A60

A60 or A-60 may refer to:

Beriev A-60

The Beriev A-60 is a Soviet/Russian airborne laser laboratory aircraft based on the Ilyushin Il-76MD transport.

In the 1970s a special aviation complex was established by the Soviets at Taganrog machine-building factory to develop airborne laser technology for the Soviet military.

In 1977 Beriev OKB started the design of a flying laboratory designated '1А'. The purpose was to solve the complex scientific and engineering problems regarding the creation of an airborne laser and also to facilitate research on the distribution of beams in the top layers of an atmosphere. Work on this topic occurred with wide cooperation between the enterprises and the scientific organizations of the USSR, but the basic partner OKB was TSKB Almaz headed by B.V.Bunkin.

Design

The Il-76MD was selected as the base aircraft for the flying laboratory. To accommodate the laser many changes were made to the basic IL-76 design, which drastically changed the appearance of the plane.

Beriev

The Beriev Aircraft Company, formerly Beriev Design Bureau, is a Russian aircraft manufacturer (design office prefix Be), specializing in amphibious aircraft. The company was founded in Taganrog in the 1934 as OKB-49 by Georgy Mikhailovich Beriev (born February 13, 1903), and since that time has designed and produced more than 20 different models of aircraft for civilian and military purposes, as well as customized models. Today the Company employs some 3000 specialists and is developing and manufacturing amphibious aircraft.

Pilots flying Beriev seaplanes have broken 228 world aviation records. The records are registered and acknowledged by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. In November 1989 BERIEV Aircraft Company became the only defense industry enterprise to win the Prize for Quality awarded by the Government of Russia.

In mid-2002, Irkut raised its 40 percent holding in the Beriev Design Bureau to a controlling stake.

Aircraft designed by Beriev

Beriev Be-200

The Beriev Be-200 Altair (Russian: Бериев Бе-200) is a multipurpose amphibious aircraft designed by the Beriev Aircraft Company and manufactured by Irkut. Marketed as being designed for fire fighting, search and rescue, maritime patrol, cargo, and passenger transportation, it has a capacity of 12 tonnes (12,000 litres, 3,170 US gallons) of water, or up to 72 passengers.

The name Altair was chosen after a competition amongst Beriev and Irkut staff in 2002/2003. The name Altair was chosen as it is not only the name of the alpha star in the Eagle constellation, but also because "Al" is the first part of the name of the Beriev A-40 Albatross amphibious aircraft, whose layout was the development basis for the creation of the Be-200, "ta" stands for Taganrog, and "ir" stands for Irkutsk.

Development

The Be-200 was designed by the Beriev Aviation Company, with the Russian Irkutsk Aircraft Production Association (now part of the Irkut Corporation). Beriev are responsible for development, design and documentation; systems-, static-, flight- and fatigue-testing of prototypes; certification and support of the production models. Irkut's duties comprise production preparation; manufacture of tooling; production of four prototypes and production aircraft; and spare parts manufacture. Both companies now fall under the umbrella of the state-owned United Aircraft Corporation.