Designed by the combined team of the Alekseyev OKB-21 design bureau and one of the longest-serving Soviet aerospace contractors at Sukhoi, the Albatross consisted of a triple-stage-to-orbit system.

The Alexeyev/Sukhoi Albatros launch system, proposed in 1974, would have launched a Soviet space shuttle on the back of a carrier spaceplane, launched off the back of a hydrofoiling barge. It ...