Byline: Christopher Lloyd

After breaking the story last week, Christopher Lloyd takes a detailed look at the craft.

DEEP in the Russian heartlands, 400 miles southeast of Moscow, lies Saratov, a massive aerospace complex in which a revolutionary aircraft shaped like a flying saucer has been secretly under development for several years.

The complex covers 2,000 acres and comprises 20 gleaming workshops. Here, Russian scientists are testing an aircraft design that turns the science fiction of flying saucers into reality.

The Russian military hoped that the new craft, codenamed Ekip, would transform the difficulties of transporting troops, food and ammunition because it can take off and land from almost any surface, sea or land, on air cushions similar to those used by hovercraft.

It has two-mode jet engines that create the air cushion and provide power for propulsion. Air intakes on the saucer's nose feed the engines, which ram air across the craft's back, reducing drag and creating enormous lift.

Russia has appalling infrastructure problems. The road and rail networks are limited and in a poor state. Ekip could help ease the transport crisis. It could, for example, be used to ferry supplies to remote mining communities and bring back raw materials for industrial use or export.

Russian scientists have tested one Ekip, a remotely controlled prototype, measuring 2.7 metres (9ft) wide, which successfully completed trials last summer. They have almost finished building a bigger version, 15 metres wide and 11 metres long (49ft by 36ft). This weighs five tons and can carry loads of almost two tons. If test flights of the second prototype, due in about two months, are successful, the Russians...