Above: An Antonov AN-124 after it arrived in Santiago, Chile carrying four helicopters. Photo by Tom Parsons of Global Supertanker.
An Antonov AN-124 arrived in Santiago, Chile Tuesday morning and unloaded three Bell 205 helicopters, one K-MAX 1200, and a flatbed truck with an attached goose-neck trailer. The Chilean government contracted with Helicopter Express out of Chamblee, Georgia to supply the equipment during the siege of wildfires that has been plaguing the country for the last several weeks.
The helicopters and the truck were loaded onto the Ukrainian freighter at Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport Monday for the flight to South America.
CNN Chile reported that one of the helicopters has night-flying capabilities.
The 205 with the belly tank in the photo is H-531 the USFS night flying ship when on contract with the Forest Service.
An-124 – This is a Soviet air freighter belonging to the Russian transport airline.
AN-124’s were designed in the Ukraine and built both there and in Russia. But this one is owned by a Russian airline? We are receiving conflicting information on this.
took about a minute on google to find this (using tail number of the aircraft as reference):
OFFICES OF VOLGA-DNEPR AIRLINES
Volga-Dnepr, Managing Company
Moscow, Russia
Mezhdunarodnoye shosse, 28B Bld.3
Moscow, 141411, Russia
Tel.: +7 495 786 2613
in**@vo*********.com
**@vo*********.com