OREANDA-NEWS. November 12, 2010. During the visit to ANTONOV Company, Hugo Chavez, President of Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela paid attention to the programme of further development of the family of AN-74 multipurpose aircraft. He surveyed transport version of the aircraft represented in the shop and had been interested with its new versions in particular, that for maritime patrol.

Dmytro Kiva, President – General Designer of ANTONOV Company noted that new versions of AN-74 were developed using the newest technologies according to wishes of the customers. “In particular they differ from their predecessors with a number of considerable improvements including installation of the newest means of piloting, navigation and communication. With that one of the typical peculiarities of these aircraft is their versatility. Different versions of AN-74 fly in all climatic zones with the temperature range from -60C? to plus45C?, take-off from runways with length of 700 m, deliver people and cargoes to the regions difficult for access, perform dropping of paratroopers and vehicles, evacuate sick and wounded people, perform search operations and ice reconnaissance, patrol sea surface, transport passengers with high comfort”, - said D.Kiva.

All these tasks as well as the other ones new AN-74 will be able to perform effectively in Venezuela.

ANTONOV Company and Kharkov State Aviation Manufacturing Company, manufacturer of AN-74, conducted big preparatory work on promotion the aircraft to the market of Venezuela. In 2006 Venezuelan pilots who controlled the aircraft together with Ukrainian colleagues familiarized with its capabilities in details. In 2007 AN-74 family was represented to Ministry of Defence of Venezuela within the limits of which AN-74TK-200 performed 11 demonstration flights with approaches in the airports difficult of access. Venezuelan part announced a need in 48 aircraft of such a type and showed interest in establishment of the joint centre on maintenance of these machines with the follow-up development it in assembly-unit plant. During the visit to ANTONOV Company in February 2010 Mr. Julio Ramon Fernandez, head of interdepartmental commission of the Ministry of infrastructure and housing confirmed intention to continue interaction in this direction.