However, the civil commercial versions have made the aircraft famous all over the world for transporting outsize and very heavy cargoes that no other aircraft can carry.

The AN-124 has a double-deck fuselage layout. The upper deck is for the cockpit and crew, and the lower deck is a pressurised cargo compartment. The aircraft has cargo doors in the nose and rear, with ramps for quick and easy cargo handling. Inside the cargo hold there is a system of rails for internal winch cranes to load and unload cargo without the ground equipment.

The AN-124 has transported 90-tonne hydraulic turbines, a 109-tonne locomotive, a Tu-204 aircraft fuselage, and Lynx antisubmarine helicopters; it has carried spacecraft and other unique cargoes in their containers. The delivery of a 135.2-tonne Siemens electric generator was entered in the Guinness Book of Records as the heaviest single cargo item ever carried by air.

The Antonov AN-225 "Mriya" is the world's largest aircraft. It was designed for the transportation of the Russian Space Shuttle "Buran" and first flew in December, 1988.

The principal design of the AN-225 is the same as the AN-124 and, like the AN-124, the AN-225 has a flight crew of six: two pilots, two flight engineers, a navigator and a communications operator.

The An-225 has six engines (while the AN-124 has four engines), a 32-wheel landing gear system, and does not have the rear ramp/door assembly.

The main difference between the 2 planes is in size. The AN-225 is enormous: it takes up more than 2 Boeing 747 parking spaces. There is enough cargo space to load 5 tanks, the complete assembled fuselage of a Boeing 737, or 8 double-decker buses.

The only AN-225 built for military purposes was put into storage in spring 1994. If needed it could be made airworthy again.

In 2000 it was decided to relaunch the AN-225 as a civil commercial aircraft. During a test flight in September 2001, the aircraft broke 124 separate FAI (Federation Aeronautique International) world records. Unlike any other commercially available aircraft, the An-225 has the ability to carry external loads of up to 90 tonnes mounted on its "roof rack".

It is unclear when or how the AN-225 will be used in a military context again. There are rumours that it will be used as a launch platform for spacecraft.

Meanwhile, non-military uses of both aircraft continue. In November 2003 5 AN-124s flew from Europe to Japan simultaneously to deliver 600,000 bottles of Beaujolais wine.

Both aircraft have also been used for humanitarian missions. More than 400 flights of An-124s were made to bring supplies for international contingents in Afghanistan as well as humanitarian cargoes for the Afghani population.

In June 2003 AN-124 and AN-225 aeroplanes started flying to Iraq. They delivered 800 tonnes of equipment to aid the humanitarian efforts there.

These huge aeroplanes are mostly operated by Russian and Ukrainian airlines, but in 2003 NATO signed a letter of intent to lease 6 AN-124s for its strategic airlift force.

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