Russian giant flies in

Matthew Scerri

Jul 24th 2012, 23:39

Exactly as much financial aid the RyanAir flight drops on Spain on it's flight from Belfast to Malta. Zilch. :)

stephen koludrovic

Jul 23rd 2012, 20:48

Don't kid yourself, this is not an out of date dinosaur. Beats the hell out of any chinook.

Francis Grech

Jul 23rd 2012, 22:13

An out of date dinosaur you must be joking Cassar, it's the only helicopter that is able to carry up to 100 people one of them is enough to solve our transport between the two Island during winter time or when Gozo channel has only one ferry working,Please Mr Putin have a heart and donate one to tiny Malta in appreciation for all the Russians that we have working in Malta taking Maltese jobs.

K. Vella II

Jul 23rd 2012, 14:26

Excuse my insolence, Professor, but how is most of your comment related to the article?

F. Pisani

Jul 23rd 2012, 14:29

Yes you are a lucky man, the intelligent sort of a lucky man, but you seem to forget that this is Russian, and Russians did not really know what they are doing at that period. They simply saw something the Americans did, make the thing out of leaves and wood or Siberian mud, look at it, see if they like it or not and simply putting it into production. This was the Russian way, because apart from the AK-47 everything they made was copied and put into production. some examples are the Antonov- a direct response to the Boing 737, the ilyushin Il-76- a direct response to the C-130 Globemaster, the Su-27- a direct response to the F-15 Eagle and many many more. You know the Mig-25 a big jet with enormous jet nostrils at the back? It was a great piece of engineering able to keep up with the mighty SR-71 at speed and altitude? it never worked thou, due to the fact that the fuel consumption was ridicules, and the service cycling wasn’t that working well due to the fact it wasn't very well made, but this was the Russian way, just to scare the Americans away, and this is the story here. This helicopter is so massive so that it will be bigger that the CH- 53 Sea Stallion, or the HH-47 Chinook that is all, so we must not mock the Russians to much, they have done it. Live with it! It Brilliant!

Pule' Carmel

Jul 23rd 2012, 15:39

Hallo Mr Vella,
Well I am an observant man and so seeing that photograph, I commented about the inefficiency to the intakes on those jet engines. As Mr Pisani commented, the Russians had a tendency to copy from the Americans and what they copied was not always analysed efficiently. So I thought I would comment on it.

Also in life you have to make your own luck and do not expect it to fall on our lap. So I commented how knowing that there were Russian helicopters in Malta of a related design to the one shown in the photograph I did go to Luqa and bought a ticket and I spent hours talking to the Russian pilots and after they saw that I was so interested, they decided to take me for a flight even though there were only three of my family.
I seem to make my own luck.
As far as the last part, it is a confirmation that it is up to us to make our own opportunities and I did just that.
I hope that people who read my comment will, read in how I made my luck,in this case the helicopter was an instrument to transmit this message to the young students who want to make their own luck and live an exciting life. You do not make money out of observing such wonderful machines , but you learn a lot how to approach people and understand the beauty of technology all through social contacts.

Pule' Carmel

Jul 23rd 2012, 15:49

Mr Pisani.
Yes you are absolutely correct. I alwaus thought that the exhaust of the Russian jets was always so smokey and their designs were not optimised. Once I had an interest in following " The Russian Monster of the caspian sea" It was a surface hugging craft with eight smokey jet engines up front and making use of the ground effect. Once a fired of mine and I went into a large single engined Russian biplane ( Radial engined) which landed in Malta had extra eigh 45 gallon fuel tanks inserted in its hold to fly all the way to south Africa. I noticed that all the instruments were of the Naval type that I used in Submarines when I worked for the british navy. Once I Introduced a Russian pilot to a friend of mine who was a pilot of modern fly by wire aircraft and he was bewildered to see tha " all glass pannels in front og the pilot with each monitor taking care of about 400 measurements all in software.
May be the Russian Aircraft are coppied and I do agree, but I must say they have some excellent pilots and recently I saw one landing and aborting on an aircraft carrier and believe me that pilot was good. I also follow the lady Russian pilot Svetlana Kampanina, and I tell you she takes my breath away in more than one way. She is good, even though she flies in a copied aerobatic cech plane.

Alan Cordina

Jul 23rd 2012, 23:03

Mr Pisani, for Heaven's sake ! ...... an Antonov (which one out of many ?? but whichever) has ABSOLUTELY no connection or anything else to a Boeing (correct spelling) 737 !!!! ......... and an Ilyushin Il-76 is as similar to a C-130, just as much as a goat is to a bicycle !!! ..... apparti li C-130 is Hercules not Globemaster. (Globemaster is the C-17).

That's why I don't comment when the subject is on pastry or home economics, because I would probably end up writing about fishing without knowing !