The Air Force has given a lift to an audacious program to build the world’s biggest airplane. USAF reasons that an airplane big enough to carry wind turbine blades and land on gravel runways might have military applications, so it’s entered into a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) to advance the development of the Radia WindRunner. “By leveraging the unique design and capabilities of the WindRunner, we can together explore innovative solutions for transporting outsized and high-volume cargo, enhancing the DoD’s ability to respond to global challenges,” said Mark Lundstrom, Radia Founder and CEO.
WindRunner was conceived as a solution to a problem far removed from the logistical needs of the military. Wind turbines are restricted in size (and therefore efficiency) because of transportation limitations. Radia figured that there are plenty of places that get lots of wind that would accommodate an unpaved runway big enough to launch and recover a giant airplane, so it designed the WindRunner specifically to carry a 340-foot turbine blade. The result is an 8,000-cubic-meter cargo hold with a nose that flips up out of the way. The Air Force came calling and suddenly the rather specialized market for the WindRunner expanded.
“The WindRunner allows the world’s biggest things to be delivered to the hardest-to-reach locations. This collaboration demonstrates how commercial capabilities may help to support U.S. national defense by integrating with and addressing military needs,” Lundstrom said. The joint research project will look at the full gamut of integrating the huge airplane into Air Force operations from the types of loads it could carry to how to use it in military actions. There will be a lot of attention paid to its airfield needs, including the services and equipment that will be needed to accommodate the enormous airplane.
How does this concept compare with the C-5 Galaxy?
Big plane is a good (specialty) idea. I think the AN 225 is a better and more practical design with its triangulated lower fuselage accommodating wider loads. As for turbine wind power blades they are way more cheaply delivered by barge (water) as most coastlines are subject to reliable onshore winds. Regardless, any offloaded turbine blades still need to be transported to the wind farm sites which are likely to be near coastlines as the majority of this planet is covered in water. How strategic can a giant subsonic target be?
Big plane, but what about W&B when empty?
Radia hasn’t disclosed it yet, but it’s hard to imagine it’s not a real factor.
The WindRunner is built around a single 340-foot blade. Just one. Every design choice, from the forward-loading nose to the rear-set wings, seems aimed at that one mission. But with no blade onboard, the center of gravity would likely shift aft.
To stay within limits, forward ballast would probably be needed. Maybe steel. Maybe water tanks. Fuel loading might help a little, but probably not enough. Each empty repositioning flight would need its own W&B plan, and some kind of support setup at the delivery site to prep for the next leg.
It looks like a precision tool with a narrow role, but if the basics are off, it might get complicated fast.
Slow Sunday evening.
Love the way that in the image not even AI can get the fighter’s wings to fit through the hole…
It is hard enough doing that on a naval aircraft carrier with aircraft having folding wings.
There are fewer new land based wind turbines now, and people like Flying Whale have been trying to develop airships for large blades for at least a decade.
Fact is that it is cheaper to build trailers, with a hundred steerable wheels to get round bends, and computer planning of routes, than to go by air.
This concept also ignores that wind farms need transmission lines, and transmission lines always go on the flattest, easiest and cheapest route, just where the “gravel runway” will be wanted.
Still, since the Russians destroyed the world’s largest heavy lifter there is a gap.
Even if it is only used once a month.
Plans for wind power farms are being abandoned more and more. Wind power is proving environmentally unfriendly and costly to maintain. Add to the mix a custom aircraft’s cost for blade delivery and viability gets worse.
Has anyone explored making blade manufacturing mobile? Bring the fabrication much closer to the site.
How long would a wind turbine have to operate to offset the carbon generated by delivering three of these blades using this aircraft?
The projected growth rate for wind power is in the 8 to 9% range for the rest of this decade, which is still substantial. Innovative solutions to logistics problems like this may well contribute to the continuation or expansion of that for decades.
There are large wind farms in eastern Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska and Texas. I am quite certain other areas of the central US have a large number. At night one can see a sea of flashing red lights. Took a short hop Saturday. Around Pueblo there are several large solar farms. There is a new area where they are laying in the infrastructure for another large solar farm. In the same area is a company that builds the pylons for the wind turbines. A bunch of wind and solar out here.
Since Arthur isn’t here to swat this down, I’ll do it for him.
This feels less like a military breakthrough and more like a shiny brochure aimed at investors. The Air Force says it might be useful for hauling oversized gear, missiles, drones, space parts. Sure. Because what frontline commander wouldn’t want a giant, slow billboard lumbering across the sky? Great for showing off your cargo… until someone takes it out with a $500 drone.
Let’s not forget, the WindRunner was designed to carry one wind blade. That’s it. One. To remote, peaceful places with wide-open gravel strips, not hot LZs. It’s not fast, not survivable, and not adaptable. Slapping a “dual-use” sticker on it doesn’t change that.
Cutting-edge military tool? Try expensive PR stunt with wings. Arthur would’ve had a field day.
As with most things that start with the letter F, it would be much cheaper to rent it’s capabilities than buy/own it.
Lease it. But then Udvar-Hazy was fantastically rich…
Will need much more than the declining market for wind turbines to succeed financially.
Is road transport that difficulty?
Height is a question, it took lifting power wires and circuitous route to get Philippine Mars from Lake Pleasant AZ to Tucson AZ museum (Pima).
Be wary of projections without end, they often fail to recognize offsetting factors.
Out west, a poster Fool’s project was the plan to build several nuclear power generation reactors in WA stat. Popularly known as WHOOPS! Projections neglected people’s tendency to conserve, alternative sources like natural gas for heating, and possibility of changes in tax rules for bonds. It collapsed, only one was finished, a second one should have been (decades later the power is desired). (A cooling tower of the second can be seen west of Olympia WA, left in place as useful for drying long objects.)
I disagree with your CG analysis. As you point out, it is designed around that 340’ blade - which means that they’d be idiots not to configure it such that that one blade would slide in without affecting the CG,
Other loads would have to be balanced, but they point out that their loading system is set up to do just that.
The company’s vision is that fairly basic runways (e.g., 6,000’ of gravel) could be built on the wind farms themselves - NO road transport!
Fair point, and I hear you—but I wouldn’t completely dismiss the CG issue.
Yeah, the blade’s mass is probably centered near the CG, no argument there. But once it’s out, you’ve got a long, empty fuselage, wings set back, and a lot of tail. That could easily shift the CG aft.
Even the C-5 and AN-124 sometimes need ballast when flying empty, and they’re built to carry all kinds of stuff. The WindRunner’s built for one thing. So yeah, I’d expect they’ll need some ballast up front on repositioning flights.
And I agree with you, the designers aren’t idiots.
Hub end probably quite heavy.
Yes, road can be slow and has its risks.
Aussies do haul very heavy loads long distances, one reason an Australian company purchased Western Star trucks in Kelowna BC.
(Now build by Freightliner in OR, tractor that pulled Philippine Mars from Lake Pleasant AZ to Pima museum looks like a Western Star.)
Now here’s a question for you, would you honestly consider throwing money (your own) at this half baked idea?
If I was a venture capitalist, or if I had available funds for interesting ideas, then I would certainly take a far closer look at this than we are seeing here - especially with the Air Force showing interest.
Another Design study with lots of simulation and no hardware.
We probably find ourselves in the same boat when it comes to investments and need much more concrete facts before getting onboard with vaporware like this.
Look again. The jet is on a ramp which will be lifted at the rear 'til it is horizontal (as is seen on car carriers) - with the wings located at just about the widest point in the fuselage.
[Elsewhere, they praise their loading/stowing system both for having effective balance control and easy integration with basic ground cargo handling systems.]