In our quest to blot out fellow humans , humans have undertake some pretty whacky and ghoulish ideas , from thepain rayandGreek Fireto firing the corpses of pestis victims at the enemyusing a catapult . One appropriately stupid ( and short - lived ) invention was the flying storage tank , dream up by the Soviet Union during World War II .
Tanks , even the diminished one , are pretty hefty , making transporting them to field of honor a bit of an return . Driving them the whole way depart them expose to enemy fire , and so the Soviet Union set about experimenting with way to airlift them to their destinations . For a meter , they essay lash T-27 tankettes to the underside of bombers and landing them on flying field , but the tanks were not capable of doing enough impairment to justify risking their expensive aircraft . Other methodsinvolved simply dismiss tanks from aircraft into piss , or from a very low height , while the crew jump down before climbing in and skip the enemy had not got there first .
But then , during the Second World War , the Soviets issue forth up with another idea ; impound a storage tank to a glider and allowing it to swoop into battle . The result was the Antonov A-40 Krylya Tanka , roughly render to " tank car annexe " .
In 1940 , designer Oleg Antonov seek to make the sailing tank , essentially bolting biplane wings and a long tail boom onto a small , lighter armored combat vehicle . The idea was that the army tank plane would be towed by a larger aircraft and released , and simply glide down to the field of battle before ditching its wings and behind .
It took several year before a image of the flying tank was built and taken for a spin .
" To test flee it , they have to leave the ammunition out and most of the fuel to redeem weight unit , " aviation journalist Jim Winchester excuse toBBC Future . " The concept was that as the tank ’s gun enclosure turn , you moved the ascendency on the wings . You just move the gun leave or right . "
In 1942 , test pilot Sergei Anokhin had the honor of twit in the tank as it was tow by a Tupolev TB-3 bomber into the air travel . Quickly , it became seeming that the idea was not a great one , as the drag of the tank airplane was too much for the bomber to address . The armoured combat vehicle was released early , but Anokhin was able to glide it down and land safely in a field , before drive it back to the base .
Though Japan and the UK both attempted to make their own version of flying tanks , they too failed to make it aerodynamical , and like the Soviets , they quick abandoned the idea .
