NOTE: RADIO CONTROL AIRPLANES ARE ON THE BOTTOM HALF OF THE PAGE.
The Tupolev Tu-144 is the world's fastest airliner.
The first flight was on Dec. 31, 1968. It preceded the Concorde's first flight that took place on March 2, 1969.
On June 5,1969 the Tupolev Tu-144 became the first
transport aircraft to exceed the speed of sound and on July 15, 1969 it became
the first transport aircraft to fly at double the speed of sound.
The aircraft went in to service on Dec. 26, 1975 flying
mail and freight. Passenger service started in Nov. of 1977 and ran through June
1, 1978 for a total of 55 flights.
Freight only service began again on June 23, 1979. Including the
55 passenger flights, Tupolev Tu144
aircraft flew 102
scheduled flights before commercial services ended.
Aeroflot continued to fly the
airliner after the official end of service, with
non-scheduled flights ending in 1987.
The development of the Tupolev Tu-144 is said to be closely related to spying on
Aérospatiale, builder of the Concorde, even though the Tu-144 flew first.
The Russians came into possession of some
early supersonic transport pre-prototype documentation. The documentation was
not sufficiently developed to be used as any thing more than a guide to
development ideas of engineers. Certainly these documents alone could not have
been used to build the aircraft.
At first glance, the similarities of the
Tu-144 to the Concorde are, on their surface, great. However there are extensive
differences between the aircraft. A side-by-side look at the two aircraft
reveals major differences in their wing shapes and engine nacelles. Internally
the two aircraft have differences too numerous to list.
On June 3, 1973 a Tupolev Tu-144 crashed during a demonstration
flight at the Paris Air Show. Witnesses said that it broke up when
attempting to pull out of a dive.
It is said that the airliner was forced to dive in order to avoid a collision with a
Mirage fighter aircraft that was closing in on it to photograph
it. While the French admit to the presence of the Mirage, they say it had
nothing to do with the crash.
Another explanation of the crash is that the
Russian engineers bypassed safety devices that were placed in the Tupolev
Tu-144 so that it would have better performance than that of the
Concorde, while being exhibited. It is said that during its steep climb the
aircraft stalled, resulting in a dive from which it could not
recover.
A third theory is that the Concorde designers knew of the Russian
spying and purposely put fatal flaws in the plans that they let the Russians
steal. The Russians never caught the flaws and these caused the fatal crash when pushed to its limits.
Pictured above and immediately below is the rc Tupolev Tu-144 scratch built by Sergio Vergara. The length of the radio control airplane is 108", and the wing span is 48".
Construction of the rc Tupolev Tu-144 is of foam, and all-up weight about 10 lbs. Sergio powers his radio control airplane with 4 x 16/7/4 Mega motors driving Alfa 60/25 ducted fans.
If you have a favorite rc Tupolev Tu-144, please email us.
Tupolev Tu-144 SST
