A Caspian Christmas

Following this piece of news from CNN, a group of friends fell into discussing what the Ekranoplan was good for or not.

I have been fortunate enough to see one in real life:

This one was parked up in Moscow. I think I might have been the only person in our travel group who knew what it was.

They look great, and the footage of them not exactly skimming across the surface of the sea is incredible. Surely there isn't a game in there, is there? 

All I can say, is read on, gentle reader, read on:

This morning, this short announcement dropped into the inbox:

Pravda, Friday 13 May 1977

In a demonstration of Soviet technical prowess, tomorrow the Caspian Sea Flotilla will new demonstrate the new A-90 Ekranoplan to a specially invited group of VIPs.  On board for a tour of the Caspian will be members of the Politburo and their wives, members of the Presidium of the Party in Azerbaijan, ambassadors of our Warsaw Pact allies and ambassadors of leading non-aligned nations such as India, Brazil, Saudi Arabia and Indonesia.

Meanwhile in Helsinki, negotiations towards a Final Agreement on Human Rights have reached a delicate stage...

 This had been preceded by a short extract from the Ekranoplan operating manual:

The A-90 “Orlyonok” Ekranoplan Manual
(This is representational only.  Do not emulate this should you find yourself operating a real Ekranoplan...)

1. Crew Skills
There are three Crew Skills: pilot, navigator and turbine operator.  All three are needed to operate the Ekranoplan.  Crew members are trained in two different Crew Skills.

2. Direction and Heading
For our purposes there are eight headings: North, North-East, East etc.

3. Speed and Manoeuvrability
The A-90 is powered by up to five turbines with the following performance:
Turbine One: hover – can change to any heading
Turbine Two: 50 kts – can change direction by up to three headings
Turbine Three: 100 kts – can change direction by up to two headings
Turbine Four: 150 kts – can change direction by only one heading
Turbine Five: 200kts – cannot change direction

4. Accelerating and Decelerating

 Follow this procedure:

Pilot: “Comrade Turbine Operator, engage Turbine One!”
Turbine Operator: “Comrade Pilot, Turbine One engaged!”
Pilot: “Comrades, hovering!”
Pilot then inputs hovering into the on-board computer (WhatsApp group)

The Political Officer will make a suitable morale-raising exhortation.

 5. Changing Direction
Follow this procedure:
Pilot: “Comrade Navigator, Heading North West!”
Navigator: “Comrade Pilot, Heading North West!”
Pilot: “Comrades, Heading North West!”
Pilot then inputs heading north west into the on-board computer (WhatsApp group).
The Political Officer will again make a suitable morale-raising exhortation.
 --
 Remember as you go about your duties: the eyes of the Party and of the people of the Soviet Union are upon you.

Shortly after that, a personal briefing and Zoom link turned up.

What could possibly go wrong? So off I went to Shedquarters to retrieve some suitable headgear..

Okay, so it's the wrong fleet, but we never got down to the Caspian Sea on our visit. Russia is quite large. I have a Soviet Navy stripy shirt somewhere as well, that I might dig out if I can be bothered.

I won't say too much about the game, as the designer is intending to run it at least once more, with people some of whom follow this blog.

The game was a committee style RPG conducted via Zoom and WhatsApp. The game was divided into sessions with a series of break out rooms where players were divvied up, depending upon where they actually were alternating with plenary groups. This worked very well for public meetings and small groups, with Zoom chat available for personal messages.

It took us about two hours to get to a conclusion, and much fun was had on the way. Here's a picture of us in the first plenary, where I haven't got round to changing my name just yet.

See, I did find my stripy shirt, and my backdrop is the cabin of an actual Ekranoplan.