WW1 Imperial Russian Aerosledge (Aerosani)

[ArmchairSamurai]

Apparently, combat aerosani were a real possibility on the Eastern Front during the First World War; a notion I would have never thought realistic given their presence was not notable until the Second World War. I had come across a few posts while searching Yandex (linked below) that point out that aerosani development not only started in 1903/4 (i.e. Sergei Nezhdanovsky) but continued up through the Russian Civil War with promising results. Sikorsky even dabbled with aerosani, to the point he raced his design against competing designs from Russian companies in 1913, to which his proved to be most capable in snowy conditions, even garnering him considerable interest from the Russian army--though nothing came of it for reasons unknown. Later designs, based on work from Alexey Kuzina, saw an aerosani that did see production, albeit in very small numbers and likely without seeing combat: the All-Russian Zemstvo Union (VZS) Aerosani. To say, all of the later renewed interest garnered in the vehicle during the war itself, was supposedly based on rumors of the Germans employing similar vehicles... which has some truth to it--though they too, while interested, never followed through with it.

Thought I would share that with all of you. I had never heard of it. Maybe one of you has more information on it, who knows.

VZS Aerosani

https://dzen.ru/a/YF3bPBiKn3NZHbtE

Sikorsky's Aerosani

https://dzen.ru/a/YFiTRgOOuGsQyiDL

Motorschlitten mit Luftschraubenantrieb (?)

https://dzen.ru/a/YFCvxLHexSJ1YX6f