the fuselage manufacturing-method was considered uneconomical. German, Ukrainian and Russian companies had formed the joint-venture "AirTruck" to plan and manage the modifications needed to westernise the An-70. The German government, for political reasons, preferred the An-70. During a separate German Ministry of Defence evaluation of the An-7X, the aircraft was apparently considered to be superior to the A400M designed by the military branch of Airbus. According to AirTruck, the Defence Ministry estimated the An-7X to be 30 percent cheaper than its rival, would provide industrial benefits as Germany would receive substantial workshare, and was deemed to be technically superior, due mainly to its new propfan technology; however, a Defence Ministry spokesperson denied that a conclusion had been reached. On the other hand, DASA preferred the A400M, and refused to be the prime contractor for the An-70 if it was to be chosen. In the meantime, Belgium, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Turkey and the UK, were tentative members of the FLA programme and were estimated to have a requirement for up to 288 aircraft; Russia and Ukraine themselves were looking to acquire 210 An-70s. Other contenders for the FLA were the C-17 and C-130J. In April 2000, the German government, the strongest supporter of the An-70, stated that it was committed to buying the same aircraft as the other countries. In the end, the A400M was chosen for the FLA project; had the An-70 been chosen, fifty percent of the aircraft would have been manufactured by Airbus. 2001 incident and later disputes In December 1999, the Russian government outlined that it planned to purchase 164 aircraft by 2018. The Ukrainian government in October 2000 estimated that the country had a requirement for 65 aircraft. By then, the Russian government had awarded the Polyot plant, which was based in Omsk, the right to produce the aircraft, ahead of Aviakor and Aviastar of Samara and Ulyanovsk, respectively. The Kyiv Aircraft Production Plant was expected to produce the first aircraft in 2003, and Polyot, in 2004. As the An-70 flight test programme had reached its final stages by the end of 2000, it was expected that the Russian and Ukraine Defence Ministries would approve of mass production at the start of 2001. On 27 January 2001, however, the second An-70 prototype made a crash landing on its belly after losing power in two engines on take-off during cold weather testing in Omsk, and was