This Date in Aviation History: October 20 - October 23

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn) 10/23/2018 at 12:35 • Filed to: wingspan, Planelopnik, TDIAH

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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 October 20 through October 23.

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(Staff Sgt. Jeremy Smith, US Army)

October 20, 1956 – The first flight of the Bell UH-1 Iroquois. Ever since the airplane became a weapon of war, certain aircraft have become symbols of the conflicts in which they served. In WWI, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! became icons of nascent aerial warfare and dogfighting, while WWII saw the propeller fighter rise to its zenith with memorable fighters like the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! slugging it out over the Pacific while the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! becoming synonymous with the air war over Europe. Helicopters entered military service at the end of WWII, and their use was greatly expanded in the Korean War. But it was the Vietnam War that came to be known as the Helicopter War, the first conflict that saw widespread use of the helicopter on the battlefield and that witnessed the maturation of the concepts of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The ubiquitous presence of cameras in a war zone for the first time brought vivid images of the Bell HU-1 Iroquois, better known as the Huey, into American living rooms, and it became an indelible icon of America’s longest war.

The Bell XH-40, the prototype of the HU/UH-1 (US Army)

The arrival of the turbine engine revolutionized helicopter design and, in 1953, the US Army began the search for a new turbine-powered utility helicopter for medevac, instrument training and general utility. No less than 20 companies submitted proposals. In 1955, the Army selected !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! to build three prototypes of their Model 204 that were given the military designation XH-40. By 1960, the Army had ordered 100 helicopters, and the designation was changed to HU-1 (Helicopter, Utility) and the nickname “Huey” was born, a monicker that stuck despite a change in designation to UH-1 in 1965. While the turbine engine had definite advantages over earlier piston-powered helicopters in speed and lifting power, the original Hueys were still found to be underpowered. To address that shortcoming, the first significant variant, the UH-1B, was developed with a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! engine that increased the lifting power. Bell also elongated the fuselage to accommodate seven passengers or four stretchers. The follow-on UH-1C saw a still more powerful engine, a new rotor system to combat !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and a longer tail boom.

American soldiers leap into a landing zone from a UH-1 “Huey” during the Vietnam War. (San Diego Air and Space Museum)

The Huey entered service in 1959 with the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and the 57th Medical Detachment, but its adoption was originally intended only for evaluation of the new helicopter. However, the rapidly escalating conflict in Southeast Asia meant that the Huey was quickly pressed into combat service in Vietnam in 1962. In addition to its medevac and transport roles, the “utility” part of its designation showed as the Huey was quickly armed with guns and rockets to protect fleets of helicopters dropping troops into landing zones. By the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in 1965, the Huey had become the modern version of the cavalry horse, transporting soldiers into battle, extricating them when the battle had ended, and whisking away the casualties.

Though closely associated with the Army, the US Marine Corps and US Air Force also adopted the Huey, with each service using a model that was developed for their specific needs.The Huey continued to be upgraded throughout its production, and over 16,000 were built between 1956-1987, a number second only to the the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . With the introduction of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in 1979, the Army began phasing out the Huey, and it was retired from active service in 2005. The Marine Corps continues using a significantly advanced version of the Huey, known as the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

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(US Air Force)

October 21, 1947 – The first flight of the Northrop YB-49. In any fixed-wing aircraft, it is, obviously, the wings that generate the lift required to fly. The tail structure, or empennage, helps control the aircraft in flight, but the rest of the aircraft, particularly the fuselage, while necessary for crew and cargo, provide little to no lift, and instead impart !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and add extra weight. But what if you did away with the fuselage and empennage entirely, and create an aircraft that was just a wing? That was the question that !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! doggedly pursued throughout the 1930s and 1940s with his flying wing aircraft, and the story of the jet-powered YB-49 begins with the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , its piston-engined predecessor. And the story of both aircraft tells a frustrating tale of what might have been.

The propeller-powered YB-35. The problematic piston engines and props were removed and replaced with jet engines to create the YB-49. (US Air Force)

In April of 1941, the US Army Air Forces, fearing the fall of England and the loss of bases in Europe, identified a need for a bomber that could attack Nazi-occupied Europe from bases on the US mainland. So they requested a new bomber, one that could carry 10,000 pounds of bombs on a 10,000 mile round trip. When other manufacturers responded with large, traditional bombers, Northrop responded with their YB-35, a huge flying wing that was powered by four piston engines turning !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . But the piston engines proved to be the YB-35’s Achilles heel. The engines and the propellers had never been tested together, and problems with vibrations made the power plants unreliable. Jack Northrop considered them dangerous. Through a fiasco of competing interests, the Army, who supplied the engines, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the maker of the propellers, and Northrop could not agree on a resolution. So Jack Northrop himself grounded the YB-35 until a suitable powerplant could be found, or until the Army fixed the engines they had provided. But the Army now believed that the future of aviation lay with the jet engine, so they directed Northrop to replace the four propeller engines on the YB-35 with eight turbojet engines.

The YB-49 takes off on its maiden flight. (US Air Force)

The re-engined flying wing was now designated the YB-49. The eight !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! turbojet engines immediately gave the YB-49 better performance, allowing the bomber to soar to 40,000 feet and exceed 520 mph in test flights. The performance validated the flying characteristics of Northrop’s design, and indeed the flying wing concept, but the trade off for this performance was was a dramatic drop in the bomber’s range. The thirsty turbojets cut the YB-49's range in half, thereby eliminating it from consideration as a long range strategic bomber. Though the YB-49 lost out to the gargantuan !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , a bomber of traditional design that was likely more appealing to Army Air Forces brass, the Army ordered testing of the YB-49 to continue, and existing YB-35 airframes were slated for conversion to jet power. Ultimately, though, only three YB-49s were produced from converted YB-35s, and two YRB-49 reconnaissance models were built before the program was cancelled and all the aircraft were scrapped.

YB-35 bombers awaiting conversion to YB-49 jet bombers. With the cancellation of the program, all finished and unfinished aircraft were broken up, and not a single airframe was left, even for a museum. (US Air Force)

Northrop believed that the cancellation was entirely political, but there is no question that the YB-49 was over budget and behind schedule and, even though the Peacemaker was an essentially obsolete WWII design, it offered the Air Force a more comfortable option to the radical flying wing. The Air Force tried to make amends to Northrop by awarding the company a contract to build the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! interceptor, and Northrop eventually produced just over 1,000 copies, though it’s doubtful that Jack Northrop was mollified. Despite the cancellation of the YB-49, the flying wing concept did not die in vain. Northrop’s vision was eventually vindicated with the introduction of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! bomber in 1997, and Jack Northrop was allowed to see and hold a model of the Spirit a short time before his death when the project was still top secret. Northrop, unable to speak because of his illness, reportedly wrote on a sheet of paper, “Now I know why God has kept me alive all these years.” Jack Northrop died 10 months later.

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(US Air Force)

October 22, 1955 – The first flight of the Republic F-105 Thunderchief. As the nuclear bomb became the Air Force’s strategic and tactical weapon of choice in the 1950s, the doctrine of a fleet of high-flying strategic bombers carpeting a target with bombs was replaced by the concept of a small number of tactical bombers or fighter-bombers flying at very high speeds and very close to the ground to penetrate enemy airspace and deliver a single nuclear weapon. Maneuverability was sacrificed for high speed, low level handling, and long range. In response to this doctrinal shift, the design team at !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , led by !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , developed the F-105 Thunderchief, the first aircraft designed specifically for this nuclear penetration mission.

One of two YF-105A prototypes. The F-105B would receive updated air intakes and an area-rule fuselage. (US Air Force)

The F-105 began as a private venture by Republic to find a replacement for the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the ultimate development of the straight-winged !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The US Air Force was initially interested in the project and had planned to purchase 200 of the new tactical bomber, but the realities of the Korean War led the Air Force to cut the order to just 15 aircraft. Nevertheless, Republic continued the development of the F-105, and used lessons learned from Convair’s !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! program to redesign the fuselage of the Thunderchief to take advantage of the recently discovered !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! to reduce transonic drag. The F-105A, though underpowered like so many fighters of this era, still managed to break the sound barrier on its maiden flight. The redesigned F-105B, with an afterburning !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! axial-flow turbojet and modified with the Thunderchief’s characteristic forward-swept, variable-geometry air intakes, topped out at 1,420 mph, or Mach 2.15. Further development led to the F-105D, the definitive production variant and the one built in the largest numbers. The F-105D also included an all-weather attack capability provided by the AN/APN-131 navigational radar. And the Thunderchief was big. In fact, it was the largest single-seat, single-engine combat aircraft in history, weighing in at 50,000 lbs.

Led by an RB-66 Destroyer radar guide, Thunderchiefs bomb through the clouds over North Vietnam in 1966 (US Air Force)

The Thunderchief, or “Thud” as it was called by its pilots, entered service in 1958 as the tactical bomber it was designed to be but, in 1964, it was pressed into service in the Vietnam War as the Air Force’s primary ground attack aircraft, capable of carrying a greater bomb load than the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! or !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! from WWII. Despite its ground attack mission, Thud pilots still managed to claw 27.5 North Vietnamese aircraft out of the sky. But the F-105 was vulnerable to antiaircraft defenses and enemy fighters, and its combat losses were high. In December 1966 alone, 14 Thuds were lost to North Vietnamese fighters. As a result, the F-105 became the first US warplane to be withdrawn due to combat losses.

An F-105 is brought down by a Soviet-made S-75 Dvina surface-to-air missile over Vietnam ca. 1966 (Author unknown)

The F-105 was phased out in favor of newer aircraft, particularly the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , though the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! electronic warfare variant served until the end of the Vietnam War. The F-105B briefly served as the platform for the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! demonstration squadron, but after just six shows the team switched back to the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! after a fatal crash caused by an overstressed airframe. Ultimately, 833 Thunderchiefs were produced, and the type was fully retired by 1984.

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October 23-26, 1944 – The Battle of Leyte Gulf takes place, the largest naval battle in history and the first successful organized kamikaze attack. By October of 1944, the Allies had regained considerable territory from the Japanese, and were drawing closer to the recapture of the Philippines and a possible invasion of the Japanese homeland. Japan could not match the industrial might of the US, and the numbers of Japanese ships, aircraft, and trained pilots dwindled rapidly while those of the US and her allies continued to increase. The Japanese faced a critical shortage of experienced combat pilots, while the Allies seemingly had an endless supply. The Pacific battlefield was becoming more and more tilted in favor of the Allies.

The !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! arose from the planned operation to invade and retake the Philippine islands of Leyte, Luzon and Samar. The result was the largest naval battle of the entire war and possibly the greatest naval battle in history. By October 1944, the Japanese fleet was numerically inferior to the American fleet, and the loss proved to be a devastating blow for the Japanese. The battle opened when the American submarines !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (SS-227) and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (SS-247) attacked the Japanese fleet in the Palawan Passage, sinking the heavy cruisers !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and the overall battle of Leyte Gulf eventually encompassed four smaller engagements: the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . By the time the action came to a close on October 26, the Japanese had suffered approximately 12,500 casualties, lost one fleet and three light carriers, 10 cruisers, 11 destroyers, and more than roughly 300 aircraft, losses that spelled the end of the Japanese Navy as an effective fighting force. But out the desperation in which the Japanese found themselves, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! was born.

The word kamikaze is usually translated as divine wind in reference to typhoons in the years 1274 and 1281 that helped the Japanese repel Mongol invasions and, though most commonly associated with suicide air attacks, the term is not limited to aircraft. The flying units that carried out the missions were called tokubetsu kgeki tai ( special attack unit ) . Pilots of both sides had deliberately crashed their aircraft into ships before, but the kamikaze attacks during the Battle of Leyte Gulf were the first organized missions of the tokubetsu kgeki tai under the direction of 1st Air Fleet commandant Vice Admiral !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Speaking to officers in Manila just days before the battle, nishi said, “I don’t think there would be any other certain way to carry out the operation [to hold the Philippines] than to put a 250 kg bomb on a Zero and let it crash into a US carrier in order to disable her for a week.”

On October 25, five !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! fighters, each armed with a single bomb, attacked escort carriers of the US fleet off the Philippine coast. Four of the kamikaze aircraft were unsuccessful, but the fifth hit the escort carrier !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (CVE-63), igniting fires which detonated the ship’s magazine. The carrier eventually sank, killing 143 members of her 889 man crew. Based on this initial success, the kamikaze program was expanded and, by war’s end, the Japanese had undertaken over 4,000 attacks, including missions to ram bombers attacking Japan. Ultimately, though, all the tokubetsu kgeki tai achieved was the loss of irreplaceable pilots and aircraft. Only 14% of the kamikaze attackers got through, and only 8.5% of the ships that were hit were sunk. Those that weren’t sunk were quickly repaired. Ultimately, the damage inflicted by was no greater than that achieved in 1942 by traditional tactics. The Imperial Japanese Navy, short of fuel, ceased to be an effective fighting force in the Pacific, and Allied victory over Japan was inevitable.

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(Author unknown)

October 23, 1939 – The first flight of the Mitsubishi G4M. When the Japanese laid their plans for the conquest of the western Pacific, which they grandiosely called the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , they knew that they would have vast stretches of ocean or large swaths of Southeast Asian jungle to cross. Aircraft carriers, basically mobile airfields, would cover the Pacific, but land-based aircraft would have to have exceptional range in order to be effective.

Mitsubishi G4M bomber, known to the Allies as the “Betty” (Author unknown)

Work on the G4M began in 1937 as the Japanese Navy sought a replacement for the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , which first flew in 1935, with particular attention paid to increasing both range and speed over the earlier bomber. The G4M prototype was completed in 1939 and the bomber, Allied reporting name “Betty,” entered service in June 1941, six months prior to the Japanese !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! on Pearl Harbor that dragged the United States into World War II. The Betty could fly a little more than 100 miles farther than the Nell, and had a greater maximum takeoff weight, but the increases in range and payload over the Nell were bought at a dear price to its pilots. Mitsubishi had wanted to build a four engine bomber, but they reduced it to two engines under pressure from the Japanese Navy. To save more weight, Mitsubishi chose not to fit the new medium bomber with protective armor plating for the crew, or self-sealing fuel tanks. So while the Betty had excellent range, it was extremely susceptible to gunfire from heavily armed Allied fighters, and often burst into flames with the slightest hit. Allied pilots took to calling the Betty the “one shot lighter,” while the Japanese pilots referred to it as hamaki, which means cigar , a reference to its overall shape but perhaps also an allusion to how readily it burned.

The G4M formed the backbone of the Japanese bomber force and served throughout the Pacific theater. In the early years of the war, the Betty fought very effectively when it had sufficient fighter cover, but losses began to mount as the Allies gradually gained air supremacy. Final variants of the Betty did add armor protection and rudimentary sealing for the fuel tanks, but these upgrades came too late for the Betty to have a significant impact on the outcome of the war. By the final stages of WWII, with dwindling numbers of Japanese fighters to protect them, Bettys were mauled by US Navy and US Army Air Corps fighters and many of the bombers were shot down before they could launch their attacks.

In addition to its land bombing duties, the Betty was used to bomb shipping and as a torpedo bomber. Late in the war, it served as the mother ship for the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , a rocket-powered, piloted bomb with 2,646 pounds of explosives in the nose used for !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! attacks. The Betty also took center stage in a pivotal event in the Pacific War, when Japanese General !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the architect of the Pearl Harbor attack and commander in chief of the Japanese combined fleet, was !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and killed in 1943 while flying as a passenger in a G4M during an inspection tour of Japanese bases. More than 2,400 G4Ms were produced, but no flyable examples remain today, and only one complete aircraft remains.

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Short Takeoff

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(NASA)

October 20, 1988 – The death of Sheila Scott. Born in England in 1922, Scott (née Hopkins) learned to fly in 1958 and went on to set over 100 flight records, specifically making a name for herself with long distance flights. She first flew around the world in 1966, and repeated the flight in the same aircraft in 1969-70. Her greatest feat of distance flying was a 34,000-mile flight in 1971 nicknamed “world and a half” in which she became the first person to fly over the North Pole in a single-engine aircraft. Scott was named an Officer of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (OBE) in 1968.

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(Author unknown)

October 20, 1977 – Members of the band Lynyrd Skynyrd are among those killed in a plane crash. While flying to Louisiana after a performance in South Carolina, the band’s !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (N55VM) ran out of fuel and crashed near Gillsburg, Mississippi, killing band members !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick, pilot Walter McCreary, and co-pilot William Gray. Other musicians, tour manager Ron Eckerman, and members of the road crew suffered serious injuries. The !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! into the crash determined that the fuel exhaustion was caused by the flight crew’s failure to monitor the aircraft’s fuel levels, exacerbated by a malfunctioning engine that burned more fuel than expected.

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(US Air Force)

October 20, 1948 – The first flight of the McDonnell XF-88 Voodoo, a fighter designed as long-range escort for US Air Force bombers and envisioned as an aircraft that could carry out a similar role to that performed by the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! during WWII. Initially underpowered, afterburning engines were added to increase the aircraft’s speed, but by that time the long range escort concept had been abandoned in favor of high speed interceptors. Though the XF-88 never entered production, it served as the basis for the supersonic !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! which first flew in 1954.

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October 21, 1966 – The first flight of the Yakovlev Yak-40, the world’s first commuter trijet and one specifically designed to operate from poorly equipped airports with short or unimproved runways. The Yak-40 was developed to take over shorter routes from obsolete piston-powered airliners and could carry up to 32 passengers with a range of just over 1,000 miles. Over 1,000 were produced from 1967-1981, and they provided local service throughout Russia and served over 30 international customers. The Yak-4o remains in service today.

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October 21, 1961 – The first flight of the Breguet Atlantique , a turboprop-powered, long-range maritime patrol aircraft that was designed to perform reconnaissance and anti-submarine warfare (ASW) missions and developed to replace the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! then in service with NATO forces. Aircraft were delivered in two batches, with 87 Atlantique   1 aircraft built from 1965 to 1968. The Atlantique 2 was produced from 1972 to 1974 with more powerful engines, updated avionics, and the ability to fire the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! anti-shipping missile. A total of 115 of both variants were produced.

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October 21, 1950 – The first flight of the Martin 4-0-4. The !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! made its first serious foray into the civilian airliner business when it developed the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! to compete with the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Production of the unpressurized was stopped due to structural faults, so, rather than fixing the 2-0-2, Martin developed it into the pressurized 4-0-4. Martin also stretched the fuselage to accommodate up to 40 passengers. The 4-0-4 entered service with Eastern Air Lines and TWA in 1951, as well as the US Coast Guard who operated two as executive aircraft designated the RM-1. Those aircraft later served the US Navy as the VC-3A. Though superseded by newer turboprop airliners, the 4-0-4 continued to serve smaller regional airlines and charters into the 1980s. A total of 103 were produced from 1951-1953.

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(US Navy; US Army)

October 21, 1942 – A B-17 transporting American WWI ace Eddie Rickenbacker ditches in the Pacific Ocean. The public explanation for Rickenbacker’s trip was an inspection tour of American bases in the Pacific Theater, but the true nature of the former WWI ace’s mission was to deliver personally a message of rebuke to General !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! from President !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! for negative comments the general had made about the Roosevelt administration. The !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! departed Hawaii, but then strayed hundreds of miles off course and was forced to ditch in the Pacific Ocean far from normal travel routes. Rickenbacker and the crew drifted in life rafts for 24 days before a US Navy !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! crew finally spotted and rescued the seven survivors. After his recovery, Rickenbacker completed his mission to deliver the letter to MacArthur.

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October 23, 2003 – The Concorde makes its final passenger flight. Air France had made its final passenger flights on May 30, 2003, and British Airways finally ended Concorde service with a flight from from John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York to London’s Heathrow Airport, while two other Concordes made round trips over the Bay of Biscay and to Edinburgh, Scotland. All three aircraft then circled London before landing. The flights closed the book on the Concorde, the world’s first operational supersonic passenger airliner after entering service with British Airways in 1976. Following a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in 2000, Concorde flights were suspended for a year, but, after returning to service in 2001, the Concorde remained unprofitable and BA and Air France suspended operations.

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October 23, 1967 – The first flight of the Canadair CL-215, also known as the Scooper, the first in a series of amphibious firefighting aircraft developed by !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and later !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Powered by two !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! radial engines, the CL-215 can scoop 1,440 US gallons of water in 12 seconds from lakes or rivers and drop it over wildfires. Special design considerations such as its high, straight wing allow for operations at low speeds or in the gusty conditions often found over forest fires. A total of 125 were produced, and the CL-215 was subsequently developed into the CL-215T and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! which are powered by two turboprop engines.

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(US Government)

October 23, 1952 – The first flight of the Hughes XH-17, a super heavy lift helicopter and the first project developed by the helicopter division of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Built from parts scavenged from several different aircraft, the XH-17 was capable of lifting over 10,000 pounds with a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! of 43,500 pounds. The XH-17 was powered by two turbojet engines that ducted bleed air through the hollow rotor blades to tip-mounted jets, and still holds the record for the world’s largest rotor system. Only one was built before the program was cancelled and the aircraft scrapped.

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(US Air Force)

October 23, 1951 – The last daylight bombing mission of the Boeing B-29 Superfortress. By the end of WWII, the development of large four-engine bombers reached its zenith with the B-29, but its advanced design saw the Superfortress serve into the Korean War. At first, B-29s flew daylight bombing missions as they had in WWII. But the arrival of jet fighters made the slower bombers vulnerable to being shot down. The final daylight mission was an attack on an airfield in North Korea, but three of the 10 bombers were shot down, four were forced to make emergency landings in South Korea, and three were badly damaged but still able to return to Okinawa. The B-29s were switched to nighttime bombing missions before being withdrawn in 1953.

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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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RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > ttyymmnn 10/23/2018 at 12:51

1

The funny thing is, there are still some tipjet helicopters flying today, but mostly experimental classed ultralights.

ttyymmnn > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 10/23/2018 at 12:56

1

Interesting. I didn’t know that. I remember reading about the Little Henry when I was a kid. I had a book about military aircraft that was written for kids, and used really cool illustrations instead of pictures. It also talked about the Ryan XV-5 . I wish I still had that book. But that was 40 years ago.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > ttyymmnn 10/23/2018 at 13:01

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If I recall correctly , plans are fairly readily available, and most of the tipjet designs out there use propane. With just about anything, you can reckon on “it it’s small and no greater than ‘50s tech, there are plans out there”.

user314 > ttyymmnn 10/23/2018 at 13:02

0

That’s a cool shot of the Zuih (“Auspicious Phoenix”); I don’t think I’ve seen that particular style of camo before. It’s an interesting idea, though I don’t think it quite worked...

The B-49 may not have ever fired a shot in anger in real life, but one did drop an A-Bomb on the Martian invaders in the ‘53 War of the Worlds film, for all the good it did.

InFierority Complex > ttyymmnn 10/23/2018 at 13:10

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Fiat Aviazione’s first (and only?) helicopter was also a tip jet system. Not the prettiest thing, it looks like it was made from Erector set pieces.

ttyymmnn > user314 10/23/2018 at 13:30

2

I knew that Independence Day was nothing more than a remake of WotW, but I didn’t remember the parallel between that scene and the nuking of Houston with the observers in an APC . And that guy who got blown off the top of the comms truck—dafuq was he doing up there in the first place? My ass would have been in the tunnel.  I’ve read the original WotW a couple of times, and seeing this clip makes me want to read it again. It is a fantastic book, and gave us Thunder Child , the most badass name for a ship ever.

ttyymmnn > InFierority Complex 10/23/2018 at 13:31

1

I had forgotten about that! Looks like a ski lift car with a prop on the top. Nice GR1 poking its nose in from the side.

user314 > ttyymmnn 10/23/2018 at 13:51

1

I love the reading of that part in Jeff Wayne’s musical....

The steamer began to move slowly away but on the landward horizon appeared the silhouette of a fighting machine. Another came, and another, striding over hills and trees, plunging far out to sea and blocking the exit of the steamer. Between them lay the silent, grey Ironclad “Thunder Child”. Slowly it moved towards shore; then, with a deafening roar and whoosh of spray, it swung about and drove at full speed towards the waiting Martians...

 Come on Thunderchild! 

The name showed up as an Easter Egg in ST: First Contact too:

InFierority Complex > ttyymmnn 10/23/2018 at 19:39

1

Sorry, I just keep coming back to the photo of the pilots. Who knew a picture of a bunch of smiling kids and a puppy could be so completely haunting. 

ttyymmnn > InFierority Complex 10/23/2018 at 19:46

0

That’s why I included it. That kid was only 17. My son just turned 16.