"Our partner in the Ukraine have acquired an aircraft..." Seems legit.
Yep, especially "THE Ukraine" part.
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TU-95MS – Soviet Bomber
101–110 of 121 posts
Re: TU-95MS – Soviet Bomber
#102Earlier quoted context omitted.
there is a TU variant with swept wings, var geometry, and jet engines that replaced this plane that most Russian republics use
> there is a TU variant with swept wings, var geometry, and jet engines that replaced this plane that most Russian republics use "Most Russian republics"? So, more than half of the 1? And "Tu" is just an abbreviation for Tupolev, its not a particular plane of which there are variants. Saying a "TU variant" is like saying a Boeing variant. And there are two different Tupolev strategic bombers that meet that general de…
More than half of the 21 actually. Russia is a federation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republics_of_Russia
Re: TU-95MS – Soviet Bomber
#103Earlier quoted context omitted.
Seems like a 3d printing niche opportunity.
Not really. It would NEVER be certified for US commercial operations as the US FAA does not have a reciprocal airworthyness agreement with the Soviets[1]. FAA certification - required for commercial use (but not experimental, which is how old warbirds are generally operated these days) would take years and probably $100M+, fi the FAA would ever even consider it. [1] Ironically, we DO have such an agreement with Polan…
Ekhm, let me correct that slip: " in Poland [...] elsewhere in the USSR". Poland was fortunately never part of the USSR and hopefully never becomes even in USSR 2.0
Re: TU-95MS – Soviet Bomber
#104Re: TU-95MS – Soviet Bomber
#105It took me only a few seconds to find on Google Maps: https://maps.google.com/maps?ll=46.921164,32.083704&spn=0.00... Looks like it has a few siblings, so what you're getting is not as exclusive as you might think... That explains the pictures on the eBay auction appearing to be from different fuselages - they actually are (the two rightmost ones on Google Maps). EDIT: Hmmm, maybe not. Perhaps it's the same plane in…
Wow, this is my city! What you found is military airfield Kulbakine, it is functioning (I hear/see jet training flights from time to time).
On a tangent, how much do you notice the political tensions in your everyday life? I read some accounts by people from Odessa who said they didn't bother much and saw as their first priority that nobody died no matter on what side. Are you still far enough away from the Crimea to ignore everything if you chose to do so?
Also I'm wondering if people will give you strange looks exporting a 4-engine military aircraft out of Ukraine these days. That'd certainly be fun to try.
Re: TU-95MS – Soviet Bomber
#106That's a good purchase, Satoshi.
Re: TU-95MS – Soviet Bomber
#107"Payments: Cash in person"
Re: TU-95MS – Soviet Bomber
#108Earlier quoted context omitted.
Spare parts are probably attainable (there's a reason retired aircraft are mothballed rather than scrapped), and the major companies that the built the engines, etc, are still around. Out of 500 or built ~60 are still in service. Getting parts as a civilian operator might be touchy though. It's probably being sold more as a museum piece. In terms of doing a restoration Russian stuff is usually pretty viable since mec…
I can vouch for this. A friend has a mig that's going to a museum, and they're gonna restore it to museum cond. FYI never tell or show anyone you own a jet in storage or it will be likely robbed of flight / nav gear. High security storage is a must.
> FYI never tell or show anyone you own a jet in storage or it will be likely robbed of flight / nav gear. High security storage is a must.
Is there a story behind this? If it is interesting, can we hear it?
Re: TU-95MS – Soviet Bomber
#109It took me only a few seconds to find on Google Maps: https://maps.google.com/maps?ll=46.921164,32.083704&spn=0.00... Looks like it has a few siblings, so what you're getting is not as exclusive as you might think... That explains the pictures on the eBay auction appearing to be from different fuselages - they actually are (the two rightmost ones on Google Maps). EDIT: Hmmm, maybe not. Perhaps it's the same plane in…
I found the source of the photo: http://www.panoramio.com/photo/27416195 Not convinced that the auction is legit. By the way, the American version (military aviation graveyard) of this is pretty fun to look around at too: https://www.google.com/maps/@32.1572109,-110.8374108,4128m/d...
There is an area there where the airplanes are scraped out https://www.google.com/maps/@32.1594878,-110.8272291,81m/dat...
Re: TU-95MS – Soviet Bomber
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wow, this is my city! What you found is military airfield Kulbakine, it is functioning (I hear/see jet training flights from time to time).
On a tangent, how much do you notice the political tensions in your everyday life? I read some accounts by people from Odessa who said they didn't bother much and saw as their first priority that nobody died no matter on what side. Are you still far enough away from the Crimea to ignore everything if you chose to do so? Also I'm wondering if people will give you strange looks exporting a 4-engine military aircraft ou…
We're almost bordering Crimea, but Crimea is an autonomy, so what happens there is more or less confined. You can ignore politics here if you choose to do so, but unfortunately you can't ignore economic repercussions of it. Exchange rates are skyrocketing, prices on import products (majority of them) rise accordingly, banks put limits on access to debit cards and extreme limits on credit cards. In our biggest bank you literally can't spend more than $20 per day from credit card (and this, combined with higher prices, put strain to people with low income).
As for tensions, our city is pretty much evenly split up pro-russian/anti-russian. Majority of people I know is anti-russian, but this is probably demographics bias, because older people (who lived half of their life in USSR) are mostly pro-russian. But you won't see many fights here over this. In everyday life when someone mentions they are from one camp and someone from another, we usually just laugh it off and change theme. Some extremists do escalate the conflict, but they're not good people anyway, no matter what side they're taking.
I've witnessed one episode recently when playing at trivia competition with my team. It's split up to pro-russian/anti-russian, just like our city, but we just joke casually about each other and that's it. One of the pro-russian members is a world-class athlete. She took part in world championship on behalf of Ukraine and came to this trivia competition in national athletics team's suit. One of the anti-russian people from other team was shouting to her that she does not deserve to wear this suit, because she's pro-russian and hence anti-ukrainian. But that's just nonsense, because she earned the right to wear this suit more than anyone else in that room. Fortunately, this was one of just few exceptions. So what you read about people in Odessa is true for people in Nikolayev - majority here value respect for each other more than political beliefs.