Yakovlev Yak-141

The Yakovlev Yak-141, also designated Yak-41 and given the NATO reporting name Freestyle, was a Soviet supersonic vertical and short takeoff and landing fighter designed by the Yakovlev bureau to replace the subsonic Yak-38 aboard Soviet aircraft carriers. After studying twin-engine layouts and rejecting them because an engine failure during landing would cause asymmetric thrust, the designers chose a single main engine, a Tumansky R-79V-300 with a vectoring nozzle, backed by two Rybinsk RD-41 lift jets behind the cockpit. Four prototypes were built, two of them used for flight testing. The first flight was made at Zhukovsky on 9 March 1987, and in September 1991 the type made its first landings aboard the carrier Admiral Gorshkov. Funding collapsed after the Soviet Union dissolved and the project was cancelled, although a partnership with Lockheed was announced in 1992 and surviving airframes are displayed in Russian museums.