«Raketa» — a mass-produced Soviet passenger hydrofoil, the lead vessel of its class. It was built from 1957 at the Krasnoye Sormovo Plant Gorky, and from 1959 also at the Feodosiya Shipbuilding Plant. Designed for high-speed daytime passenger service on suburban and local river routes. Raketa-class vessels operated throughout the USSR, including those registered at Gorky (Nizhny Novgorod).[1][2]

History

The designer of the Hydrofoils and Ekranoplans that gave rise to the Raketa class was Rostislav Alekseev (1916–1980). A native of Novozybkov, he moved with his family to Gorky in 1933 and enrolled at the shipbuilding faculty of the Zhdanov Industrial Institute. Even as a student, Alekseev became interested in increasing vessel speed through the use of hydrofoils; in 1941 he defended his diploma thesis on this topic. After graduating, he was assigned to Plant No. 112 «Krasnoye Sormovo», where, despite wartime conditions (the plant was producing tanks), he was granted permission to work on a hydrofoil vessel.[1]

Through independent research, Alekseev established the hydrodynamic characteristics of a submerged foil as a function of submersion depth and speed — the so-called «Alekseev effect» (the shallow-submerged foil effect). On this basis, the first experimental craft were built: the A-4 (1943), displacing around 1 tonne with a 25 hp engine, which rose fully onto its foils and reached speeds exceeding 30 km/h; the A-5 (1945) achieved 87 km/h on its very first outing. These developments formed the foundation for the production passenger vessels. In total, from 1957 to the mid-1970s, approximately four hundred Raketa-class vessels were built.[3][1]

Technical specifications

The design was approved on 7 December 1958 (Project No. 340). The vessel was produced in modifications 340, 340E, 340ME, 340T (5 units), and 340P. The hull and superstructure were fabricated from D16 aluminium alloy (structural sections) and D16AT (sheet); reinforcements were of St.3 steel; construction was riveted, with certain joints made by spot welding.[1]

  • Overall length — 26.96 m, beam — 5 m, height above baseline (without mast) — 4.46 m.
  • Draft at rest — 1.8 m / 1.2 m (Project 340 / 340ME); on foils — 1.1 m / 0.5 m.
  • Displacement at full load — 25.43 t / 23.1 t.
  • Operating speed — 60 km/h.
  • Passenger capacity — 64 / 50 persons.
  • Range without refuelling — 500 / 350 km.
  • Main engine — M50, M400, M401 types; maximum output 1,000–1,200 hp.
  • Propulsor — six-bladed variable-pitch propeller, diameter 0.68–0.665 m.
  • River Register Class «O»: freshwater rivers and reservoirs in temperate-climate regions, including international routes.

The vessel maintained foil-borne operation in wave heights up to 0.8 m (Project 340) or 0.5 m (340ME), and in displacement mode up to 1.5 m.[1]

Service history

Raketa-class vessels were built from 1957 and distributed among river shipping companies throughout the Soviet Union. The maiden voyage of Raketa-1 took place on 25 August 1957 as part of the Volga United River Shipping Company: the 420-kilometre journey from Gorky to Kazan was completed in seven hours with thirty passengers on board.[3] Home ports included Gorky (Nizhny Novgorod), Moscow, Leningrad, Kazan, Ufa, Yaroslavl, Rybinsk, Kuybyshev, Astrakhan, Perm, Omsk, Novosibirsk, Krasnoyarsk, Irkutsk, Yakutsk, as well as cities in Ukraine and Belarus. During one of the sea trials of Raketa-1 organised by R. Ye. Alekseev, the rocket engineer S. P. Korolev was present as a guest; several test runs were also made by the pilot and Hero of the Soviet Union Mikhail Devyatayev.[3] A number of vessels received individual names — «Yuri Gagarin», «German Titov», «Adriyan Nikolayev», Dzerzhinsky», «N. Ye. Zhukovsky», «K. E. Tsiolkovsky».[2]

Raketa-15, registered at Gorky (built in 1960), was decommissioned in March 1979; Raketa-16 (built 24 October 1960) operated under the name «Gorky» / «Nizhny Novgorod» until July 2009; Raketa-31 (1961) served until the 1990s, after which it was renamed; Raketa-39 (1961) was registered at Dzerzhinsk and decommissioned in May 1989.[2]

In December 2024, the Nizhny Novgorod company «Vodolyot» announced its intention to restore a Raketa hydrofoil for nostalgic excursion routes along the Volga.[4]

Sources

  1. spkfleet.ru — raketa (archive)
  2. fleetphoto.ru — Raketa type, Project 340 (archive)
  3. Wikipedia (ru) — Raketa (vessel) — In total, from 1957 to the mid-1970s, approximately four hundred Raketa-class vessels were built. (archive)
  4. korabel.ru — Technical specifications for Project 340E, Raketa type, hydrofoil vessel — In December 2024, the Nizhny Novgorod company «Vodolyot» announced its intention to restore…