Ukrainian cargo plane delivers Boeing 777 engine to Northern, canada

A Ukrainian Antonov 124 cargo plane delivered engines to a stranded Swiss Air Boeing 777 in Northern Canada

Until the Boeing 747-8F, the An-124 was, for thirty years, the world’s highest aircraft gross weight production cargo airplane and second heaviest operating cargo aircraft, behind the one-off Antonov An-225 (a greatly enlarged design based on the An-124). The An-124 remains the largest military transport aircraft in the world.

General characteristics of AN-124

Crew: 4–6 (pilot, copilot, navigator, senior flight engineer (+flight engineer, radio man) + 2 loadmasters)
Capacity: 88 passengers or the hold can take an additional 350 on a palletised seating system
Payload: 150,000 kg (330,000 lb) (75 tons)
Length: 68.96 m (226 ft 3 in)
Wingspan: 73.3 m (240 ft 5 in)
Height: 20.78 m (68 ft 2 in)
Wing area: 628 m² (6,760 sq ft)
Empty weight: 175,000 kg (385,000 lb)
Useful load: 230,000 kg (508,000 lb)

Antonov to the rescue! The huge four-engine aircraft lands at 3:30 p.m. Feb. 4 in Iqaluit, with a new engine for the Swiss International Airlines Boeing 777-300, as many plane-spotters gather, in their vehicles, at the end of the runway to catch the landing. (PHOTO BY MIALI BUSCEMI)

This photo posted on Twitter by Michael Ettlin from Zurich shows the engine that arrived Feb. 4 in Iqaluit for the Swiss International Airlines Boeing 777-300 there since Feb. 1. (PHOTO/TWITTER)

The GE90 engine weigh about 9-10 tons

The Antonov 124, a four-engine aircraft owned by Antonov Co., a Ukrainian aircraft manufacturing and services company, flew from Zurich, a trip of more than 4,000 kilometres, with a new engine for the disabled Swiss International Airlines Boeing 777-300.

A single engine, according to online aviation sites, costs about $24 million.

The Swiss aircraft, flight 40, en route from Zurich to Los Angeles, saw one of its two engines shut down Feb. 1 and then successfully made an emergency landing at the Iqaluit airport.

The Boeing 777-300, which carried more than 200 passengers and crew, is still on the tarmac in Iqaluit, although everyone on board left Feb. 2 for New York City on another Swiss International aircraft.

The 777’s new engine was no light load to bring to Iqaluit. The engine is so large that it’s about the same diameter as the fuselage of the Boeing 737s that northern airlines fly in Canada.

Each 777 engine, made by General Electric, provides 111,000 units of horsepower, making the engine more than a 1,000 times more powerful than a car.

And, as the 777 is equipped with two engines, each one is supposed to but ultra-reliable.