Beriev Be-200

what is it?

The Beriev Be-200 Altair (Russian: Бериев Бе-200 «Альтаир») is a jet-powered amphibious flying boat of utility type designed and built by the Beriev Aircraft Company. Marketed as being designed for fire fighting, search and rescue, maritime patrol, cargo, and passenger transportation, it has a capacity of 12,000 litres (3,200 US gal) of water, or up to 72 passengers. The name Altair was chosen after a competition amongst Beriev and Irkut staff in 2002–2003 as a reference to the name of the alpha star in the Eagle constellation and 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, while "ir" stands for Irkutsk.

🔎How to recognise it: 2 jet engines · 32.8 m wingspan

base stats

• speed 700 km/htop speed
• range 2,100 kmwithout refuelling
• seats 72passengers
• size 41 tmax take-off weight
• built 18made in total

Bars compare against all aircraft: 3,500 km/h, 20,000 km, 850 seats; size and number built on a log scale up to 640 t (An-225) and 45,000 built (Cessna 172).

fun facts

• 🎂First flew 28 years ago, in 1998.
• 🏎️Top speed is 5.4× a car on the Dutch motorway (130 km/h).
• 🚗Wingspan of 32.8 m: about 7 cars parked nose to tail.
• 🐘Fully loaded it can weigh as much as 7 African elephants (~6 t each).
• 🌍Range of 2,100 km: 12× Amsterdam to Brussels.

jet: Gas turbine pushing air out the back (turbofan or turbojet): fast and high-flying.

spec sheet

first flight

1998-09-24

introduced

2003

status

in production

number built

18

role

multirole amphibious aircraft

origin

🇷🇺 Russia

makers

Yakovlev Corporation, Beriev

engines

2× Progress D-436TP

crew

5

passengers

72

length

32 m

wingspan

32.8 m

height

8.9 m

max take-off weight

41 t

top speed

700 km/h

cruise speed

560 km/h

range

2,100 km

ceiling

8,000 m

ICAO code

BER2

Specs are for the version in the Wikipedia article's specification section. Blank means the sources don't say.