ACU_Auugust Fourth Draft

COVER STORY
ens of thousands of
Tplanes fly over the skies
every hour but there is
truly just one that dominates the
airspace when it comes to size,
capacity and power, the Antonov
AN-225 Mriya, the world's biggest
and heaviest aircraft.
Powered by six turbofan engines
and wings spanning 88.4 meters
long, the mammoth AN-225 Mriya
is 9 meters longer than the world's
largest passenger aircraft, the
Airbus A380 superjumbo.
Capable of carrying as much as
250 tons, it had accumulated 242
world records over the past 30 years
in hauling super heavy or breakbulk
cargo worldwide that includes
ships, trains, small planes and
helicopters, satellites, rails, super
heavy generators, aerospace
materials, and so on.
It's a unique engineering marvel
that remains unmatched since it
first flew on December 21, 1988.
There is only one Antonov AN-225
in the world with the completion of
its twin put on hold in 1994 or three
years after the collapse of the Soviet
regime.
In 2016, China tried to take over
where the Soviets had left off on
AN-225 but the project failed
because the 70 percent completed
giant plane couldn't be transported
to the country.
AN-225 is
scheduled to remain in service until
at least 2033, according to experts.
Ukraine's pride
Ukraine, a former USSR state
which is marking its 28th year of
independence on August 24 from
the Soviet communist regime after
it collapsed in 1991, holds the pride
to Antonov AN-225 Mriya's
(Ukrainian for 'Dream') creation.
Conceived and built in the 1980s
during the Cold War era, AN-225 was
originally designed to carry the Buran
Spacecraft, Russia's answer to
America's Space Shuttle, from the
assembly line to the sprawling deserts
o f K a z a k h s t a n a t B a i k o n u r
Cosmodrome where Yuri Gagarin
launched his pioneering space
voyage in 1961.
AN-225 successfully completed
its mission and there were plans to
build three more of its kind to
support Russia's space exploration
projects but the Soviet Union