This Date in Planelopnik History: Speed Round

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn) 04/17/2015 at 10:05 • Filed to: planelopnik, planelopnik history

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Here is today's Planelopnik History Speed Round , getting you caught up on milestones and important historical events in aviation from the past few days.

April 15, 1971 – The Hawker Siddeley AV-8A Harrier enters service with the United States Marine Corps. Developed from the Hawker P.1127 and the Hawker Siddeley Kestrel FGA.1, the Harrier was the first operational V/STOL fighter. With the reactivation of the Iowa class battleships in the 1980s, the Navy briefly considered removing the ship's rear turret and replacing it with two ski-jump take off ramps and a hangar for 12 Harriers. The idea for the "Battlecarrier" never made it beyond the concept phase. An advanced version of the Harrier, the AV-8B Harrier II, remains in service with the Marine Corps, as well as the navies of Italy and Spain.

April 15, 1952 – The first flight of the Boeing B-52 Stratofortress. Built as a replacement for the Convair B-36 Peacemaker, the B-52 has been in service continuously with the US Air Force since 1955. Originally designed with tandem seating as in the B-47 Stratojet, the cockpit was redesigned at the insistence of General Curtis LeMay to a more traditional side-by-side configuration. The Stratofortress, more commonly called the BUFF (Big Ugly Fat Fucker), can carry up to 70,000 pounds of weapons and has seen action in numerous conflicts since its first combat missions in the Vietnam War. Following upgrades, the BUFF is expected to serve beyond 2040, achieving a staggering 90 years of service.

April 15, 1935 – The first flight of the Douglas TBD Devastator torpedo bomber. When the Devastator entered service with the US Navy as its first all-metal monoplane, it was the most advanced carrier attack plane of its day. By the start of the war in 1941, however, the Devastator was already obsolete. With no replacement readily available, the Devastator soldiered on, but was seriously mauled in the Battle of Midway in 1942, when 35 of 41 planes were shot down after scoring no hits on enemy ships. The Devastator was replaced by the Grumman TBF Avenger.

April 15, 1919 – The United States Navy selects the collier USS Jupiter for conversion into the first US aircraft carrier, the USS Langley (CV-1) . The Langley was converted at the Navy Yard in Norfolk, Virginia, and on October 17, 1922, Lt. Virgil Griffin launched the first plane from her deck, a Vought VE-7. After successfully proving the feasibility of carrier operations, the Langley was converted to a seaplane tender (AV-3) in 1936, and saw service in the early days of WWII. She was attacked by Japanese Val dive bombers on February 27, 1942 near Java and damaged so severely that she was scuttled by her crew.

April 16, 1988 – The first flight of the McDonnell Douglas T-45 Goshawk. The Goshawk was developed from the British Aerospace Hawk Mk 60, and modified to become a fully carrier-capable trainer for the Navy and Marine Corps to replace the older North American T-2 Buckeye. Used for intermediate and advanced pilot training in carrier operations, the Goshawk became operational in 1991 and, with upgrades, is expected to be in service until 2035.

April 16, 1949 – The first flight of the Lockheed F-94 Starfire. Developed from the Lockheed T-33 Shooting Star, the all-weather interceptor entered service in 1950, replacing the F-82 Twin Mustang. The Starfire was the first operational US Air Force fighter to employ an afterburning engine and the first all-weather fighter to see service in the Korean War.

April 16, 1912 – American aviatrix Harriet Quimby becomes the first woman to fly across the English Channel. Harriet Quimby was the first woman to earn a pilot's license in the United States in 1911, and her exploits were an inspiration to many women of her day who railed against a male-dominated society. Unfortunately, her Channel crossing was overshadowed by the sinking of the Titanic just one day after her historic flight. Quimby was killed on July 1, 1912 when, for unknown reasons, her Bl้riot XI monoplane suddenly pitched forward, ejecting both her and her passenger at an altitude of 1500 feet. Ironically, the plane came to earth relatively undamaged.

April 17, 1973 – Federal Express delivers its first package. Starting with 14 aircraft and 389 employees, Federal Express began operations from Memphis, TN, delivering packages to cities on the East Coast of the United States. Adopting the name FedEx in 2000, the company now employs 300,000 employees and operates a fleet of 669 aircraft. FedEx's first airplane, a Dassault Falcon 20 nicknamed Wendy , is on display at the Smithsonian's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center near Washington, DC.

April 17, 1934 – The first flight of the Fairey Swordfish. Designed in the 1930s, the Swordfish torpedo bomber was clearly obsolete by the start of WWII. However, the "Stringbag", as it was nicknamed, continued in front line service throughout the war. It's most significant victory came in the hunt for the German battleship Bismarck, when Swordfish pilots crippled the ship by disabling her rudder with a torpedo strike, rendering the ship unmaneuverable. Bismarck was then sunk by ships of the Royal Navy.

doodon2whls > ttyymmnn 04/17/2015 at 10:13

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Good stuff as usual, ttyymmnn...

Let's not forget the last 'flight' of OV-103, a.k.a. Space Shuttle Discovery as she rode 'piggyback' atop SCA N905NA on April 17, 2012, landing at Dulles Airport and transferred to the the Smithsonian's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center for permanent static display to the public.

Full Size Photo.

FJ80WaitinForaLSV8 > ttyymmnn 04/17/2015 at 10:16

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Thank god they didn't ruin the Iowas with Harriers.

ttyymmnn > doodon2whls 04/17/2015 at 10:52

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Thanks for adding that. I had considered that one, but I can't write about everything! I also left out the birth of Glenn Martin. He was born in 1886!

ttyymmnn > FJ80WaitinForaLSV8 04/17/2015 at 10:53

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It's a pretty insane concept, really. Talk about packing a punch!

FJ80WaitinForaLSV8 > ttyymmnn 04/17/2015 at 11:06

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Any idea how many they would have carried? The fantail section of those ships is already pretty damn big.

ttyymmnn > FJ80WaitinForaLSV8 04/17/2015 at 11:12

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The initial plan also envisioned a Phase II, under which the aft turrent was to be deleted and a hanger and flight deck added in its place. The hanger would accomodate 12 AV-8B Harrier STOVL jumpjets. The Martin Marietta version for Phase II had a V-shaped flight deck with two ski jumps on the forward edges, on either side of the main superstructure. The flight decks would measure 330 feet by 150 feet. However, by 1984 the plans for these "Battlecarriers" had been dropped. ( Global Security )

"Battlecarriers." How cool/crazy is that? It sounds like something out of Star Blazers.

FJ80WaitinForaLSV8 > ttyymmnn 04/17/2015 at 11:17

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I would love to get my hands on that feasibility study.

You can tell a Finn but you can't tell him much > ttyymmnn 04/17/2015 at 11:25

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These look so strange with the original cockpit on them. It really brings home the era that they were designed in.

Great post as always, but I do have one nit to pick. The B-52's nickname is BUFF, not Buff. BUFF stands for Big Ugly Fat Fxxker from what I've seen.

ttyymmnn > You can tell a Finn but you can't tell him much 04/17/2015 at 11:32

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I actually went back and forth with the all-caps acronym vs. the single cap name. And I had at first put the meaning, complete with the vulgarity, but I generally try to avoid profanity in my posts, even though this is historical profanity. I also wondered if the nickname started out as a conflation of the B with the F of "fifty-two" and then took on its current meaning. Sometimes acronyms come about afterwards when they seem to fit (there's actually a word for that: "backronym").

No apology necessary for picking nits. Writing history is hard, and sources can be wrong. I am entirely open to making corrections where they are warranted. It's very difficult to take something as complex as the Harrier, or even Harriet Quimby, and condense it down to just three or four sentences.

ttyymmnn > FJ80WaitinForaLSV8 04/17/2015 at 11:40

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I found this picture on the Interwebs. I have no idea of the source, but it looks pretty close to the proposal. There are some other concept models/pictures here . Again, source is unknown. Pretty crazy concept, and I would bet that the take off from the ramp could be pretty hairy. (See what I did there?)

You can tell a Finn but you can't tell him much > ttyymmnn 04/17/2015 at 11:43

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It seems like I've heard the story of how it got the nickname but I can't find anything online right now. Must have read it in one of those paper things like a magazine or book back in the stone age.

Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo > ttyymmnn 04/17/2015 at 14:45

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Yes, but only because the anti-aircraft defenses on the Bismarck were obsolescent and actually unable to aim low enough to hit the low, slow Swordfish. But for some bad decisions by the Reich, the Bismarck could have been very bad news for the Allies.

Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo > doodon2whls 04/17/2015 at 14:46

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They flew directly overhead and I saw them fly over. Low and loud. I heard them coming and knew exactly what it was and ran out and looked up.

doodon2whls > Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo 04/17/2015 at 14:51

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We had a better viewpoint from our 8th floor office...

http://flightclub.jalopnik.com/the-shuttle-or…

Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo > ttyymmnn 04/17/2015 at 14:55

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Your own photo of the Falcon?

ttyymmnn > Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo 04/17/2015 at 15:04

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Yes! Not bad for handheld in that space. It’s pretty dark in there.

Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo > doodon2whls 04/17/2015 at 16:52

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Yeah, well, I was working in downtown San Francisco about 13 years ago in the run-up to Fleet Week and one afternoon the Blue Angels were practicing and one of them banked multiple Gs right next round the top of our 24-storey building. I was on the roof with the maintenance people and we all ran and waved like a bunch of little kids and, all joking aside, I was able to look through the top of the canopy at the top of the helmets of the two people inside the plane. Lots of vapor trailing off the leading edges. Crazy awesome.

No, no picture, but I was there!

In all honesty, that post about seeing the shuttle ferried over was more for the benefit of ttyymmnn than it was for the general bloggership. Still, I am very proud of our space program and happy that I knew enough to be aware and go out and look up at that historic moment.