Stratolaunch: biggest plane in the world to take off next year

Plane packs in six jet engines and 28 wheels, to support a 385-foot wingspan

The biggest plane in the world is due to set off next year, and it’s a wide as three Boeing 737s.

The Stratolaunch — which is currently in production — began development in 2011, and is under construction at the Mojave Air and Space Port in California. Its makers, Scaled Composites, hope to have it ready to take off on test flights next year.

The plane is nicknamed “Roc” after a mythical bird, reports Yahoo. It has six jet engines, 28 wheels and a 385-foot wingspan.

That makes it far larger than any plane ever made, and about three times as wide as a Boeing 737.

Scaled Composites is a company that was built to create experimental aircraft. Its most famous planes are those used in the Virgin Galactic plan to launch commercial space travel, which crashed last year and killed one of its pilots.

The Stratolaunch is also intended to eventually be used to carry things up to space. But rather than people it will carry up rockets, which can then detach and fly into space to release satellites.