EXTREMES
16 AH SEPTEMBER 2019
T
he peculiar passion that Russians seem to harbor for huge
aircraft can be traced all the way back to 1913, when
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four-engine airplane and the largest in the world at that
time. Their enthusiasm for giants continued into World War I,
with the production of Sikorsky’s four-engine Ilya Muromets,
and persisted throughout the Soviet era. While many Soviet
designers created gargantuan airplanes, the most consistently
successful ones originated from the design bureau headed by
Andrei Tupolev.
For more than 60 years Tupolev remained one of the most
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arrested for subversive activities—once by the Tsarist regime
and once by the Soviets. In fact, Tupolev actually developed
his highly successful Tu-2 medium bomber while imprisoned
for treason by Josef Stalin during World War II.
After Stalin’s death in 1953, a relative thaw began in Soviet-
Western relations. Unlike Stalin, Premier Nikita Khrushchev
was willing to travel abroad in order to confer with his Western
counterparts. He also sought to publicize Soviet technological
achievements to the rest of the world. The accomplishment of
those objectives, however, would require the development of
a suitably prestigious transport aircraft, which at that time did
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during Khrushchev’s arrival at the 1955 summit in Geneva
in an Ilyushin Il-14. While a perfectly adequate twin-engine
airliner, the Il-14 was overshadowed by President Dwight D.
Eisenhower’s sleek four-engine Lockheed Super Constellation
Columbine III.
The Soviet Air Ministry turned to Tupolev, issuing a speci-Aeroflot’s
Intercontinental Giant
DEVELOPED FROM THE TUPOLEV TU-95 “BEAR” STRATEGIC BOMBER,
THE TU-114 ROSSIYA AIRLINER SET RECORDS AS THE WORLD’S FASTEST
TURBOPROP AIRCRAFT BY ROBERT GUTTMANEXTREMES
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port with a range of 8,
kilometers (4,971 miles).
Tupolev had already devel-
oped a successful jet-powered
airliner, the Tu-104, but
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moderate distances and was
not suitable for transoceanic
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to develop an airliner—the
Tu-114—from his Tu-
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gic nuclear bomber with true
intercontinental range.
It was not a particularly
original idea. Boeing had
already developed its 307
Stratoliner and 377 Strato-
cruiser airliners from its
B-17 and B-29 bombers,
respectively, while Avro
developed its Lancastrian
and Tudor airliners from its
Lancaster bomber.
The Tu-114 featured an
entirely new fuselage with a
pressurized cabin that could
accommodate up to 224
passengers. The 35-degreeswept wing was relocated
from the high-wing position
used on the Tu-95 to a low-
wing position on the airliner.
An entirely new tail and
stabilizer were also designed.
Power was provided by four
Kuznetsov NK-12MV turbo-
prop engines driving contra-
rotating propellers, each
delivering 14,795 hp. The
resulting aircraft had a wing-
span of 168 feet, a length of
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of 385,809 pounds. Its maxi-
mum speed was 541 mph
and it cruised at 478 mph,
with a maximum range of
5,244 miles.
Concurrent with the
Tu-114, Tupolev also devel-
oped another passenger-
carrying version of the
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purpose was “to conduct
route and scheduling studies,
propulsion system tests and
study compatibility issues
with civil airports.” In reality,
however, it was intended to