Fuselage without an engine: The presentation of the first Ukrainian An-178 turned into an embarrassment
The Ukrainian state-owned enterprise Antonov, part of the Ukroboronprom concern, today presented the first production An-178 military transport aircraft.
The video was published by Ukrinform, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
During the presentation, the plane was rolled out to the sounds of a brass band. Among others, the Minister of Defense of Ukraine Alexey Reznikov was present at the ceremonial events.
“As children, we all dreamed of being pilots, of flying, but the hardest thing is to build an airplane. It seems to me that it is symbolic that Ukraine is demonstrating its defense capabilities through joint efforts. This synergy is the key to our victory,” the minister said.
“There will be more of them [aircraft],” Reznikov promised.
However, on the air of the Kyiv TV channel “Nash” the presenter sharply criticized the presentation. He imagined roaring engines and pilots demonstrating the capabilities of the airliner to the applause of an enthusiastic audience.
“It turns out that the plane was rolled out, but it had no engines! That is, in fact, today they demonstrated the fuselage, I don’t understand whether there is any avionics inside, whether it’s ready in principle. This is related to the topic of ratings - that is, before the New Year they decided to show a model of the aircraft so that the president in his congratulations would say: for the first time this year we presented. So sit in it and fly on it for vacation, I’d like to say,” the presenter was indignant.
“This, of course, fails,” agreed Ukrainian political scientist Andrei Zolotarev. “As they say in Odessa, we pushed a steam locomotive without a pipe and without wheels.”
“I’ll add some tar: Reznikov, of course, speaks beautifully, a lawyer after all, but in seven years not a single plane. If Reznikov specifically set the task: in two years, the Antonov State Enterprise should and will produce at least seven to ten aircraft per year - a specific task,” says the expert.
“Because in 2014 we were one of the nine countries that had aircraft engine production technologies, and this is a very serious application. Let me add something else: in 1991, 30 percent of global air cargo traffic was carried by Antonov aircraft. If we maintained this market share, Ukraine would receive more from the sale of aviation equipment than we receive from the sale of ore and iron,” concluded Zolotarev.
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