Evgueny Zakharov, the owner of Aerolift, an airline with a fleet of ageing Antonov and Ilyushin transport aircraft based in Johannesburg but registered in the British Virgin Islands, said in an interview: "We transported lots of men in uniform -- Arab men with masks.
"They were disciplined men and although none of them had rank badges there were obviously people in charge. They got on the aircraft as if they had done it many times before."
Interesting.
Antonov, known as Antonov Aeronautical Scientific/Technical Complex (Antonov ASTC) (Ukrainian: Авіаційний науково-технічний комплекс імені Антонова, АНТК ім. Антонова) is a Ukraine-based (since 1952) aircraft manufacturing and services company (design office prefix An) with particular expertise in the field of very large aircraft construction.
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The Antonov company lacks facilities for full construction of some aircraft, a result of Soviet industrial strategy that split military production between different regions of the USSR. This distribution minimized potential war risks, and prevented Soviet republics from developing self-sufficient economies. As a result, Antonov airplanes were often constructed by aerospace companies in Kharkiv (Ukraine), Novosibirsk (Russia), and Tashkent (Uzbekistan).
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Whilst less famous, the An-24 'Coke', An-26 'Curl' and An-30 'Clank' series of twin turboprop, high winged, passenger transport aircraft are important for domestic air services particularly in parts of the world once led by communist governments.
Ilyushin (Russian: Илью́шин) is a Russian (formerly Soviet) design bureau and aircraft manufacturer (design office prefix Il), founded by Sergey Vladimirovich Ilyushin.
It began operations on January 13, 1933, by order of the People's Commissar of the Heavy Industry of the USSR and the Head of the Main Department of Aviation Industry, P.I.Baranov
Aviation Industries Ilyushin is a subsidiary established in 1992 to act as Ilyushin's marketing and customer service arm.
Ilyushin has developed aircraft for widely varying roles over the years. The Russian government is planning to merge Ilyushin with Mikoyan, Irkut, Sukhoi, Tupolev, and Yakovlev as a new company named United Aircraft Building Corporation.[1]