Antonov An-70 (first large propfan engine aircraft)

The Antonov An-70 is a four-engine medium-range transport aircraft, and the first large aircraft to be powered by propfan engines. It is being developed by Ukraine's Antonov design bureau to replace the obsolete An-12 military transport aircraft. The maiden flight of the first prototype took place on 16 December 1994 in Kyiv (Kiev), Ukraine.

The An-70 is a high-wing monoplane with four wing-mounted propfan engines, it has a full glass cockpit and fly-by-wire controls. The aircraft has a 19.1 metre (22.4 metre with the ramp) x 4 metre x 4.1 metre cargo space and can carry 47 ton of cargo. Powered by four Progress D-27 propfan engines, each turning a pair of contra-rotating scimitar propellers.

<sup>The An-70 was the first Eastern-bloc transport aircraft to be built according to the new IAC AP-25 norms that conformed with JAR-25. This would allow civilian certification in both Western Europe and North America. Another first was the use of a MIL-STD-1553B-compatible data bus, which allows NATO avionics and defensive suites to be installed.

In October 1997, the German defence minister Volker Rühe announced the intention to study whether the An-70 could be the basis for the FLA/Airbus A400M. Evaluation was in competition with the newly-designed, paper-only A400M proposed by Airbus Military Company. The An-70 participation in the 1998–2000 tender process for the FLA was very successful and was the best bid from a financial, technical and operational point of view. The plane was checked thoroughly by MBB Munich, and presented to Air Transport Command in Cologne after Le Bourget airshow in 1999.However, for political reasons and under pressure both from the newly founded EADS company and the French government, the A400M was selected for the FLA. The French claimed that their projected Airbus A400M, although more expensive, would have lower life cycle costs (LCCs) than the An-70. Antonov lost this opportunity to sell its An-70 to Western European nations and to make matters worse, shortly after, the second An-70 prototype made a crash landing on its belly in January 2001 after losing power in two engines on take-off during cold weather testing in Omsk, and was severely damaged. It looked as though the A400M was now going to have the market all to itself. But Antonov recovered the crashed aircraft and repaired it in record time, but the project still lacked funding.</sup>

General characteristics

• Crew: 4 (Two pilots, navigator and flight engineer)
• Capacity: 300 troops or 206 stretcher cases
• Payload: 47,000 kg (103,620 lb) of cargo
• Length: 40.7 m (133 ft 6 in)
• Wingspan: 44.06 m (144 ft 7 in)
• Height: 16.38 m (53 ft 9 in)
• Empty weight: 66,230 kg (146,000 lb)
• Max. takeoff weight: 145,000 kg (319,670 lb)
• Powerplant: 4 × Progress D-27 propfans, 10,350 kW (13,880 hp) each

Performance

• Maximum speed: 780 km/h (421 knots, 485 mph)
• Cruise speed: 750 km/h (405 knots, 466 mph)
• Stall speed: 113 km/h (61 knots, 70 mph)
• Range: 6,600 km or 5,000 km (3,564 nm or 2,700nm) with 20 or 35 tonnes of cargo
• Service ceiling: 12,000 m (39,370 ft)
• Rate of climb: 24.9 m/s (81.7 ft/s)