Upgrade your browser!

Skip to Content

Videos / Military Videos /

The Caspian Sea Monster

"A boat? A plane? A bit of both in fact. The Soviet 'Ekranoplan' was one of the more obscure products of the fight for technological supremacy in the Cold War. In September 1966 an American spy satellite flew over a Soviet naval base on the Caspian Sea and took a series of photographs. This being the height of the Cold War, the results created quite a stir among the American intelligence community, because they showed an object, more than 100m long with inexplicably stubby, square wings, quite unlike anything they had seen before." More info at BBC: news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7638659.stm

  • Views: 7365
  • All Ages
  • All Ages

Related Media

  • Video:Underwater Lake
  • Underwater Lake
  • During the Jurassic period the waters here were shallow. . .
  • Votes 4.71/5 - Views 4235 - Comments 15
  • Video:Seal Owns Shark
  • Seal Owns Shark
  • Sharks are pretty fast when it comes to catching seals,. . .
  • Votes 4.74/5 - Views 11337 - Comments 24
  • Video:T-Bone
  • T-Bone
  • And I'm not talking about a steak. I think its safe to. . .
  • Votes 4.77/5 - Views 4150 - Comments 14

View All

Your Macromedia's Flash Player
may be out of date

Click here to upgrade your flash player.

You may also get this message if you have disabled your javascript. You must enable it to view videos.



Trouble playing the video? Click here to download the original.

Rate This Video:
Rate it 0.5 Rate it 1.0 Rate it 1.5 Rate it 2.0 Rate it 2.5 Rate it 3.0 Rate it 3.5 Rate it 4.0 Rate it 4.5 Rate it 5.0

4.7 out of 5 based on 965 votes

Rating Results:
Earn XP by sharing this video!
learn more

Video URL:

Embedded Link:

Send This Video To A Cell Phone! Digg

15 Comments

Current View: 15 / Show all Comments

darkangeledge : LVL 32: VP 4.1: said:

darkangeledge

42 votes NegativePositive

68 days 15 hours ago...

fucking awesome !!

bm28651 : LVL 30: VP 3.9: said:

bm28651

22 votes NegativePositive

68 days 15 hours ago...

It is just physics. When the plane pushes air down, it bounces off the water and back up to the plane creating more lift. Why is this not used more?!?

Of course this only works in calm seas and flying 300mph at 20 ft above the water doesn`t give you much time to eject.

exploder : LVL 48: VP 5: said:

exploder

27 votes NegativePositive

68 days 14 hours ago...

^calm seas only = not true. Obviously there would be some wave height issues in very large seas, but you do get some average sea height effect (your lift suface is the average, not the bottom), whereas if you are boating a 40` wave is trough to peak. It`s also very likely that they could hop the thing a little if needed, especially at higher speed.

When I was flying amphib, this was my very favorite way to fly. 25% less throttle for a given speed, and it feels like you`re riding a big poofy pillow. Very nice feeling, just remember to steer with rudder only (yaw), or you dip a wingtip and go for a terminal spin. In little planes with slow maximum landing speeds, you can`t do it in stronger downwind runs though, because otherwise you end up trying to land rough water at excessive speeds in the event of an engine failure / forced landing.

softcock : LVL 31: VP 4: said:

softcock

2 votes NegativePositive

68 days 14 hours ago...

wasn`t this the plane they crashed on purpose because it was bankrupting the navy?

ingenious design though

rybear4513 : LVL 27: VP 3.6: said:

rybear4513

Hidden (Show Comment) -25 votes

68 days 13 hours ago...

exploder knows all

bow down

Chrisalexan : LVL 25: VP 3.4: said:

Chrisalexan

23 votes NegativePositive

68 days 8 hours ago...

Shapesphere ur the man, put more cool stuff like this. It`s starting to get a bit rusty in spiked.

drogue : LVL 13: VP 2.2: said:

drogue

3 votes NegativePositive

68 days ago...

@ exploder: So an aircraft of this design, with the shorter wings--I`m just envisioning getting caught in a bad storm. Are you saying it could pull through easily? I`m having a hard time picturing that in super choppy water.

OceanDonkey7 : LVL 34: VP 4.2: said:

OceanDonkey7

11 votes NegativePositive

68 days ago...

But will it blend?

STONED->BC : LVL 25: VP 3.4: said:

STONED->BC

0 votes NegativePositive

68 days ago...

Fuckin mass produce it already and save tones of fuel, mabye gas will go down in price then, LOL, it WAS a joke :P heh

wObbegOng : LVL 3: VP 1.2: said:

wObbegOng

10 votes NegativePositive

67 days 23 hours ago...

I can never get enough of the `oldschool-futuristic` stuff :)
Very cool.

exploder : LVL 48: VP 5: said:

exploder

4 votes NegativePositive

67 days 23 hours ago...

^ drogue : I don`t know about super choppy water. If you think about it going fast though, at 300+ mph (440+ fps), you would usually have a few waves passing underneath every second. Combined with the large mass of the thing damping any vertical bumpiness, and flying 20+ ft above the average sea height, you would need some pretty tall waves peaks to hit the hull. I also expect the thing could fly a bit higher, by applying more power and a slightly higher attitude, since there is no magic cutoff line where one foot higher suddenly equals no more lift. It would also be highly dependant on how much load it was carrying.

Failing all of the above, I guess there would still be situations when it couldn`t fly, in extreme seas.

Presto : LVL 38: VP 4.6: said:

Presto

-1 votes NegativePositive

67 days 21 hours ago...

wouldn`t that plane get fucked up by heavy storms? waves get much higher then 20 ft in a storm

Teh_Darkwater : LVL 38: VP 4.6: said:

Teh_Darkwater

2 votes NegativePositive

67 days 21 hours ago...

Why are we not using this, then?

Mr6Sozac : LVL 33: VP 4.2: said:

Mr6Sozac

8 votes NegativePositive

67 days 18 hours ago...

this would be great for drug runners X_X

Thetinsnail : LVL 20: VP 2.9: said:

Thetinsnail

2 votes NegativePositive

67 days 18 hours ago...

i believe these planes suffered from problems with water getting into the engines in rough seas

Post a Comment:

Avatar

The Spikedhumor Drawing!Moderators Contest
Prize
Entry Dates: 11/4/2008-12/15/2008

Recent Blog Posts

Squeegee Duel

Surgeon Saves Life By Text Me...

9 Year Old Writes 'How to Tal...

Gay Penguins Steal Eggs from ...

Study: Mice Research Links Fa...

Keys Penetrate Toddlers Brain...

8 Year Old Crashes Teacher's ...

Man Releases Worms on Train t...

Hotlinks on Spiked

Top 100 Artists of the Decade: The White Stripes

Keyboard Cuts: How To Build A Slasher

Batman: Arkham Asylum Trailer

Hipster Music For Those Over 25 Years Old

Badass New Internet Terminator Poster

Sexy Mrs. Claus Tribute Gallery

Forgetting Sarah Marshall And Boffing Mila Kunis

World's First Known Lolcat Discovered

Spiked Classics of 2006

Weekend Update - Best of ...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.4
  • 5
3513444
Jay Gatsby
View Profile
Level: 38
Voting Power: 4.6

National Geographic Pictu...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.1
  • 5
1610787
DaVyWaVyBaBy
View Profile
Level: 65
Voting Power: 5

Millions Of Dominoes Fall...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.4
  • 5
7043373
merugo
View Profile
Level: 34
Voting Power: 4.2

That's My Parking Space!
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.4
  • 5
6244576
DaVyWaVyBaBy
View Profile
Level: 65
Voting Power: 5

Most Mugged Man In Americ...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.4
  • 5
7431845
DaVyWaVyBaBy
View Profile
Level: 65
Voting Power: 5

Venus Fly Trap
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.3
  • 5
4414529
DaVyWaVyBaBy
View Profile
Level: 65
Voting Power: 5

Captain Picard Sings Alph...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.1
  • 5
366994
merugo
View Profile
Level: 34
Voting Power: 4.2

"The Gentle Rhythms of Na...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.3
  • 5
1611772
SanMan899
View Profile
Level: 32
Voting Power: 4.1

Slow Motion High Frames C...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.4
  • 5
5172433
Opperator
View Profile
Level: 53
Voting Power: 5

Seinfeld's Kramer A Crazy...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.2
  • 5
17862483
merugo
View Profile
Level: 34
Voting Power: 4.2

World War I (Last Gallery...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.0
  • 5
124843
robusto
View Profile
Level: 38
Voting Power: 4.6

Underwater Atomic Bomb Ex...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.2
  • 5
5913479
CRY ME MERCY
View Profile
Level: 17
Voting Power: 2.6

Wii - Experience A New Wa...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.1
  • 5
819662
bigredseany
View Profile
Level: 31
Voting Power: 4

Olbermann - Educating Bus...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.2
  • 5
10710785
carrotfire
View Profile
Level: 37
Voting Power: 4.5

John Madden (Frank Calien...
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.2
  • 5
1410204
merugo
View Profile
Level: 34
Voting Power: 4.2

Kramer vs. Kramer
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.2
  • 5
12816815
PorridgeGun
View Profile
Level: 49
Voting Power: 5

Double-seated F1 Car
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4.1
  • 5
185660
DUDE@Luxembourg
View Profile
Level: 18