This Date in Aviation History: September 29 - October 2

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn) 10/02/2018 at 12:35 • Filed to: wingspan, planelopnik history, Planelopnik

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Welcome to This Date in Aviation History , getting of you caught up on milestones, important historical events and people in aviation from September 29 through October 2.

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(US Air Force)

September 29, 1954 – The first flight of the McDonnell F-101 Voodoo. During WWII, huge formations of bombers ranged the skies over Europe and the Pacific, protected from enemy fighters by a surrounding screen of fighter escorts. Following the war, and before the arrival of the intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and high altitude surface-to-air missiles (SAMs), this method of penetrating enemy airspace continued basically unchanged, though the fighters and some newer bombers were now powered by jet engines instead of piston engines. To stem the expected waves of Russian bombers should the Cold War turn hot, a new breed of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! was needed, purpose-built to fly fast and stop enemy bombers before they could reach their target, or to range ahead of a bomber fleet and take out enemy interceptors.

The McDonnell XF-88 Voodoo, an penetration fighter that formed the basis for the F-101 Voodoo. (US Air Force)

In 1946, the US Air Forced issued requirements for a jet-powered penetration fighter, and three manufacturers responded: McDonnell Aircraft presented the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , Lockheed developed the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and North American proposed the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . McDonnell won the competition but, following the detonation of the first nuclear bomb by the Soviet Union in 1949, the Air Force turned their attention to creating !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and the penetration fighter project was shelved for a time. But with America’s entry into the Korean war in 1950, the Air Force quickly discovered that there was still a need for bomber escorts and, in 1951, the Air Force once again issued an operational requirement for a penetration fighter. And once again, they tapped McDonnell to build it. But this time, McDonnell responded with a much better airplane.

An early F-101A Voodoo on loan to the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) at Edwards Air Force Base in 1956. (NASA)

The F-101 was based on the earlier !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and it retained the Voodoo nickname, but the new fighter was made much larger to accommodate three times the fuel capacity of the XF-88 as well as a larger radar. The F-101 also received more powerful !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! turbojets, and the horizontal stabilizer was moved to the top of the tail to provide greater stability at high speeds. The F-101A entered service with the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (SAC), but was only built in small numbers because the need for a penetration fighter soon became secondary once again to the need for an interceptor. So the F-101A was shifted to the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (TAC) in 1957, where its designation changed to strategic fighter, where its planned role was to carry a single nuclear bomb for tactical strikes against enemy airfields or other important military targets of immediate value. While development of the F-101 was underway, the Air Force was working on the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , a project designed to create a dedicated, state-of-the-art interceptor to combat Russian bombers, a project that eventually led to the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . But lengthy delays in that program meant that these aircraft would not be ready on schedule, and the Voodoo was transformed into an interim interceptor as the F-101B.

A pair of two-seat F-101B interceptors belonging to the New York Air National Guard’s 136th Fighter Interceptor Squadron in 1981. (US Air Force)

The B model received more powerful J57 engines with significantly longer afterburners which increased top speed to Mach 1.8. This variant had a two-seat tandem cockpit for pilot and weapons officer, and was fitted with the Hughes MG-13 fire control radar along with the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (SAGE) system which permitted controllers on the ground to direct the aircraft to its target remotely. The internal cannons of the interceptor were removed and replaced by four !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! air-to-air missiles. More Voodoos were produced in this interceptor variant than any other.

A camouflaged US Air Force RF-101C reconnaissance aircraft over Vietnam in 1967. (US Air Force)

The Voodoo was also developed into the reconnaissance RF-101, which served longer than any of the fighter/interceptor variants and saw extensive action in the Vietnam War. The RF-101 also took part in reconnaissance missions over Cuba during the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The Voodoo was retired by frontline USAF units by 1972, but continued to serve the Air National Guard for 10 more years. The F-101 was exported to China and Canada, where Canadian Voodoos flew with the Royal Canadian Air Force as the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , replacing the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The RCAF finally retired their Voodoos in 1984 following their adoption of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

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(US Army)

September 30, 1975 – The first flight of the Boeing AH-64 Apache. “Soviet ground forces outnumber US ground forces by virtually every criterion: total ground force personnel; number of divisions; and ground force systems, especially tanks (5:1), personnel carriers (2.5:1), artillery pieces (4:1), and heavy mortars (2.5:1).” These words were spoken by US Air Force General George Brown, at a time when a large ground war against the Soviet Union was still a very serious possibility, and they spoke to the enormous gap in men and materiel faced by the West in any potential conflict with Russia. Coming so soon after the end of American involvement in the Vietnam War, where the attack helicopter had its baptism of fire and proved its mettle over the battlefield, General Brown’s comments made it clear that the US needed a new, dedicated attack helicopter to face a potential European invasion by the Soviet Union that would likely be spearheaded by huge numbers of tanks and armored personnel carriers.

An early experimental attack helicopter built by Hughes in 1976, which later became the AH-64 Apache. (US Army)

In response to this threat, the US Army initiated the Advanced Attack Helicopter (AAH) program in 1972 to find a more capable replacement for the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! that had entered service during the Vietnam War. Bell Helicopter, Boeing Vertol/Grumman, Hughes, Lockheed and Sikorsky all submitted proposals, with Bell and Hughes selected to build prototypes of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and YAH-64 respectively for further evaluation. In 1976, the Army named Hughes the winner. Both helicopters were similar in capability and design, but the Army cited the YAH-64's four-bladed rotor that could withstand greater battle damage, and the greater stability of its tail-dragger landing gear as two of the main reasons for their selection.

The AH-64 was powered by two !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! turboshaft engines for added survivability over the Cobra’s single engine and, like the Cobra, the Apache had a tandem cockpit, with pilot in the rear and co-pilot/gunner in the front. The AH-64 was armed with the new !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (which is an acronym for “Helicopter launched, fire-and-forget”), as well as a single 30mm !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! which held 1,200 rounds of ammunition and was mounted in a swiveling chin turret. Two stub wings were fitted with hardpoints for air-to-ground rockets, missiles, or !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! air-to-air missiles for defense. The weapons load could be tailored to the needs of the mission, whether it was anti-armor, ground support, or helicopter escort.

The Apache entered service with the US Army in 1986 and saw its first combat action during the US invasion of Panama in !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . It then saw extensive action in the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and in the skies over Afghanistan and Iraq, where it has performed admirably in the anti-tank, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (COIN) and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (CAS) roles. By 2011, the Apache had acquired over three million flight hours since its maiden flight, and it has been continuously upgraded throughout its service life. The AH-64D model features the addition of the AN/APG-78 Longbow fire-control radar and Radar Frequency Interferometer, both of which are housed in a radome mounted on the mast above the main rotor, to detect enemy radar emissions. This variant took over the scout role once held by the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Export versions of the AH-64 serve with Israel, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Egypt, and in smaller numbers with 10 other nations. Over 2,000 have been built, and the Apache remains in production by Boeing.

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(US Air Force)

September 30, 1949 – The Berlin Airlift officially ends. Following the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in France on June 6, 1944, Germany found itself squeezed on two fronts. The Allies were pushing eastward on a broad front throughout Europe, while the Russians were moving westward at a breakneck pace to reach the German capital ahead of the Western allies. Berlin fell to the Russians on May 2, 1945 and, as had been decided at the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! held in February of that year, the city was divided into four zones. The Russians controlled the eastern quarter of the city, while the remaining three quarters were divided between the French, British and Americans. The county of Germany underwent a similar partitioning, and Berlin itself ended up deep inside eastern Germany, which was fully controlled by the Russians.

Germany, divided after the war. Berlin, the German capital, lies deep in the Soviet-controlled eastern part of the country. (Author unknown)

Though the shooting war was over, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! between the Western Bloc (the US and its future NATO allies) and Russia had begun. The fragile wartime alliance between the West and the Soviet Union ended, and both sides sought to influence the political makeup of Europe—and the world—through economic and political policies and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . On June 24, 1948, in an effort to bring the city of Berlin entirely under Soviet control, the Russians cut off the western sectors of the city from the outside world, severing water connections and halting all vehicular and river traffic into or out of the Allied sectors. West Berlin was effectively cut off from the rest of Western Europe, and it became an island of democracy inside Communist East Germany.

Using the three corridors for one-way traffic, American cargo aircraft departed from Wiesbaden and Rein-Main in the south, while British cargo aircraft departed from Fassberg and flew to RAF Gatow in southwest Berlin. (Author unknown)

But while the Russians could effectively wall off the city by blocking the roads and bridges, they could not put a roof over the city, and the Western allies began the the greatest airlift in history to provide food and fuel to support the beleaguered city. Though the Russians controlled all ground access to Berlin, they had agreed prior to the blockade to let the Western allies use three air corridors from western Germany into Berlin, and these corridors formed the supply route. Starting haphazardly at first on June 24, 1948, the operation was taken over first by US Brigadier General Joseph Smith, who had commanded !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! under General !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! during the war. But Smith had no airlift experience, and he was soon replaced by Major General !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , a veteran of airlift operations over the Himalayas during the fight against Japan. Tunner cobbled together an aerial armada of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and British C-47 Dakotas, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! airliners, and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and started round-the-clock flights. He instituted strict new rules to streamline the operation by requiring !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! landings regardless of weather conditions and eliminating the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! of aircraft while planes awaited landing. If an aircraft missed an approach, the crew was required to return to their starting point, fully laden, and try again. Tunner also required air crews to stay with their planes at all times, and refreshments were brought out to the crews on the tarmac so they could take off immediately after unloading. The citizens of West Berlin pitched in to help unload the planes.

By the end of August 1948, 1,500 flights per day—one landing every minute—were delivering more than 5,000 tons of food, coal and other supplies, enough to keep the city fed and powered in spite of the blockade. On Easter Sunday, 1949, the airlift managed to deliver 13,000 tons of cargo, including the equivalent of 600 railroad cars of coal. The airlift continued for 11 months, making more than 189,000 flights totaling nearly 600,000 hours of flying that covered more than 92 million miles. Faced with this herculean effort, the Russians finally conceded and lifted the blockade one minute after midnight on May 12, 1949, though the flights continued for four more months. West Berlin remained a free city, and it stood as a powerful symbol of the West’s resolve to fight the spread of Communism in Europe before the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in 1990.

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October 1, 1990 – The death of Curtis LeMay. During the Second World War, strategic bombing became one of the most potent elements of modern warfare, and one man took the lead in shaping the bombing program for the US and molded it into one of the most powerful—and controversial—forces in the world. Born in Columbus, Ohio in 1906, Curtis LeMay earned a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Ohio State University before receiving a commission in the US Army Air Corps (USAAC) in 1930. There, LeMay flew pursuit fighters, specialized in navigation, and served as a navigator aboard the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . When WWII began, LeMay’s reputation for discipline and perfection ensured his rapid rise through the ranks of the USAAC. He began as the commander of a squadron of B-17s based in England, where he helped to develop the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! formation that later became standard practice for all American strategic bombing missions. Later, as the commander of a squadron of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , he personally led many dangerous missions, and threatened crews with court-martial if they failed to reach the target. His insistence on discipline and doing things his way earned him nicknames such as “Old Iron Pants” and the “Big Cigar.”

In 1944, LeMay was transferred to the Pacific Theater, where he found that the bombing tactics used in Europe were unsuited to the fight against Japan. Unlike Europe, with its centralized manufacturing, many war industries in Japan, such as the manufacture of ammunition, were spread among the civilian population. To address the poor success rate of high-altitude bombing, LeMay had his crews switch to low level, nighttime !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! against the Japanese homeland, where many of the cities were largely constructed of wood. These fire raids killed an estimated 500,000 Japanese civilians, more than the combined death toll of both atomic bombings, and led to vicious reprisals against American POWs. However, despite the high civilian casualties, LeMay remained dedicated to his methods. He steadfastly believed that if his tactics could shorten the war by one day it was worth it. The incendiary attacks continued until the Japanese surrender in 1945, and some were carried out after the atomic attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

General LeMay confers with President Johnson at the president’s Texas ranch in 1962. Johnson later confided to an aide that the tough-talking general “Scares the hell out of me.” (National Archives)

In 1948, with Berlin under a Russian blockade, LeMay took over and reorganized the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! which, at its peak, brought in 5,000 tons of supplies on 500 flights per day to the beleaguered city, with one cargo aircraft landing every minute. By the end of the Airlift in 1949, 213,000 flights had brought in 1.7 million tons of supplies, and the Russians lifted their blockade. Also in 1948, LeMay took over the nascent !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (SAC), molding it into an effective tool for the nuclear age and projecting American power around the globe with high-flying strategic bombers such as the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

LeMay, with his trademark cigar, works on his Corvette in 1971. (Life Magazine)

LeMay served as the US Air Force Chief of Staff from 1961 until his retirement in 1965, and was !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! running mate for Wallace’s unsuccessful presidential bid in 1968. In addition to his Air Force service, LeMay was a sports car owner and racing enthusiast, and he allowed the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (SCCA) to use SAC facilities to hold their races as a safer alternative to racing on roads. For his support of the SCCA, LeMay was inducted into the SCCA Hall of Fame in 2007. LeMay died of a heart attack at March Air Force Base and is buried at the US Air Force Academy Cemetery in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

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October 1, 1947 – The first flight of the North American F-86 Sabre. !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! was founded in 1928, and early on the company made a name for itself with the production of training aircraft, notably the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , one of the most-produced trainers in history. During WWII, North American continued to provide aircraft for the war effort, and produced many of the iconic airplanes of the war, including the versatile   !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and the remarkable !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The period of WWII was a time of transition, as the design of propeller aircraft reached its zenith and the jet engine began to take over as the powerplant of the future, and North American evolved as well, ultimately producing one of the finest fighters of the early jet era.

The straight-winged FJ-1 Fury. Though the Fury was unsuccessful, the lines of the future F-86 are apparent. (US Navy)

However, their start was not entirely auspicious. North American made its first foray into jet fighter design with the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , an unremarkable straight-winged fighter built for the US Navy that borrowed the tail, wings and canopy from the Mustang. The US Air Force was just about purchase the Fury for themselves, designated the XP-86, but the new fighter was incapable of reaching the speeds the Air Force required. It was here that aviation history took a fateful turn. Based on aerodynamic data obtained from Germany at the end of the war, North American took the Fury and replaced the straight wings with wings swept at 35 degrees. The iconic Sabre was born.

Testing of the early Sabres showed the Air Force that they had a winner on their hands. On September 5, 1948, Air Force pilot Maj. Richard Johnson set an official world speed record of 671 mph, and the Sabre became the first jet aircraft to exceed Mach 1 while flying in a shallow dive. Soon after its introduction, the Sabre went to war in 1949 in the skies over Korea. There it became the preeminent US jet fighter of the Korean War, and often tangled with Soviet-built !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! fighters in the northwest corner of North Korea along the Yalu River, an area that came to be known as “ !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .” Though the MiG-15 was superior to the early Sabres, advances in engine and firepower soon brought the Sabre to parity with the MiG, and American pilots, many of whom had gained invaluable combat experience during WWII, claimed 792 victories over North Korean and Chinese pilots against the loss of only 78 Sabres, though recent scholarship places the ratio at closer to 2:1. Nevertheless, of the 41 American pilots who became aces during the Korean War, 40 of them flew Sabres. The top scoring US ace of the war, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , claimed 16 jet-to-jet victories, and other notable pilots such as !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and pilots who would late take part in the fledgeling American space program, such as !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , flew the Sabre in combat.

A Canadair CL-13A Sabre of the Royal Canadian Air Force. (Alain Rioux)

With the end of the Korean War, most Sabres were transferred stateside to fly with Air National Guard units, but export Sabres continued to be flown in combat in conflicts around the world. A total of 26 nations flew the F-86, and over 1,800 were produced under license in Canada as the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . In all, a total of 9,860 Sabres were built, the most of any Western jet fighter. T he US finally retired its last Sabres in 1970, and Bolivia was the last export country to retire its Sabres in 1994. The remarkable F-86 was further developed into the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! interceptor, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! which did not enter into production, and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! for the US Navy.

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(US Air Force)

October 1, 1942 – The first flight of the Bell XP-59 Airacomet. In the period before and during WWII, American jet engine development lagged far behind that of Europe. Germany had flown the first jet-powered aircraft, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , in the summer of 1939, even before the war had begun, and fielded the first operational jet fighter with the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Britain flew their first jet aircraft, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , in 1941, and their first fighter, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , entered service in 1944. As part of an agreement between the US and Britian to share British technology in exchange for American help manufacturing military hardware, the US obtained plans for the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! turbojet engine, and a complete engine was flown back to the US in the bomb bay of a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The plans were given to General Electric to manufacture the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! -designed engine under license as the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

XP-59 fitted with wooden propeller and covered with shrouds to conceal the true source of its propulsion. (US Air Force)

The US Army Air Corps then approached !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , head of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , to design a fighter around the new power plant. Secrecy was paramount. At the time, Bell was developing a twin-boom, pusher propeller fighter that the USAAF had designated the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . America’s new jet fighter received the same designation in the hopes that observers might think it was just a further development of the XP-59. The piston-powered fighter never moved beyond wind tunnel mockups, and the unrelated jet-powered fighter became the XP-59. The ruse was further perpetuated when, during ground movements of the first Airacomet at Muroc Army Air Field ( !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! today), a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! was affixed to the nose and shrouds were placed over the engine nacelles to hide the true nature of the aircraft’s power plant.

A Bell family photo: the first production P-59A flies in formation with a Bell P-63 King Cobra (center) and a Bell P-39 Airacobra (top). (US Air Force)

Bell finalized the design for the Airacomet in January 1942, and even before the first prototype was flown, an order was placed for 13 aircraft. Unlike the Meteor and the Me 262, both of which had their two engines housed in wing-mounted pods, the Airacomet integrated its engines and intake nacelles into the fuselage, a arrangement that heavily influenced future jet aircraft design. The Airacomet’s first flight was accidental, and occurred when Bell test pilot Robert Stanley unintentionally lifted off the ground during high-speed taxi tests. T he official maiden flight was made on October 2. The Airacomet generally performed well, though it showed a tendency to yaw from side to side and was deemed unsuitable as a fighter.

Bell P-59B Airacomet. (US Air Force)

With a top speed of 404 mph, it was no great leap forward from contemporary propeller fighters. Even when the P-59B was given upgraded engines it’s top speed only just equaled that of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . A further development of the Airacomet, with a single engine, was considered, but that project was eventually handed off to !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , where !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! developed it into the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the first jet fighter to be flown operationally by the US. A total of 66 Airacomets were produced and, though the aircraft saw only limited service, it  proved useful for training the first generation of jet fighter pilots and mechanics, who used the P-59 to learn the characteristics of jet flight and maintenance before transitioning to more modern aircraft.

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Short Takeoff

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(NASA)

(NASA)September 29, 1988 – The launch of Space Shuttle Discovery on ST-26, the first flight following the Challenger Disaster. After the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! of the Shuttle !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! on January 28, 1986, STS-26 was declared the “Return to Flight” mission after an almost three-year hiatus in Shuttle missions. It was the first flight to have all crew members wear pressure suits during landing, and the first with a crew bailout contingency since !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . It was aslso the first mission since !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! where all crew members had been on at least one previous space mission. Discovery launched from Kennedy Space Center in Florida and spent four days in orbit while the crew deployed a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (TDRS). It was also the first spacecraft to fly with a Voice Control Unit (VCU), a computer capable of interpreting and acting on voice commands.

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(NASA)

September 29, 1964 – The first flight of the LTV XC-142, an experimental !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (V/STOL) transport and cargo aircraft developed for the US Army, Navy and Air Force. The goal of the XC-142 was to provide an aircraft with helicopter-like performance but with greater range and speed than was possible with a helicopter. The XC-142 was powered by four !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! turboshaft engines linked by a common drive shaft that also turned a small horizontal propeller on the tail to control pitch during hover. Yaw during hover was controlled by the ailerons. In testing, the XC-142 completed all phases of hover and transition to level flight, but the project was canceled after five prototypes were built, and the aircraft are turned over to NASA for testing. One remains today at the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

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(US Navy)

September 29, 1948 – The first flight of the Vought XF7U-1 Cutlass. Allegedly based on design concepts captured from the German !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! at the end of WWII, the Cutlass had a short, checkered career with the US Navy. A radical tailless design with twin vertical stabilizers, the Cutlass, known by its detractors as the “gutless Cutlass,” suffered from serious handling problems and underpowered engines, and its long nose gear caused difficulty with carrier landings and lead to numerous !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and pilot fatalities. The Cutlass was introduced in 1951 and served for only eight years before being replaced by the extremely successful !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

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(Australian Government)

September 29, 1940 – The Brocklesby mid-air collision. During a training flight over Brocklesby, Australia, two !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! collided in midair and became locked together. The pilot of the lower Anson bailed out, along with the navigators of both aircraft. The collision caused the engines to stop on the upper aircraft; however, the engines on the lower Anson continued to run at full power, and the pilot of the upper Anson found he could control the connected aircraft using his ailerons and flaps. After flying five miles with the planes connected, the pilot made an emergency landing in a pasture. Only one member the crews suffered minor injuries. The upper aircraft was subsequently repaired and returned to service.

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Coburn, left, and Perot. (Bettman/Corbis)

September 30, 1982 – H. Ross Perot and J.W. Coburn complete the first circumnavigation of the globe in a helicopter. In an effort to beat Australian Dick Smith, who had started his own attempt at a circumnavigation by helicopter, Texas billionaire Perot purchased a stock !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , christened Spirit of Texas , and modified it to hold more fuel, deployable pontoons and upgraded navigational equipment. with Coburn as pilot, the pair set out from Dallas on September 1 and made 56 refueling stops while crossing 26 countries and flying 26,000 miles before returning to Dallas. One stop was made aboard a container ship in 15-foot seas and 40 mph winds since Russia would not allow the team to land in the Soviet Union. Perot also paid for a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and crew to support the flight. The circumnavigation took a total of 246 flight hours at an average ground speed of 117 mph, and an overall average of 35 mph, setting a world record for flight time in a helicopter. The Spirit of Texas now resides at the National Air and Space Museum.

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(US Army)

September 30, 1943 – The first flight of the Northrop XP-56 Black Bullet, an experimental fighter developed in response to the US Army Air Corps’ 1938 !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! which was intended to stimulate new, radical aircraft design to stay ahead of European advances in aircraft design. The Black Bullet was built around the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! engine, which ultimately never entered production, and was essentially a flying wing design with bent wings and no vertical stabilizer, though a stabilizer was added later to improve handling. Flight tests were disappointing and showed little promise for challenging the performance of traditional fighters, and the project was canceled after 10 test flights. However, Northrop pioneered the use of magnesium in the airframe, and patented a process for !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! magnesium welding.

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(Author unknown)

September 30, 1942 – The death of German Luftwaffe ace Hans-Joachim Marseille. Marseille was born on December 13, 1919, and joined the Luftwaffe in 1938. He fought his first battles during the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , but his wild lifestyle away from battle caused him to be transferred to the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Flying from North Africa, and fighting his entire career in the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , Marseille scored 158 victories, all but seven against experienced British pilots, including a remarkable 17 victories in one day. Marseille perfected the method of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! fire, aiming in front of the enemy fighter rather than chasing it from the rear. Nicknamed the Star of Africa for his tally of victories, Marseille was killed when an engineer fire forced him to bail out of his Bf 109 and he struck the tail of the aircraft.

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(Author unknown)

October 1, 1975 – The first flight of the Bell YAH-63, the unsuccessful entrant into the US Army’s !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (AAH) competition announced in 1972. Bell’s entry lost to the Hughes YAH-64, which would enter production in 1983 as the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (now produced by Boeing). The Army cited Bell’s two rotor blades as being more vulnerable to ground fire than the Apache’s four, and felt the tricycle landing gear was less stable. Bell would use the lessons learned with the YAH-63 to help develop the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , an upgraded version of the earlier !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! attack helicopter.

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October 1, 1958 – The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) becomes operational. NASA has its origin in NACA, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , an agency created in 1915 to further the efforts of aeronautic research and technological development in the United States. But as America entered the space age following WWII, it became clear that the country needed an organization for a new era. The !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! carries this simple preamble “To provide for research into problems of flight within and outside the earth’s atmosphere, and for other purposes.” The Act goes on to say that “The Congress hereby declares that it is the policy of the United States that activities in space should be devoted to peaceful purposes for the benefit of all mankind.” In addition to NASA’s high profile space programs such as !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the organization continues to fund research into all aspects of space exploration, space travel, aviation, and related sciences. NASA’s latest large project, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, will see astronauts return to the Moon, create a permanent lunar station, and one day journey to Mars.

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Deutsches Bundesarchiv)

October 1, 1950 – The first flight of the Ilyushin Il-14, a civilian and military transport aircraft that was developed to replace the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and its Russian-built version, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Developed from the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the Il-14 was produced in Russia, former East Germany, former Czechoslovakia and China. Over 1,300 were built, and they served in many Eastern Bloc and Russian allied countries. Following the Soviet aircraft design ethos, the Il-14 was of rugged construction and designed to operate from rough and unimproved airstrips. The last Russian aircraft were retired in 2005, though a handful remain operational today.

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(Tim Shaffer)

October 2, 1981 – US President Ronald Reagan restarts the Rockwell B-1 Lancer program. The original B-1 had been developed as a low level, supersonic nuclear and conventional bomber, and first flew in 1974. But citing cost overruns, as well as the proliferation of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the project was canceled in 1977 by President Jimmy Carter. By the time Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, the doctrine of fighting the Soviet Union had changed, and the US was now facing regional conflicts that were seen as difficult to fight with the existing !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . As part of his promise to rebuild the US military, President Reagan restarted the B-1 program, and the bomber was developed into the B-1B, an upgraded and more capable version of the original B-1A. Rockwell received a contract to build 100 Lancers at a cost of $2.2 billion, and production ended in 1988.

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(US Army)

October 2, 1956 – The first flight of the Hughes TH-55 Osage. Development of the Osage began in 1955 when Hughes identified a market for a low-cost, lightweight two-seat helicopter and began work on the Model 269. Though the Army initially chose not to adopt the 269, they showed a renewed interest in the improved Model 269A, and adopted it in 1964 as the primary training helicopter to replace the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . By the time the Osage was replaced by the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (“Huey”) in 1988, more than 60,000 Army pilots had trained on the TH-55. The civilian Model 269/300 is used for transport, observation and agricultural spraying. A total of 2,800 were produced from 1961-1983.

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October 2, 1946 – The first flight of the Vought F6U Pirate, the first jet fighter built by Vought for the US Navy. In September 1944, the Navy announced a specification for a single-seat fighter built around the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! turbojet engine. To save weight, the Pirate was constructed of “Metalite,” balsa wood sandwiched between layers of aluminum. But the Pirate was woefully underpowered and, even after the installation of a more powerful engine, the Navy’s !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! stated, “The F6U-1 had proven so sub-marginal in performance that combat utilization is not feasible.” The 30 production Pirates racked up only 945 hours of total flight time, and some had a mere six hours on the airframe, just long enough to certify the aircraft for acceptance and ferry it to its final resting place.

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(Loverdet)

October 2, 1928 – The first flight of the Dewoitine D.520, a French fighter that entered service soon after the beginning of WWII. The D.520 was designed to compete with modern fighter aircraft was fitted with !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! 12-cylinder engine, the most powerful engine available to the French at the time. Though slower than its chief adversary, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the D.520 was more maneuverable, and proved nearly a match for the German fighter. With the fall of France, the D.520 continued to be flown by both the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! Air Force and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! Air Force, and production was restarted in 1942 to serve the Luftwaffe and German allies. The D.520 saw combat in North Africa, Bulgaria and on the Eastern Front, and was ultimately retired in 1953 after roughly 900 had been built.

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Connecting Flights

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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!!! . You can also find more stories about aviation, aviators and airplane oddities at !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

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Just Jeepin' > ttyymmnn 10/02/2018 at 13:24

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Is it my imagination or is this significantly longer than usual? Haven’t made my way through most of it yet.

Excellent work as always. I’d be curious to learn more about this bit, though:

Americans pilots, many of whom had gained invaluable combat experience during WWII, claimed 792 victories over North Korean and Chinese pilots against the loss of only 78 Sabres, though recent scholarship places the ratio at closer to 2:1.

How is that remotely possible? Even with fog of war and boastful pilots, that’s a crazy adjustment.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > ttyymmnn 10/02/2018 at 13:26

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Can’t say I’ve thought about it before, but there’s a certain amount of similarity between the Voodoo and a HF-24 Marut.

One of the most interesting things about the Sabre program to me was the issues they had with gunfire-induced flameouts. Something that highlighted how much the story of the jet fighter was in its infancy with strange new teething problems, and involved what was a step back (away from cannon and to MGs ) to address its seriousness - although with the gyro sight, there weren’t many MiGs around to laugh.

I remember stumbling across “in action” pictures of the XC-142 in my formative years, in a Time Life book on flight. It was like a Tom Swift Jr. fantastical device in real life.

Would you say that the F6U Pirate falls under the obverse of the rule “if it looks right, it’ll fly right”? Because it certainly looks “wrong”.

ttyymmnn > Just Jeepin' 10/02/2018 at 13:29

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I don’t remember where I read that. I wrote this last year. My guess would be that there really weren’t as many jet-to-jet dogfights as we think there were. But you’re right, how we go from 10:1 to 2:1 should be looked into.

It’s not your imagination. At over 6,200 words, I think this is by far the longest TDIAH post ever. It all depends on the calendar, though, and how many of the topics I choose to write long posts about. This one has six long topics, while most have two, or maybe three.

I’ll look into those Sabre numbers. I remember writing it, and I remember re-reading it when I updated for this year, but it didn’t stand out.

Thanks for reading.

ttyymmnn > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 10/02/2018 at 13:36

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Can’t say I’ve thought about it before, but there’s a certain amount of similarity between the Voodoo and a HF-24 Marut.

There were certainly many variations on a theme back in the day. The Dassault Ouragan looks sort of like the love child of a Sabre and a MiG-17.

I remember stumbling across “in action” pictures of the XC-142 in my formative years,

Me, too. I’m old enough that most of those things were “new and exciting” technologies, whereas now they seem so dated. If anything, it speaks to how long it takes for technology to mature to the point where the fantastic ideas of the past can become reality.

I think Vought was just like, “Shit, guys, we need to get a jet fighter out there. NOW!” So they threw this disaster together just to get their foot in the door. It really was an abject failure. And it’s also a very unattractive aircraft.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > ttyymmnn 10/02/2018 at 13:49

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Not related to aviation, but there’s a war story in this article you might be interested in:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Borie_(DD-215)

An engagement with U-boat crew including flares, thrown artillery casings, and even a thrown knife. Surreal.

Chariotoflove > ttyymmnn 10/02/2018 at 13:56

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Busy day today.

ttyymmnn > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 10/02/2018 at 14:08

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Thanks. I’ll check that out over lunch.

ttyymmnn > Chariotoflove 10/02/2018 at 14:09

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6,319 words. I think it’s the longest TDIAH post ever. Sometimes the calendar just works out that way.

user314 > ttyymmnn 10/02/2018 at 17:36

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NASA’s latest large project, the Space Launch System and the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, will see astronauts return to the Moon, create a permanent lunar station, and one day journey to Mars.

Eeeeehhhhhhh... Unless the BFR and Blue Origin both manage to step on their collective wienies, I very highly doubt Shelby’s Lunch Shakedown is ever going to do more than one or two flights, then be relegated to the history books. It’s far too expensive versus its supposed utility.

You can tell a Finn but you can't tell him much > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 10/03/2018 at 09:27

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That is an amazing story, thanks for linking it.