Assembling new “Doomsday aircraft” on the basis of the Il-96-400M started at the facilities of the Voronezh aircraft plant (VASO). At the moment, we are talking about two new air command posts, but it is not excluded to order a third.
As reported by RIA Novosti, citing a source in the Russian defense industry, Voronezh has already started assembling the first of two ordered air command posts. The work is carried out within the framework of the project “Unit-C”. No data on the second plane yet, most likely it will be laid later, but about the third question has not yet been resolved. not excluded, that the Ministry of Defense will still order another “Doomsday Plane”.
Currently, Russia is armed with second-generation air command posts based on the Il-80. They are designed to work in conditions of failure of ground control points, nodes and communication lines, rapidly changing operational environment, as well as in the case of the enemy's use of nuclear weapons. It is for this reason that aircraft of this type are usually called “doomsday planes”. In total, four machines have been created in Russia.
AT 2019 year, it was decided to modernize the existing VKP fleet of the second generation, at the same time, work was underway to create “Doomsday aircraft” next, third generation. The aircraft was developed on the basis of the improved IL-96-400 by the Nizhny Novgorod research and production enterprise “flight”, developed the VKP of the second generation.
note, that today only the United States and Russia are in service “Doomsday planes”.
