Information AboutEkranoplan |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT EKRANOPLAN | |
| aircraft configurations | |
| ekranoplans | |
| ekranoplan | |
| seaplanes and flying boats | |
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During the Cold War , ekranoplans were sighted for years on the Caspian Sea as huge, fast-moving objects. The name Caspian Sea Monster was given by U.S. intelligence operatives who had discovered the huge vehicle, which looked like an airplane with the outer halves of the wings removed. After the end of the Cold War, the "monster" was revealed to be one of several Russian military designs meant to fly only a few meters above water, saving energy and staying below enemy radar. The KM, as one model was known in the top secret Soviet military development program, was over 100 m long, weighed 540 tonnes fully loaded, and could travel over 400 km/h, mere meters above the surface of the water. Another model was the Lun-class . The Ekranoplan has a lifting power of , one of the biggest lifting powers in the world. The important design principle is that the wing lift reduces the further above the surface the ekranoplan "flies" (see Ground Effect ). Thus it is dynamically stable in the vertical dimension. Once moving at speed, the ekranoplan was no longer in contact with the water, and could move over ice, snow, or level land with equal ease. These craft were originally developed by the Soviet Union as very high-speed (several hundred km/hour) military transports, and were mostly based on the shores of the Caspian Sea and Black Sea . The largest could transport over 100 tonnes of cargo. Since the Collapse Of The Soviet Union , commercial development has occurred mostly in the United States and Germany . Ekranoplans were featured in the Joe Buff novel Seas of Crisis. EXTERNAL LINKS
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