[lbryce]

The Soviets, as characterized in many of their cold-war weaponry, inherent in design was one in which they projected size to gargantuan effect as seen in their ill-fated N-1 Moon rocket as well as the ana-225, the world's largest jet with six engines, seen here.

[vladimir998]

They would have built the Death Star if they could have.

Stupid waste of money.

[blam]

You'll not want to miss this video of the Ekranoplane in flight/operation. It's a real sea-monster.

[SES1066]

These Soviet semi-airplanes, designated 'ekranoplan', were a mystery to American Intelligence in the early 1960s when aerial photographs showed a large aircraft on a ramp near the Caspian Sea but with obviously truncated wings. Also seen were large wakes from small objects in that land-locked sea (between the Soviet Union and Iran). Jokingly referred to as the "Caspian Sea Monster" it took a while to realize that these were the GEV 'ekranoplan' types that we see here.

[NTHockey]

NASA had plans on the drawing board and a company (Rohr Industries in San Diego, CA) ready to build nuclear-powered GEV freighters capable of ocean travel in the late ‘60s. They would be able to go from New York to London in one day! Freight capacity was small (<200 tons), but low cost and high speed made a fleet of them cost effective.

Plans were dropped in favor of continued space travel.

[Celtic Conservative]

I see one of them is carrying the "buran" space shuttle, a blatant ripoff of American technology(which never flew).Cool stuff, Thanks.

CC