While searching the internet I found this hybrid airplane-hovercraft known as an Ekranoplan, affectionately known as the Caspian Sea Monster. The Ekranoplan skimmed across the sea at extremely high speeds using what's called the Wing In Ground effect (WIG). There's something so ingenuous, magical and awe-inspiring about the thing. I love the way it looks, like something that sprang from the mind of a delirious 10 year old boy. Want it to go faster? Just put more engines on it! It's sort of like those airplanes in "Things to Come" or the six-engine Russian Antonov AN-225 (below). Note the quirky double tailfin configuration.
A photo of another Ekranoplan for your viewing enjoyment appears below. Also, watch a documentary on the Ekranoplan at YouTube by clicking here.
I think what I like about the ekranoplan is that it's bricolage wrought gigantic. It's like they took whatever engines they had on hand and connected them to leftover wings and a fuselage. Then the thing looks like it was put together by a small committee who literally tried to fuse an airplane with a boat. It's easy to imagine this design deriving from communist era military officers sequestered in a room with no real budget given the task to create a secret military craft.
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