Word: tupolev
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...interest in the novel fuel has been rekindled by news that the Soviets have conducted a successful test flight of a Tupolev Tu-154 passenger jet modified to burn a mixture of liquid hydrogen and natural gas. The three- engine jet, which lifted off near Moscow and flew for 21 minutes, was the first aircraft to use the fuel in takeoff. Says Senator Spark Matsunaga, a Hawaii Democrat and a leading advocate of a U.S. hydrogen-fuel research program: "It appears that the Soviets have stolen a technological march...
Eleven hijackers commandeered the Tupolev-154 jet as it was en route to Leningrad after a fueling stop in the Ural Mountains city of Kurgan, and they told the pilot to fly to London, Tass said. It identified them as the Ovechkins, a family musical group from Irkutsk, the southern Siberian city where the flight originated...
...week earlier the Libyans had managed to reverse a string of Chadian victories by retaking a key oasis town near the border. Angered by the setback at Maaten es Sarra, Libyan Leader Muammar Gaddafi last week ordered a retaliatory air strike on N'Djamena. But as two Soviet-built Tupolev-22 bombers approached the capital, French troops fired a U.S.-made Hawk antiaircraft missile. One of the jets exploded in a green phosphorescent fireball, and the other fled toward Libya. Two other Tupolevs later struck the town of Abeche, some 400 miles to the east, killing two civilians but missing...
Gaddafi denounced the "colonial aggression" by Habre, who has the backing of France and the U.S., and sent waves of Soviet-built Tupolev bombers to assault Chadian villages and troops. The planes even penetrated the part of Chad guarded by French forces, drawing a stern reminder from Paris that France was still prepared to use military means to support its former colony...
...fact, there was little evidence of any South African involvement in the crash. The accident occurred as Machel was returning from a Zambian summit meeting of so-called frontline black African states located near South Africa. Machel's official plane, a Soviet-made Tupolev 134-B, took off with 44 people aboard, including a Soviet crew of five. It refueled in Lusaka, then flew across Zimbabwe and headed south toward the Mozambique capital of Maputo. Violent thunderstorms were hitting the area, and visibility was poor. Near the South African town of Komatipoort, the Soviet pilot announced he had Maputo airport...