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Pontius Navigator wrote: ↑

Tue Jun 08, 2021 6:22 pm

The Vulcan also carried 96 pints of alcohol. One of our sorties was cancelled because of a leak. The first sign was the policeman guarding the aircraft was drunk. Then we discovered the aircraft was as well. It was lucky as I had a monumental headache too.
The alcohol was intended to deice cockpit and bomb aimer's windows. The installation of gold film windows meant it was never used for windscreens and the bomb aimer's window didn't ice up. The fix was to remove the requirement.

The Myasishchev VM-T Atlant (Russian: Мясищев ВМ-Т «Атлант», with the "VM-T" ("BM-T") standing for Vladimir Myasishchev – Transport) was a variant of Myasishchev's M-4 Molot bomber (the "3M"), re-purposed as a strategic-airlift airplane. The VM-T was modified to carry rocket boosters and the Soviet space shuttles of the Buran program. It is also known as the 3M-T.

The design was conceived in 1978 when Myasishchev was asked to solve the problem of transporting rockets and other large space vehicles to the Baikonur Cosmodrome. Engineers used an old 3M (a modified M-4 bomber) and replaced the empennage with dihedralled horizontal stabilizers with large, rectangular end-plate tailfins to accommodate payloads measuring as large as twice the diameter of the aircraft's fuselage. A large, aerodynamically optimized cargo container, placed on top of the aircraft, would contain the freight. In addition, a new control system was added to the plane to compensate for the added weight.

The Atlant first flew in 1981 and made its first flight with cargo in January 1982. Its main task was to ferry Energia rocket boosters from their development plant to the Baikonur Cosmodrome. On several occasions, the Soviet space shuttle Buran was piggybacked to the Cosmodrome as well.

Two Atlants were built. They were replaced in 1989 by Antonov's An-225 Mriya. One Atlant (RF-01502) is kept at the Zhukovsky International Airport in Russia owned by TsAGI and Gromov Flight Research Institute, the other one (RA-01402) at Dyagilevo (air base) in Ryazan.