Georgy Mikhailovich Beriev (Beriashvili) ( Georgij Michajlovič Beriev; Georgian: გიორგი მიხეილის ძე ბერიაშვილი Giorgi Mikheilis Dze Beriashvili; 13 February 1903 – 12 July 1979), was a Soviet Georgian major general, founder and chief designer of the Beriev Design Bureau in Taganrog, which concentrated on amphibious aircraft.

Biography

Beriev was born in Tbilisi in the Tiflis Governorate (present day Tbilisi, Georgia) of the Russian Empire. Of ethnic Georgian origin, his antecedents are uncertain, and it is not known when his family name was Russified from Beriashvili to Beriev. After graduating from the railway school in Tbilisi in 1923, he attended the School of Shipbuilding Engineering at the Leningrad Polytechnic Institute (now Saint Petersburg State Polytechnic University), and graduated with an engineering degree in 1930. He worked as an aircraft designer at the Central Design Office "WR Menzhinsky", where he developed the Beriev MBR-2 seaplane. From October 1934 to 1968, he ran the Central Design Office for marine aircraft in Taganrog, where he developed numerous successful, and often unique, amphibious aircraft designs. In 1947, he was awarded the Stalin Prize for his work on the Be-6. He was also twice awarded the Order of Lenin and twice the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. In 1968, for the Be-12 (1968) design, he was awarded the USSR State Prize. After retirement, he moved to Moscow and died in 1979.

Awards and honors

Memory