With Western engines and electronics, Antonov planes have some serious export potential. The only serious non-American competitor is the A400 and it is still far from operational...Big-E said:We can also add
7 An-124s
1 An-225!
1 An-22
2 An-12
1 An-72P
2 more An-26s
as part of strategic airlift... they keep these bohemoths with Antonov Airlines until called upon for military use.
Ukraine has some pretty good airlift capabilities!
IIRC Europeans were considering westernized version of An-70 as A400 alternative. An-70 is great plane whit better capabilities then any comparable competitor and it is quite shame that this great plane has such uncertain future…contedicavour said:With Western engines and electronics, Antonov planes have some serious export potential. The only serious non-American competitor is the A400 and it is still far from operational...![]()
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Fully agree, it's a shame, especially if you look at an Antonov's price tag versus that of the A400. Honestly without the European governments' support the A400 would probably never have been conceived in the first place.isthvan said:IIRC Europeans were considering westernized version of An-70 as A400 alternative. An-70 is great plane whit better capabilities then any comparable competitor and it is quite shame that this great plane has such uncertain future…
Yep we'll end up leasing flight-hours for C17s as Denmark is planning to do... while from an accounting point of view that's smart, it may end up costing us more than buying Westernized An124 if overseas missions as Lebanon/A-stan/Iraq continue.LancerMc said:Contedicavour makes a great point. While I am all for American hardware, but some of the Russian airlifters are a much better choice then the A400, C-130, and C-17. The An-124 is easily a better aircraft then the C-5 ever was, but the Russians for some stupid reason stop producing them. Now many EU nations lease these aircraft to supplement their lack of a strategic lifting aircraft. While the A400 will solve some of these problems, I believe it is still not big enough for the needs of many of the country who bought them. The A400 was one of the novel ideas to build a new aircraft together for a lot different needs, but now its way behind schedule and more expensive then predicted.
Actually Denmark will own 20% of a C-17 as of 2009.contedicavour said:Yep we'll end up leasing flight-hours for C17s as Denmark is planning to do... while from an accounting point of view that's smart, it may end up costing us more than buying Westernized An124 if overseas missions as Lebanon/A-stan/Iraq continue.
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I didn't know your air force was already leasing AN-124 ! Could you give some more details on this please ?Grand Danois said:Actually Denmark will own 20% of a C-17 as of 2009.Until then we'll use the SALIS An-124's.
It's a part of the multinational lease of 6 Ukrainian An-124's under NATO auspices.contedicavour said:I didn't know your air force was already leasing AN-124 ! Could you give some more details on this please ?
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