This Date in Aviation History: October 31 - November 3

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn) 11/03/2015 at 12:35 • Filed to: Planelopnik, planelopnik history

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Welcome to This Date in Aviation History , getting you caught up on milestones and important historical events in aviation from October 31 through November 3.

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November 2, 1947 – The first flight of the Hughes H-4 Hercules. There’s no question that Howard Hughes was an eccentric man. Known for his reclusive behavior, he was also one of the wealthiest people of his generation. Through his varied interests and investments, Hughes managed to grow a $1 million inheritance into a billion dollar empire that encompassed interests in investing, film making, real estate and philanthropy. But to many, he is best known for his efforts in aviation, first with the formation of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in 1932 and later with his purchase of a controlling investment in !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in 1939. In addition to his fascination with speed and air racing, Hughes developed a number of aircraft, but is best known for his greatest failure, the H-4 Hercules, known to most as the Spruce Goose. The Hercules was conceived early in WWII by shipbuilder !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and built by Hughes Aircraft in the hopes of providing the US with a transatlantic cargo plane that would be capable of carrying 150,000 pounds of cargo, 750 fully equipped troops, or two !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! weighing 30 tons each. Hercules was an apt name for the plane, because it was a true behemoth—it was the largest flying boat ever built, and its wingspan of 320 feet 11 inches remains the longest in history. In an effort to save weight and conserve metal, the Hercules was constructed almost entirely of birch (not spruce), and it was powered by eight Pratt & Whitney R-4360 Wasp Major radial engines each producing 3,000 horsepower. The Hercules was constructed in Hughes’ Los Angeles factory, then a house moving company transported the disassembled aircraft to Long Beach, where it was reassembled for flight testing. With Hughes at the controls, the Hercules made two uneventful taxi runs, then, on the third, Hughes lifted the Spruce Goose off the surface of the water. The giant aircraft rose to about 70 feet, flew at 135 mph for about a mile, then settled back onto the water—and never flew again. It is impossible to know if the Spruce Goose would have met its design objectives. Its first flight came more than two years after !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and the US government was no longer interested in such a huge propeller-powered cargo plane. The Spruce Goose was maintained in a climate-controlled hangar for thirty years, and eventually acquired by the Disney company and placed on display in 1980. It was later transferred to the Aero Club of Southern California and now resides at the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in McMinnville, Oregon. (FAA photo)

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November 2, 1943 – The first flight of the Grumman F7F Tigercat. Grumman has a storied history of providing warplanes for the US Navy, but the aircraft that became the Tigercat actually started out as a project by Grumman to build a twin-engine interceptor for the US Army Air Corps, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , which itself was a development of the radical !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . But when the XP-50 prototype was lost in a crash, funding was shifted to a new design, the XP-65, and development of the Army interceptor, as well as a Navy version, designated XF7F-1, took place simultaneously. The main difference between the two versions was that the Army’s XP-65 was equipped with superchargers. But, as development continued, it became clear that the Army and Navy had very different requirements, and those needs could not be met by a single airplane (a situation that would plague the development of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! twenty years later). So Grumman, based on their experience building fighters for the Navy, would focus entirely on the XF7F and the Army stopped pursuing the XP-65. The Navy envisioned their new aircraft not only as a fighter, but also as a ground attack aircraft, and the Tigercat had a serious bite: four 20mm cannons and four .50 caliber machine guns, as well as hardpoints on the wings and fuselage for bombs and torpedoes. And not only could the Tigercat hit hard, it was fast. With a top speed of 460 mph, it outpaced the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! by 80 mph, and was even a bit faster than the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . However, the early models were not able to pass carrier qualifications and Tigercats were relegated to land bases and used as night fighters and for photo reconnaissance. By the third variant, the Tigercat was finally cleared for carrier operations, but by this late stage only 12 were produced. Too late for WWII, the Tigercat did see limited action in Korea as a night fighter, shooting down two !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! biplanes, but this would be its only combat success. Most Tigercats were eventually sent into storage and later scrapped, though some were bought as surplus and used as firefighting water bombers. Of the 364 aircraft produced, seven remain airworthy, and two currently are being restored, one to airworthiness. Interestingly, Grumman had originally intended to call the F7F the Tomcat , but that name was considered too risqué for the era. The name Tomcat would famously appear later on the Grumman F-14. (NASA photo)

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Short Take Off

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October 31, 2000 –The first resident crew of the International Space Station lifts off from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The mission, named !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , had a three-man crew commanded by American Bill Shepherd and included Russians Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei K. Krikalev, both of whom had long-duration space experience on board the Russian space station !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Expedition 1 lasted 136 days, during which time the crew activated systems on board the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and unpacked equipment for future missions. The ISS has been continuously inhabited ever since. (NASA photo)

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November 1, 1997 – The introduction of the Saab JAS 39 Gripen. Designed to replace the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! for the Swedish Air Force, the Gripen ( !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! ) took its maiden flight on December 9, 1988 and has since been exported to five other nations. The single-seat, Mach 2 fighter was designed to operate from short fields and civilian roadways, and saw action is support of the no-fly zone over Libya in 2011. About 250 Gripens have been built, and it remains in production. (Photo by Milan Nykodym via !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! )

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November 2, 1992 – The first flight of the Airbus A330. One of a number of derivatives of Airbus’ original !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! wide-body, the A330 has a range of up to 8,300 miles and can carry as many as 335 passengers or 150,000 pounds of cargo, depending on the variant. To accommodate different customers, the A330 was the first Airbus airliner to offer a choice of three different engines. Still in production today, over 1,200 A330s have been built, and serve numerous civilian carriers, cargo companies, and the military. (Photo by Wo st 01 via !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! )

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November 2, 1929 – The founding of The Ninety-Nines, an international organization of woman pilots “that promotes advancement of aviation through education, scholarships, and mutual support while honoring our unique history and sharing our passion for flight.” Founded at Curtiss Field in New York by ninety-nine of the then-117 licensed female pilots, the organization counts Amelia Earhart among its charter members, and includes such notables as !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . (Photo via The Smithsonian)

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November 3, 1952 – The first flight of the Saab 32 Lansen, a two-seat transonic fighter-bomber developed by Saab for the Swedish Air Force. Desgined originally as one of the first dedicated ground attack jets, Saab produced three principal variants: the A 32A for ground attack, the J 32B for aerial combat, and the S 32C for reconnaissance missions. Plagued by a rash of fatal crashes early in its operations, the Lansen was phased out beginning in 1971 in favor of the Saab 37 Viggen. 450 were produced between 1954-1960. (Photo by Bluescan sv.wiki via !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! )

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November 3, 1944 – The first Japanese Fu-Go balloon bombs are launched against North America. The Fu-Go (“balloon bomb”) was a hydrogen balloon launched from Japan and intended to travel on the Pacific jet stream to North America. They were armed with either a small antipersonnel bomb or multiple incendiary devices, or both, and were intended to kill civilians or start forest fires in the Pacific Northwest. Over 9,000 were launched, but only one Fu-Go attack resulted in fatalities when a group of picnickers discovered one on the ground in Oregon. It detonated, killing a pregnant woman and five children. (US Navy image)

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If you enjoy these Aviation History posts, please let me know in the comments. And if you missed any of the past articles, you can find them all at !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

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HammerheadFistpunch > ttyymmnn 11/03/2015 at 12:41

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It seems to me that with a will and some good software and talent that we should be able to reconstruct digitally the flight characteristics of the H4, I for one would love to be able to know if it would have really worked and I can’t imagine I’m alone. How has this not been done?

Ash78, voting early and often > ttyymmnn 11/03/2015 at 12:46

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Thanks for posting the FuGo balloon story — that’s the best way to win a bar bet on whether the Axis powers ever managed to kill any Americans in the Continental US.

Oddly innovative, I have to say.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > ttyymmnn 11/03/2015 at 12:47

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shooting down two Polikarpov Po-2 biplanes, but this would be its only combat success.

I’m not 100% sure this is accurate. The Night Witch kills may be the only confirmed ones, but I think my old copy of The Naval Air War in Korea details some further engagement with the enemy at night to uncertain result, including a skirmish with a MiG. A lot of the MiG kills or losses are fantastically hard to confirm, because the Russkies were trying to keep a tight leash on the whole thing, with a pilot even shot dead in his parachute harness when it looked like the US might recover him.

Anyway, my first introduction to the F7F was the ‘92 Sierra/Dynamix computer game Aces of the Pacific . Back in the day...

ttyymmnn > Ash78, voting early and often 11/03/2015 at 12:47

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I would have to agree. The Japanese are certainly industrious people. Hell, they made over 9000 of the balloons.

ttyymmnn > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 11/03/2015 at 12:48

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If you’ve got more accurate info, I’d love to include it. This is all I could find, though.

ttyymmnn > HammerheadFistpunch 11/03/2015 at 12:49

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That would be interesting, particularly with how crazy good the sim stuff is these days. However, I have neither the will or the talent.

HammerheadFistpunch > ttyymmnn 11/03/2015 at 12:50

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yeah, me either.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > ttyymmnn 11/03/2015 at 12:53

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It’s likely that it wouldn’t be better confirmed, just several possibles/probables in after-action reports, reported (by me) third-hand - reports, Hallion, me... Mostly I was just noting (from memory) that the F7F saw a little more combat than picking on helpless biplanes, but not much. I think the F4U takedown of a MiG was properly confirmed, on the other hand. I don’t have the book here at work with me, so I may be full of it, but I’m pretty sure on both those points.

I’m about due a WWII/Korea out-of-print book binge at Mr. K’s , maybe this will remind me to do that.

HammerheadFistpunch > ttyymmnn 11/03/2015 at 12:55

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and interesting comparison

http://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/1250…

Looks like it would have flown out of ground effects based on this simple analysis, but not been a great performer. Its also doubtful it could even lift the load it was meant to. Now with the VDT wasps...that might have been different.

EDIT: the analysis was based on a loaded weight. Amazingly...it could have lifted all that weight but it would have been butt slow and probably not very fun to fly.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > Ash78, voting early and often 11/03/2015 at 12:55

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If kills within coastal waters count, the Germans racked up quite a few - look up Operation Drumbeat. Lots of U-boat sacks of ships essentially at the harbor necks, and even some crew coming ashore.

ttyymmnn > HammerheadFistpunch 11/03/2015 at 12:56

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Hard to say. It was really a batshit crazy idea from a batshit crazy guy. Once it flopped, he simply walked away from it and on to other things.

HammerheadFistpunch > ttyymmnn 11/03/2015 at 12:57

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no, I’m quite sure they made more than 9000 Japanese during the war.

ttyymmnn > HammerheadFistpunch 11/03/2015 at 13:01

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*edited for clarity

Hahayoustupidludditeshutupandgohandcrankyourmodeltalready > ttyymmnn 11/03/2015 at 13:18

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Do you know if there is any truth to the rumour that one Fu-Go hit a powerline nearby the operations of the Manhatten project, which, had it stayed entangled a few seconds longer, could have wiped out power to the area and potentially delayed the construction of the A-bomb significantly?

ttyymmnn > Hahayoustupidludditeshutupandgohandcrankyourmodeltalready 11/03/2015 at 13:36

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I had never heard that story, but a little googling turned up this article that states that one of the reactors producing plutonium was shut down for three days when a blackout caused by a fu-go shut down the reactor cooling. Interesting!

http://www.project1947.com/gfb/fugo.htm

facw > Ash78, voting early and often 11/03/2015 at 21:34

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Of course what could have been really nasty would have been if they had successfully combined their balloon attacks with Unit 731’s biological warfare activities.

They did come close to trying to use sub-launched aircraft to deliver plague fleas to San Diego:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation…

gmporschenut also a fan of hondas > ttyymmnn 11/04/2015 at 21:45

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The tigercat is one of my favorite what if planes. 2 x 2300hp engines! How can we improve the Corsair? What if we put 2 double wasp s in it, oh we’ll give it only 4 mg but also 4 cannons.

WW2 in ‘46 would have been terrible but part of me wonders what it would have been like up a against other period fighters.