Sikorsky Russky Vityaz

The Russky Vityaz, whose name means Russian Knight, was a large biplane designed by Igor Sikorsky and built in early 1913 at the Russo-Baltic Railroad Car Works in Saint Petersburg, where it carried the designation S-21. It grew out of a design Sikorsky conceived in 1911 and was first known as the Bolshoi Baltisky, or Great Baltic, a name it kept in its first four-engined form after starting life as a twin-engined project called Le Grand. It is recognised as the first four-engined aircraft in the world. At a time when no known aircraft could lift more than about 600 kilograms, observers abroad predicted failure or took reports of it for a newspaper hoax, yet its first test flight on 10 May 1913 was successful. The aircraft was a multi-bay biplane with unequal-span wings, a plywood-covered fuselage, an enclosed cabin with two passenger compartments and an open forward deck, and four Argus piston engines. Early engine pairs mounted in tandem gave poor take-off and climb, so the rear engines were moved onto the leading edge of the wing in a four-abreast layout. The aircraft was crushed on the ground by an engine that fell from another aircraft, and Sikorsky chose not to repair it and turned to the Ilya Muromets.