March 27, 2009
Urban Legendinski
A product of someone's vivid imagination.
Photos of this Soviet behemoth, posing as a K-7 designed by Konstantin Kalinin, have been zinging around the Internet lately, eventually landing on the desktops of National Air and Space Museum curators. “If it’s on the Internet, it must be true,” goes the saying.
Not quite so Soviet, but you get the idea.
No dice, says curator Von Hardesty, who specializes in Russian/Soviet aeronautical history. “No Kalinin design on this scale ever flew. A Russian caption suggests that this is a model of a purely hypothetical Kalinin design. K.A. Kalinin, who was later purged by Stalin, did design a prototype K-7 aircraft, a civilian version that flew briefly in the early 1930s. The K-7 was a large aircraft for its time, with seven engines (one pusher), but it did not match the giant Maxim Gorky (ca 1935). Both aircraft were destroyed in crashes.”
Admits an otherwise anonymous “Randy,” posting on a Web site: “They are actually computer-generated graphics, embellished by the artists.”
To me, they evoke the grandiose designs of Bruce McCall, as seen on the cover (right) of one of his books.
Yeah looks like computer generated…fake
Comment by mark jones — April 27, 2010 @ 4:25 pm
Obviously not a picture from the 1930′s, besides the outrageous airplane. The only airborne that will ever get is if some one drives it off a cliff. That said, that is one very angry looking plane. Very imaginative and cool rendition of the original K-7!
Comment by Rob Taylor-Shaw — May 11, 2010 @ 1:18 am
For a different opinion, go to:
http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/k/k7bomber.htm , While everyone seems to agree that the pictures shown on the item circulating the Internet HAVE been computer enhanced, the pictures on the above site, and the story, seem legit.
Comment by Alton Higgins — February 14, 2011 @ 1:21 pm