She was the pride of Ukrainian aviation, the Antonov An-225, built in 1988. At the beginning of February, the world’s largest cargo plane was flown back to its home airport northwest of Kyiv for maintenance work and parked in a semi-open hangar.
But the six-engine transport plane was destroyed in two waves of attacks in the first days of the war at the end of February, when Russian paratroopers occupied the airport 20 kilometers north-west of Kyiv.
In the Ukraine, the plane, nicknamed “Mriya”, which means “dream”, had its maiden flight back in Soviet times. Originally, the An-225 with a wingspan of 88.4 meters was only intended to transport the Buran space shuttle piggyback. Later, the one-off made a career as a transporter for particularly heavy or voluminous goods and was in demand worldwide.
In the past two years, the Antonov An-225, with its huge capacity of 1220 cubic meters, has repeatedly transported medical supplies such as masks, rapid tests and protective suits from China to Europe on countless charter flights.
After the Russian military withdrew from Hostomel at the end of April, the full extent of the destruction on the cargo plane with the official registration UR-82060 became visible: “damaged beyond repair,” according to experts. The cockpit is completely destroyed, the bow and a wing are separated from the fuselage on the hall floor.
In the meantime, several delegations of ministers from the Baltic States and Poland, various press photographers and the Ukrainian Interior Minister Denys Monastyrskyy have visited the site of the destruction. The latter used the remains of the hangar with the plane wreck in the background as a bizarre backdrop to present awards to some of his employees.
Also read:
– “Everything was gigantic” – how a photographer experienced his flight with the Antonow An-225
– An-124: Why the Antonovs are so important for NATO and the US economy
– Before the destruction of the “Mriya”: NATO probably recommended Antonov to relocate the An-225 from the Ukraine