Konstantin Kalinin


Konstantin Alekseevich Kalinin was a World War I aviator and Soviet aircraft designer.
He was born to a Russian family in Warsaw, Russian Empire. Kalinin graduated from the Odessa Military School in 1912, the Gatchina Military Aviation School in 1916 and the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute in 1925. After the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, he became a pilot and commanding officer under Ukrainian Directory Government. He was a member of the All-Union Communist Party (bolsheviks) since 1927. In 1926, he organized and headed an aviation design bureau in Kharkiv. He designed the Kalinin K-4, Kalinin K-5, Kalinin K-7 and Kalinin K-12 aircraft.
Kalinin was arrested on 1 April 1938 in Voronezh during the Great Purge. While in prison, he designed the K-15 delta-wing rocket fighter. Seven months after his arrest on 22 October, at a closed court hearing of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the Soviet Union, which lasted 10 minutes without defense or witnesses, Kalinin was accused of anti-Soviet activities and espionage and sentenced to death.
The same day, Kalinin was executed in the basement of the NKVD prison in Voronezh. According to Soviet records, he died in 1940.
Kalinin was rehabilitated on 10 August 1955.
Kalinin was one of the founders and first teachers of the Kharkiv Aviation Institute. He was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labour.

Products

  • K-1, three-passenger airliner
  • K-2, four-passenger airliner developed from the K-1
  • K-3, air ambulance version of K-2
  • K-4, multipurpose transport
  • K-5, eight-passenger airliner. Was the backbone of Aeroflot's fleet in the 1930s.
  • K-6, prototype mailplane derivative of the K-5. Only one built.
  • K-7, experimental large seven-engine bomber/airliner. Only one built.
  • K-9, liaison/sport aircraft. Only one built.
  • K-10, trainer/liaison/agricultural aircraft. Only one built.
  • K-11, twin-engine, twin-boom transport project
  • K-12/BS-2, prototype twin-engine tailless bomber. Also known as Zhar-Ptitsa.
  • K-13, long-range, twin-engine bomber. Cancelled as it was inferior to the Ilyushin DB-3.
  • K-14, airliner version of the K-13
  • K-15, delta-wing rocket bomber design
  • K-16, high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft
  • K-17, four-engine, long-range tailless bomber