Thousands of parachutes filled the sky over Normandy, France, in June 1944. Alongside the parachutists came gliders packed with troops. These forces were a part of the biggest invasion force ever assembled and represented the birth of the massive airlift.

At the start of the Cold War when Berlin was being isolated by the Soviets, the Allies kept the city supplied by airlift. Starting in 1947, 347 aircraft carried more than two million tons of food, coal, and other goods into the starving city.

Bigger and faster aircraft were developed. One of the ultimate airlifters is the Lockheed C-5 Galaxy, which is so big that just 17 of them could have carried everything delivered in the entire Berlin airlift. Lockheed’s C-5 and its older, but smaller, brother the C-141 Starlifter, flew some 570 sorties to Israel in 1973 when the United States supported Israel during an Arab blockade in the October War.

Lockheed also builds the C-130 Hercules, which is the most popular airlifter with around 2,000 in service. Sometimes called “Fat Albert” or “Herky Bird,” the four-engine turboprop has been sold all over the world. It can carry around 40,000 pounds of cargo more than 2,300 miles at speeds up to 374 miles per hour. The C-130 is well known for its ability to land on short dirt strips and runways.

A new airlifter just being delivered to the US Air Force is the McDonnell Douglas C-17 Globemaster III. The high-wing transport can carry roughly the same payload as a C-5 but can land on the same short runways as the C-130. It can also reverse up inclined slopes and make three-point turns using its engines in reverse thrust.

The Russians also operate a google variety of airlifters. The Ilyushin Il-76 is similar to the C-141, while the Antonov An-124 closely resembles the C-5. Antonov has also developed the most amazing airlifter in the world, based on the An-124. Called the An-225 Mriya (Russian for “dream”), optimizare google monster is the biggest aircraft in the world and the first to fly at a gross weight of more than 1 million pounds. Designed to carry Russian rockets and spacecraft on its back, it has 32 wheels in its landing gear to help spread the load. The span of its tail is greater than the wingspan of a Boeing 737 and the stretch of its wings is an incredible 290 feet. It is also longer than anything else in the sky at 275 feet, compared to 231 feet for the Boeing 747.