KUBINKA, Moscow Region, February 12 (AVN) - The formation of the Nebesnye Gusary aerobatics team has ended in the Kozhedub aircraft exhibition centre, Centre Chief Colonel Anatoly Omelchenko told the Military News Agency on Monday.
The group will fly a new type of aircraft which is the L-39 trainer plane produced in the Czech Republic. As many as 19 planes have been supplied to the centre flying from the training regiment located in the town of Michurinsk, Tambov region, where the storage base has for such planes been created numbering 300 planes left from the reduction of training regiments of flight military collages.
The third squadron of the group had operated SU-25 Frogfoot planes until 1995. But in the late '90s, Frogfoots were handed over to the Air Force field troops and the group split up. The group started the flight programme preparation again in 2001.
L-39 planes, produced in Czechoslovakia with the help from the Soviet Union, highly manoeuvrable, graceful and suited aerobatics purposes best. The plane first flew in 1969 and about 3,000 of them were made and are currently operated by 25 countries. The plane is powered by the AI-25 by-pass turbofan jet engine with the thrust of 1.7t. The fuel consumption is 600kg per hour, maximum take-off weight is 5.6t, speed is 740km per hour, rate of climb is 22 meters per second, practical service ceiling is 11km and maximum time in flight is 2.45 hours.