Beriev Be-200 amphibious aircraft - video

[nova_robotics]

I'm not a pilot, but I know from reading up on the 737 Max disaster that moving the engines around causes big problems for characteristics of the plane, particularly at takeoff. If you move the engines up, when they apply thrust they push the nose down. That's what caused the whole 737 Max issue. They applied a software patch called MCAS to push the nose back in the other direction to make the plane seem more like the original 737, so they wouldn't have to retrain pilots. Having the engines all the way up on the fuselage must make this thing a beast to fly.

[Saltfever]

What matters is the designed-in distance from the center of thrust to the center of lift and the CG location. In this case the engines are very close to the the wing which appears to be a smaller distance than many commercial aircraft. The plane will have dangerous (or fatal) characteristics if the weight and balance of the variables (payload, fuel, water, etc) are not correct.