[10] By contrast, Soviet aviation research institutes addressed ways of increasing passenger throughput without the need for additional airport capacity.

This was eventually called "the luggage at hand system" (Russian: "система «багаж с собой»"; transliterated: "sistyema bagazh s soboy").

[12] Soviet aviation journalist Kim Bakshmi described it (at its ultimate) thus: "One arrives five minutes prior to departure, buys oneself a ticket on board the aircraft, hangs one's coat next to the seat and places one's bag or suitcase nearby.".

[15] Lockheed implemented it into the L-1011 TriStar in 1973 at the request of Pacific Southwest Airlines (who used the baggage compartment as an entertainment lounge) and possibly also to suit potential Soviet buyers (see below).

The airliner had to operate from smaller airports (classified as Klass "B" and "V" [Russian: класс "Б", "В"] or "Class B/C" by the Soviets) 2,600-metre (8,500 ft) runways.

[17] In the second half of the 1960s, OKB-240 (as the Ilyushin bureau was formally known) was restoring positions lost (with Yakovlev, in favour of Tupolev and Antonov) during the Khrushchev era[18] and was well placed to secure design of the aerobus.

When the Soviet cabinet's defence industry committee promoted the Aeroflot specification on September 8, 1969, to a preliminary project, (Russian: аванпроект; transliterated: avanproyekt),[19] it entrusted it to Ilyushin.

In developing the concept which had been agreed, Ilyushin faced four challenges: configuration (layout or "shape"), powerplant, automation (avionics) and manufacturing capacity.

Aircraft designer Leonid Selyakov[29] states this of the underwing-engine US-pioneered layout which gradually became standard for jet airliners: "The configuration of the В-47, taken on strength by the US Air Force ... brought forth a veritable storm of critical opinions from [Soviet] aviation scientists.

Similar controversies were known in Western aeronautical circles[30] but this Soviet approach showed a typical streak of dogmatism which held that problems had immutable, "scientifically correct" solutions.

It failed to attain the required thrust, however: "only after the lapse of three years that were spent on preparing the advanced development project did it become clear that these engines would not provide the necessary take-off performance.

The design and entry into service in 1972 of the Tu-154, an airliner built to high technology principles (more automation, less human input), showed that Soviet science lagged behind in the development of avionics which would remove the need for navigators and radio operators.

A programme of avionics development was mounted to enable the Il-86 to operate in most weather with a three-member flight crew, matching Western technology of the time.

The fact that Il-86 development was protracted indicates that for long periods the programme was pursued as backup insurance in case wholesale technology transfer failed.

Before the Boeing 747 had flown, a Ministry of Civil Aviation delegation visited the United States for a series of detailed sales presentations on the type lasting three days.

At the 1971 Paris Salon, Ilyushin bureau head Genrikh Novozhilov and Boeing's Joe Sutter are claimed to have arranged an informal technology trade-off.

[45] Any residual will to export TriStars was scotched when administration of US President Jimmy Carter made human rights a key pillar of US foreign policy.

Oblique reference to this comes in an account of the An-124 by the then-powerplant head of the Antonov bureau, V. G. Anisyenko: "The MAP leadership wanted to have a uniform large engine also capable of civil aviation applications, such as the Il-86.

To purchase it, in 1976 a MAP procurement party went to Great Britain, headed by engine construction deputy minister Dondukov ... Our ultimate task was to copy the RB.211-22, for which purpose we had to buy not fewer than eight examples ...

The length of this period was due to the sensitivity of the airliner's configuration, problems with its powerplant, prolonged avionics development and the low priority of civil as opposed to military aircraft.

Beyond these initial examples, Ministry of Aircraft Manufacture ("MAP," "Minaviaprom") Factory 64 at Voronezh (today VASO) was tasked with building more than half of each Il-86 and performing final assembly.

"[64] By the mid-1980s, PZL was planned to produce half of the Il-86,[65] including the entire wing, and also to work on Il-86 developments (“Now we are preparing to manufacture units for the next model of the Il wide-body plane,” according to Belczak).

[66] From May 1977, the Polish factory manufactured entire empennages including tailplanes and the fin, all control surfaces, high-lift devices and engine pylons for the Il-86, representing "about 16 per cent of these aircraft.

Although the Il-86 was a medium-range airliner, from 1982 Aeroflot put it into scheduled service from Moscow to Havana via Shannon and Gander, "perhaps with limited payload or with additional tankerage.

"[79] Other scheduled long-range services flown by the type were to Buenos Aires, Montevideo and Lima, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, all via Sal, Cape Verde.

On October 23, 2006, Aeroflot Deputy Director General Igor Desyatnichenko said that the Il-86 was to be withdrawn from service starting November 15 that year as it operated for just two or three months in the summer.

"[81] In the event, four airframes (c/n 042, 043, 046 and 048, carrying quasi-civil registrations SSSR-86146, '7, '8 and '9) were delivered to the 8th Special Purposes Aviation Division at the Chkalovsky air base near Moscow.

Il-86 provision to Aeroflot did not constitute a sale: it was part of the centralised Soviet supply and allocation system coordinated by offices called Gosplan and Gossnab which controlled the entirety of planning and distribution in the USSR (except the black market).

[92] Vul'fov, A, notes: "Thank God no civil servant got it into his head to refuse the parallel opportunity offered to passengers of electing to drop their luggage when checking-in at airports.

The following are reported significant recorded safety events involving the Il-86: Following the Moscow crash in July 2002, the MAK Interstate Aviation Committee withdrew the Il-86's certificate of airworthiness, temporarily grounding the type.