What does one of the world’s preeminent plane builders of the day do? He takes all the things known to work, and not just doubles down on them … but triples down on them. The behemoth was called the Caproni Ca.60 Transaereo, or the “Noviplano” (“nine-wing”), also known as the Capronissimo. Not confusing at all.
It had nine wings arranged in three sets of three. Caproni basically took three triplanes and tied them together with 820 feet of struts and over one and a half miles of bracing wire. Beneath it was a long bus-like fuselage that sat passengers on wooden benches. The lap of luxury, this plane was not.
The plane had a 100-foot wingspan, was 30 feet tall, and weighed over 33,000 pounds. It was so big and heavy that it had to take off from the water using stabilizing pontoons. The Transaereo needed eight crew members to fly it, with the pilot and co-pilot sitting in an open-air cockpit at the front of the plane while additional flight engineers sat in one of two control cockpits located on the front and rear wings.
Eight Liberty L-12 V12 engines, each producing 400 horsepower, were meant to get the plane into the air. It’s believed to have had a top speed of 87 mph, and a cruising speed of 68 mph, and a range of 372 miles.
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