Antonov An-990 -

But the legend of the An-990 persists because it represents a pure, unfiltered expression of Soviet-era "gigantomania": the belief that any logistical problem can be solved by adding more engines, more wheels, and more wings. It is the aviation equivalent of building a pyramid—a monument not to practicality, but to the hubris of "because we can."

The landing gear, a nightmare of hydraulics, contained 64 wheels arranged in four independent bogie trains. Turning required a specialized tow-tractor and a five-kilometer turning radius. The only operational anecdote comes from a purported "leak" by a former Antonov test engineer in a 2012 forum post, since deleted. He claimed that a single prototype—registration CCCP-990100—was rolled out of a modified hangar in Kyiv in December 1991, just weeks before the fall of the Soviet Union. antonov an-990

The project was buried. The prototype, according to the tale, was disassembled and its parts absorbed into the construction of the second (never-completed) An-225. No aerodynamicist believes the An-990 could have flown economically—or safely. The torsional stress on the wing joints would have been catastrophic. The fuel consumption would have bankrupted a small nation. The engine-out scenario (losing one of 14) would require a flight computer more advanced than anything in the 1990s. But the legend of the An-990 persists because

The taxi test was a disaster. The weight of the central fuselage caused the asphalt of the taxiway to liquefy. The first and only "hop"—a 20-foot rise off the runway at 180 knots—reportedly shattered every window in the control tower and stripped the roof off a nearby maintenance shed due to the exhaust wake of the 14 engines. The aircraft landed immediately, its rear triple-fuselage joint cracked. The only operational anecdote comes from a purported

In the pantheon of aviation engineering, the Antonov Design Bureau is synonymous with "big." The An-225 Mriya —a six-engine, 32-wheel leviathan that carried the Soviet Buran space shuttle—remains the heaviest aircraft ever built. But in the dusty archives of unbuilt concepts, whispered about in the hangars of Hostomel Airport, lies a legend that makes the An-225 look like a crop duster: the Antonov An-990 .