ANTONOV aircraft were represented to the German parliamentarians
On April 8, 2008, Dmytro Kiva, ANTONOV ASTC General Designer, invited by the organizers, took part in Parliamentary meeting of the Parliamentary group of Aviation and Cosmonautics of the German Bundestag.
More than 300 persons of high rank including deputies of Bundestag, representatives of Ministry of defence of Germany, aircraft operators and managers of the enterprises of aviation industry participated in this event. Presentation of SALIS (Strategic Airlift Interim Solution) programme which uses AN-124-100 Ruslan airplanes, became one of the main subjects of the event.
In his report Dmytro Kiva paid attention of the participants to the high technical level of the modernized versions of AN-124-100, in particular, to AN-124-100M-150 the new version.
The enforced construction of the airframe of this improved Ruslan allows the aircraft operators to increase weigh of the transported cargo to 150 t. Its modernized integrated flight and navigation system allows to solve tasks of B-RNAV and P-RNAV. The new system of maintenance according with the PO-500 maintenance schedule is provided for AN-124-100M-150.
Mr. Kiva told about the wide range of Ruslans transport possibilities effectively used within the SALIS. He noted that “namely due to use of AN-124-100 the participants of the programme have a possibility to provide airlift delivery of oversized cargoes and cargoes with mass of more than 80 t”.
General Designer had also represented a number of modern ANTONOV programmes including AN-148 regional jet, AN-70 STOL widebody military transport, new transport with a cargo capacity of 20 t and AN-225 Mriya, the biggest transport heavy lifter.
They all can become a basis for the furthest development of cooperation with the European countries.
For the enquiry: use of Ruslans within the limits of SALIS programme in which 18 NATO and EU countries take part, started in March 2006 in accordance with the contract signed between NAMSA (NATO Maintenance and Support Agency) which represents NATO interests and Ruslan SALIS GmbH representing interests of ANTONOV ASTC (Ukraine) and Volga-Dnepr groups of companies (Russia). According to this document, two AN-124-100 aircraft are constantly based in Leipzig airport. Another 4 machines are being given on demand.
