for two pilots, a navigator and a chief mechanic was mounted on the leading edge of the wing at the centre, between two hulls with the turrets and observer's nests. The overall crew consist of 16-18 men. The flying boat was capable to lift up 6 tons of bombs and there was another project to use ANT-22 for transporting a small submarine to the target. That project was cancelled - two submarines were built, but never tested. Despite of well flying and water performances, ANT-22 as a military aircraft was weak against fighters and anti-aircratf weapons, also as it required great amount of man-hours in service. Those were the reason why the Navy refuse progress of the programm. However, the plane stayed in service until end of 30's and established several weight world records. After years ANT-22 is looking like true artifact of dieselpunk era.