World’s largest airplane is rolled out

Even if you had been allowed to kick the tires as the world’s largest airplane was rolled out for the first time Wednesday, it might have taken you a while.

Stratolaunch – which is designed to release rockets that will carry satellites into space – has a 385-foot wingspan, features six engines used by the Boeing 747, stands 50 feet tall and can carry more than 500,000 pounds of payload.

And it has those 28 wheels.

The twin-fuselage aircraft, the baby of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, was pulled out of its Mojave Air and Space Port hangar in California to begin fueling tests – the first of many ground tests.

Jean Floyd, Stratolaunch’s chief executive officer, said the goal is to have a launch demonstration as early as 2019.

“Over the coming weeks and months, we’ll be actively conducting ground and flight line testing at the Mojave Air and Space Port,” Floyd said in a statement. “This is a first-of-its-kind aircraft, so we’re going to be diligent throughout testing and continue to prioritize the safety of our pilots, crew and staff.”

Bizarre giant: The Spruce Goose —

More than 66 years after it first flew, Howard Hughes' gigantic, wooden H-4 Hercules -- nicknamed the Spruce Goose -- still has one of the widest wingspans of any airplane: 320 feet. It's housed at the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum, in McMinnville, Oregon.

Construction —

At the time it was built, the H-4 was the world's largest airplane. It had to be moved in sections from its construction site on Los Angeles' west side, south to its Long Beach hangar.

Howard Hughes —

Hughes, pictured here in the plane's pilot seat, flew the H-4 during its only flight. On November 2, 1947, off California's Long Beach harbor, the seaplane became airborne for about a mile and reached an altitude of about 70 feet. Saying it needed more development, Hughes stored it in a hangar and never let it fly again.

Was the Spruce Goose a failure? —

Hughes -- an ambitious Texas-born businessman, engineer, film producer and pilot -- died in 1976 at age 70. Was the Spruce Goose a failure? Depends on whom you ask. Hughes proved it could fly, but it was never officially certified. Lawmakers hauled Hughes before a congressional committee to explain why he spent $22 million of taxpayer money on a plane that only flew once. Hughes pointed out that he had spent an additional $18 million of his own funds to develop the plane.

Troop mover —

The Spruce Goose was designed to carry more than 700 troops across the ocean as a way to avoid threats from enemy submarines.

Wooden behemoth —

The news media nicknamed the seaplane the Spruce Goose because it was made mostly of wood.

Big moves —

In the early 1980s, the aircraft became a tourist attraction when it was moved from its hangar to a nearby dome structure next to the docked luxury ocean liner Queen Mary. In the 1990s the plane was acquired by the Evergreen museum for $500,000 and shipped up the West Coast to Oregon by barge.

Bizarre giant: The Spruce Goose

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While the Stratolaunch has the biggest wingspan, the six-engine Antonov An-225 cargo jet – which was originally designed to carry a Soviet version of the space shuttle – is longer. Stratolaunch is 238 feet long while the length of the An-225 is about 275 feet.

Also, aviation mogul Howard Hughes’ legendary H-4 “Spruce Goose,” which flew only once in 1947, has an enormous wingspan of 320 feet – not as wide as the Stratolaunch.

The Ukrainian-built Antonov An-225 is longer than the Stratolaunch.

Allen, owner of the NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers and the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks, has written about his desire to see more use of low Earth orbit without breaking the bank.

“With aircraft-like operations, our reusable launch platform will significantly reduce the long wait times traditionally experienced between the construction of a satellite and the opportunity to launch it into space,” he wrote last year.

Stratolaunch will take off from a runway. It will fly to the approximate cruising altitude of a commercial airliner before launching a launch vehicle. “As the launch vehicle rockets into orbit, Stratolaunch will fly back to a runway landing for reloading, refueling and reuse,” Allen says.

Allen’s Vulcan Aerospace has worked with aerospace pioneer Burt Rutan’s company, Scaled Composites, on the ambitious project.

The duo collaborated on the launch of SpaceShipOne in 2004.

Allen isn’t the only US billionaire with the dreams and pockets big enough to take on space.

Jeff Bezos, the Amazon CEO, and Elon Musk, the Tesla and SpaceX CEO, have distinguished themselves as the must-watch innovators pushing hardest to bring the future to us today.

In late March, SpaceX made history by successfully launching a used rocket into space. And the company plans to fly two customers around the moon in 2018. It’s already delivered satellites and has made resupply trips to the International Space Station.

Like Musk, Bezos wants to reuse rockets to drive down the cost of space travel. But for the time being, Blue Origin is mostly interested in conducting suborbital flights for tourists.

CNN’s Matt McFarland, Thom Patterson and Jackie Wattles contributed to this report.