Murderer of aircraft carriers T-4: 100-ton bomber

Get acquainted, "the murderer of aircraft carriers" Dry T-4: the 100-ton bomber overtaking a sound In the early sixties the Soviet Union constructed a bomber which speed is three times higher than speed of a sound – modern rockets, not to mention fighters cannot brag of such indicators even.

Fighters usually have higher speed, than bombers, but 102-ton T-4 was developed for commission of flights with the speed exceeding number of the Move 3 (3200 km/h).

The original project was developed in 1964. It was the tailless plane with triangular wings and four turbojets placed in one "gondola" under a fuselage.

At a first line covered a crack. The small stabilizer also was switched on in a design. The plane should be equipped with three operated solid propellant N-45 rockets located under a fuselage.

In the course of design the arrangement of aircraft engines was changed, and the number of rockets was reduced to two.

In assembly the titan and steel alloys was used, T-4 should become the advanced electrohydraulic remote system with quadruple reservation.

The plane had «a falling nose» which provided good visibility when landing, however when the nose of the plane was lifted up, pilots saw nothing and in flight they had to rely on devices.

In a final version the plane had length of 44.5 meters, scope covered 22 meters, the area of a wing of 295,7 square meters and starting mass of 114 tons.

In settlement characteristics it was specified that the bomber will have range of 6000 km, the maximum speed in 3200 km/h at height of 20,000-24,000 m, and the maximum height made 25 000-30 000 meters.

T-4 right there christened «the murderer of aircraft carriers». It was intended for the Soviet strategic command of the Air Force. Development T-4 proceeded in the 60th years, completely operating copy was ready in 1971. Before in 1975 the project was revised, development of three more prototypes began.

These prototypes were not complete. As a whole six various T-4 versions were developed. Models 101 and 102 were constructed, construction 103 and 104 was not complete, and 105 and 106 existed only on paper.

Model 101 appeared by the unique plane which has passed all flight tests. This also unique plane which did not destroy after project cancellation – can be seen it now in Monino’s well-known museum near Moscow.