"Carrier" - such a simple name was given to the aircraft under the designation An-22PZ, intended for the transportation of large-sized parts of other, even larger aircraft. This was a worldwide trend. The aviation powers acquired wide-body aircraft, into which they loaded oversized parts of flying giants, and in exceptional cases, the elements were mounted on an external sling. Such an exceptional case was the program for the creation of the Soviet spacecraft "Buran", as well as work on the An-124 and An-225 machines. It was not possible to participate in the first project of the An-22, but Antey came in handy in the assembly of the elder brother "Ruslan" and sister "Mriya".
The first to go into action was board No. 01-01, which was equipped with four external hitch assemblies and in the summer of 1980 was sent to Tashkent for testing. In the Uzbek SSR, the center section of the giant Ruslan was mounted on the Antey, after having covered it with fairings. Tests showed that the car with a load on the "hump" was controlled quite tolerably, and on July 15, an An-22P3 loaded with a center section took off, heading for Kiev. But just a few minutes after takeoff, the crew felt serious vibrations, which forced it to land in Krasnovodsk. It shook so that the pilots had to clamp the instruments with their feet to see the readings. A detailed examination revealed the breakdown of the fairings on the cargo, as well as complex interference or mutual influence of the center section and the fuselage of the An-22. The gap between the cargo and the Antey's skin during the flight further intensified these vibrations. However, the flight directors did not find anything critical in this, and the "Carrier" was set off again with an additional landing in Mozdok. In further operation, the roughness of the first flight was taken into account, the center section was shifted to the tail, and the clearance was carefully "putty". They did not forget about the de-icer for the cargo on the external sling - they installed a 1000-liter alcohol tank, a pump, a manifold and a sprayer. From that moment on, the "Carrier" received the designation USSR-150151. However, in the most famous photograph the plane bears the USSR index (UR) 64459. It was a modification of the carrier with an additional keel from the An-26, the rudder of which was locked. Since February 1982, the machine has been transferring the detachable parts of the Ruslan and Mriya wings to the assembly site. On the long routes Tashkent - Kiev and Tashkent - Ulyanovsk in 1983, board No. 01-03 began to operate, also revised under the "Carrier" program. After working out the calendar deadline, the car was sold to the German Museum in Speyer. Huge and heavy center sections (30x7x2, 5 meters and 45 tons), as well as the wing consoles "Mriya" An-22PZ transported from 1987 to 1994. In the course of this work, the "Transporter" transferred six products to the assembly site. All in all, in the role of "Carrier" An-22 made more than 100 flights. It should be noted that the group of developers of this modification "Antea" was awarded the State Prize of Ukraine.
An-22PZ No. 01-03 with a detachable wing section An-124
Additional keel from the An-24 aircraft between the vertical tail washers of the An-22PZ
Among the unrealized projects of the Antonov Design Bureau there are several aircraft based on the An-22. Such was the amphibious aircraft, which, according to the plan, was equipped with hydrofoils (ski-wing landing gear) and was supposed to provide the supply of submarines at distant lines. It was also supposed to "teach" the An-22 to combat enemy submarines and search and rescue operations. The amphibian model was even tested at a scale of 1:20 in the TsAGI hydrochannel in order to determine the hydrodynamic characteristics. There was also a second version of the seaplane, equipped with floats attached to the fuselage. But neither the first nor the second option even left the stage of the technical proposal. The further history of the An-22 continued in accordance with the decree of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR dated 1965-10-26, according to which the OKB Antonov Design Bureau on the basis of "Antey" developed a project of an ultra-long-range low-altitude anti-submarine defense aircraft with a nuclear power plant - An- 22-PLO. This largely absurd child of the Cold War had to be equipped with a small-sized reactor developed by the team of Academician A. P. Aleksandrov. At one "refueling" An-22-PLO could fly 27,500 km in 50 hours! On takeoff, the car ran on ordinary kerosene, and in flight, a reactor came into play, ensuring the operation of special turboprop motors designed by ND Kuznetsov. The serial installation of the nuclear miracle machine on board the Antey was hampered by the poor elaboration of the crew's protection from radiation, and the vast contamination zone that the nuclear-powered Antey left behind made us ponder. But this did not stop them from experimenting, and in 1972 a neutron radiation source with a power of 3 kW was mounted on aircraft No. 01-06. In Semipalatinsk, test pilot Yuri Kurlin worked on this machine in the hope of finding an effective way to protect against radiation - for this purpose, the cockpit was isolated with a special multi-layer partition. In total, the car with such a load made 10 flights. And on board No. 01-07, under the control of test pilot Vasily Samovarov, there was a full-fledged nuclear reactor in a lead shell, Antey with such a special load rose into the sky 23 times. After experimental work, machines 06 and 07 were transferred to 81-1 VTAP.
An-22 variant, being developed to transport missile fragments
Project of an amphibious aircraft with lateral stability floats
Hydrofoil amphibious aircraft project
Considered "Antey" and as an air cab for the ICBM stages - the direction index of the An-22Sh. There were even ideas ahead of their time for the implementation of the concept of an air rocket launch. It was proposed to equip the aircraft with three ICBMs at once, which were originally supposed to be installed on submarines. Each missile weighing more than 14 tons was equipped with a monobloc warhead and hit targets at a distance of 2500 km. Later they decided that one missile would be enough from the Anthea, but a big one: they planned to install a 33-ton R-29, and then a 35-ton R-29R with multiple warheads. But, like the An-22PS search and rescue project, all utopian ideas remained on paper.
Work was underway to increase the Antey's carrying capacity. The machine had the code An-122 and was supposed to lift about 120 tons to a maximum range of 2500 km. A much more advanced aircraft, the An-124 Ruslan, went into production. It is worth noting that in the fall of 1972, the Antey nevertheless became, albeit temporarily, a purely passenger plane: it evacuated 700 Soviet personnel from Egypt. Thus, the An-22 fulfilled the promise made by the chief designer Antonov at the Le Bourget air show in 1965.
