Aviation History March 2021

odyssey of the airship norge: first to the north pole?

Topgun’s Big Cat why the f-14 tomcat never lived up to its hollywood image battlefield angels: special forces pioneer aerial evacuation in WWII leave no man behind: search and rescue MARCH 2021 EARLY in THE VIETNAM WAR

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march 2021

DEPARTMENTS

5 MAILBAG 6 BRIEFING 10 AVIATORS

Daredevil “birdman” Bud Mars thrilled crowds at U.S. airshows and performed flight demonstrations on a historic 1911 tour of Hawaii and Asia.

By Daniel J. Demers

14 RESTORED

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A Kaman UH-2A Seasprite hovers above USS Coral Sea’s flight deck.

More than two decades of restoration work has saved the one-of-a-kind Bell X-14 and made it a prized museum piece.

By Douglas G. Adler

features 26 Tomcatting

Thanks to the film Top Gun, Grumman’s F-14 Tomcat was a U.S. Navy recruiter’s dream, but its mismatched original engine diminished the airplane’s performance legacy.

By Stephan Wilkinson

36 Angels From Above

16 EXTREMES

44 Leave No Man Behind

60 The control car and engine pods of the airship Norge.

Determined American aircrews battled daunting terrain and an ever-present enemy to expand and improve search-andrescue techniques during the Vietnam War.

By Eileen A. Bjorkman

52 The Greatest Flight

In 1927 two Midwesterners set out to join the pantheon of aviation’s golden age by attempting to fly around the world in a single-engine Stinson monoplane.

By Barry Levine

60 Into Cold Air

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The birth of special forces in World War II kick-started another important military innovation—the air evacuation of wounded soldiers from distant battlefields.

By Gavin Mortimer

Famed Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen and the crew of the airship Norge crossed the North Pole in 1926—the first men confirmed to reach the top of the world.

By Michael Engelhard

Pioneering designer Ivan Makhonin’s telescoping wings represented a novel approach in the development of airplanes with variable-geometry wingspans.

By Robert Guttman

18 STYLE

Showcasing products of interest to aviation enthusiasts and pilots.

24 LETTER FROM AVIATION HISTORY 66 REVIEWS 70 FLIGHT TEST 72 AERO ARTIFACT

ON THE COVER: A U.S. Navy Grumman F-14A Tomcat from the VF-84 “Jolly Rogers” fires an AIM-54 Phoenix missile.

The Tomcat was the only aircraft to use the Phoenix operationally, with mixed results. Cover illustration: Adam Tooby.

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CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: SAN DIEGO AIR AND SPACE MUSEUM; NASA; NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE U.S. AIR FORCE/KEN LAROCK; NATIONAL LIBRARY OF NORWAY

1/14/21 5:18 PM

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Aviation History

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FORMS MUST BE RECEIVED ON OR BEFORE 05/25/20. FAX ORDERS TO 504-527-6088 OR MAIL TO: THE NATIONAL WWII MUSEUM, ROAD TO VICTORY BRICK PROGRAM, 945 MAGAZINE STREET, NEW ORLEANS, LA 70130. The National WWII Museum’s Road to Victory brick program honors the WWII generation, the American heroes who served during the war, and their families. The goal of our program is to celebrate the American spirit while forging a link between the present generation and the generation who fought to secure our nation’s freedom during World War II. Therefore, the Museum reserves the right to deny requests for inscriptions that might be considered offensive or inappropriate to those who sacrificed during the WWII era, or messages that do not align with the Museum’s mission, which is to tell the story of the American experience in the war that changed the world—why it was fought, how it was won, and what it means today—so that all generations will understand the price of freedom and be inspired by what they learn.

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MICHAEL A. REINSTEIN CHAIRMAN & PUBLISHER DAVID STEINHAFEL PUBLISHER ALEX NEILL EDITOR IN CHIEF

Aviation History

Online

You’ll find much more from Aviation History on the web’s leading history resource: historynet.com

10 Incredible Aerial Rescues

Aircraft quickly developed into weapons of war, but less expected was their role as rescuers.

Today it seems natural that aircraft—particularly helicopters—should be used as angels of mercy to pluck the endangered from peril. Landplanes, seaplanes, STOL-craft and sophisticated flingwings have extended air rescue operations to distances, altitudes and environmental conditions that were once unimaginable. These 10 great aerial rescues show that aircraft have revolutionized life­ saving efforts.

Around-the-World Flight “Foredoomed to Failure”

In August 1922 the crew of a steam launch in the Bay of Bengal rescued two exhausted and halfstarved airmen who had endured two interminable days desperately clinging to the upturned floats of their capsized seaplane. This minor epic of survival marked the ignominious end of a casually optimistic but ill-prepared British attempt to become the first to fly around the world.

The 1925 MacMillan Arctic Expedition

In 1925 an unusual international rivalry played out as Norway and the United States attempted to become the first to fly over the North Pole. While neither country succeeded that year, the U.S. attempt, known as the MacMillan Arctic Expedition, marked the first productive use of aircraft in Arctic exploration by Americans and introduced the public to the man who would go on to become perhaps the most famous aviator-explorer of his era: U.S. Navy Lt. Cmdr. Richard E. Byrd.

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MARCH 2021 / VOL. 31, NO. 4

CARL VON WODTKE EDITOR LARRY PORGES SENIOR EDITOR JON GUTTMAN RESEARCH DIRECTOR STEPHAN WILKINSON CONTRIBUTING EDITOR ARTHUR H. SANFELICI EDITOR EMERITUS STEPHEN KAMIFUJI CREATIVE DIRECTOR BRIAN WALKER GROUP ART DIRECTOR PAUL FISHER ART DIRECTOR MELISSA A. WINN DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY GUY ACETO PHOTO EDITOR

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PROUDLY MADE IN THE USA KEITH FERRIS

A C-123 comes to the rescue, in The Miracle at Kham Duc.

March 2021

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Mailbag

TRI-MOTOR RIDE

ABOVE LEFT: COURTESY OF DAVID PEARCY; TOP & BOTTOM RIGHT: U.S. AIR FORCE

Thanks so much for the story on the development and history of the Ford Tri-Motor [“Tale of the Tin Goose,” November 2020]. I have always been fascinated by that aircraft. Back in the mid-2000s I bought as a Father’s Day gift a flight for my Dad and me on the very plane featured in your article when it appeared in Smyrna, Tenn., at the site of the former Sewart Air Force Base (near Nashville). > > Dad was a 20-year Air Force and Korean War veteran and retired at Sewart in 1968. I remember the waiver we signed before the flight that among other things outlined how to exit the aircraft if it caught fire! We sat right behind the pilot, who sat a level higher than we did but with no cockpit separation between him and the passengers. He had a steering wheel that operated the flight control cables via pulleys, and the cables went right past our window on the outside of the fuselage. I commented to the pilot that I had once seen a video of a Ford Tri-Motor doing a loop.

He turned to me and said, “I’ve seen that film…but we won’t be doing one of those today.” This particular aircraft was made the year my Dad was born (1929). I lost Dad back in 2016, but the flight in the Tri-Motor with him is one of my most cherished memories. I have included a photo of us after the flight [above].

David Pearcy Smyrna, Tenn.

LAKER AIRLINES’ untimely DEMISE

Freddie Laker was a great man, and he was certainly up against serious and determined competition.

However, your article [“Free-

wheeling Freddie,” November] neglected a most significant factor in the demise of Laker Airlines. It financed its airplanes in dollars but the majority of its revenues were in pounds. When the pound dropped against the dollar it became the victim of a squeeze known technically as disintermediation—the unkindest dis of them all.

Laker’s planes flew full to their last day of operation, but the mix of currencies in his operating structure was too great an obstacle for the carrier to overcome.

I remember stopping by Laker’s office near LAX the day it ceased operations to offer my condolences. I so admired what he’d done.

Dan Goldzband San Diego, Calif.

V-J DAY COMMEMORATION

It was good to see the piece on USS Essex moving airplanes to Oahu for the V-J Day anniversary [“Briefing,” November]. What is not shown in your photos is the U.S. Army Beechcraft C-12 that after some coordination got to hitch a ride to Hawaii along with its more famous twin-engine ancestors.

I can tell you that some mental math was shared by a group of Army aviators about the feasibility of hon-

oring Jimmy Doolittle’s 1942 adventure off USS Hornet.

Launching 50 nautical miles off Oahu, the C-12 with two crew and 1.5 hours of fuel would have easily made the takeoff from Essex with just a bit of upwind steam.

Hornet was actually shorter than the current Essex.

Sadly the days we live in don’t promote such efforts, even in honor of history.

But it would have been fun to watch.

Todd Fredricks Amesville, Ohio

SURVIVING CAPRONI bomber

I read with interest the recent article by Howard Muson, “The Little Flower Goes to War” [September].

I am an aviation historian and Italophile, so the article reminded me of the Caproni bomber in the collection of the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force in Dayton, Ohio. I visited there in 2014 and was impressed by the restored Caproni Ca.36 and the accompanying displays relating the service of American airmen with the Italians in late World War I. The restored Caproni, with the Italian colors on its tail, is huge for its time. It appears to be both an impressive yet very fragile aircraft. That Caproni bomber, on loan from the Caproni Museum in Italy, is one of only two veterans remaining.

Commander John Ball U.S. Navy (ret.)

WRONG ACE

Excellent article, “The Expen­­dables,” by John Lowery in the January 2021 Aviation

History. However, the photo on page 40 identified as Korean War ace Frederick “Boots” Blesse is actually Korean War ace Iven Kincheloe, who flew F-86s with both the 4th and 51st Fighter Interceptor wings in Korea. He later won the Mackay Trophy flying the Bell X-2 as a test pilot and was killed in an F-104 takeoff accident in 1958.

Truett Guthrie Hobart, Okla.

Thanks to you and several other readers who wrote to point out that error. The mistake was not Lowery’s, who notes that Kincheloe actually checked him out in the F-86 in Korea. The misidentified photo in question of Kincheloe is reprinted at top, along with a genuine photo of Blesse, above.

SEND LETTERS TO:

Aviation History Editor, HISTORYNET 901 North Glebe Road, 5th Floor, Arlington, VA 22203 OR EMAIL TO aviationhistory@historynet.com (Letters may be edited)

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briefing

Burnelli’s Dead End

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uplifting restoration Connecticut’s New England Air Museum has restored Vincent Burnelli’s formerly neglected 1947 CBY-3 Loadmaster (inset) to its original appearance (above).

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he New England Air Museum has restored an airplane that represents a fascinating but pointless path in American aviation history. The one-of-a-kind 1947 CBY-3 Loadmaster was Vincent Burnelli’s final attempt to prove that making an airplane’s fuselage an airfoil would revolutionize aircraft design.

That makes sense intuitively, but it’s a flawed aerodynamic concept. If you turn

a nicely streamlined tubular fuselage into a big, fat airfoil, you’re adding lift but at the cost of substantial drag. Highaspect-ratio wings like those of a modern airliner produce all the lift that’s needed for cruise. An airfoil-shaped fuselage with stubby, lowaspect-ratio wings shoves its bluff way through the air while leaving behind induced, profile and form drag, thanks to its flat-plate and wetted surface area.

The Loadmaster flew in South America as an airliner and cargo carrier (its quasi–U.S. Air Corps paint scheme is actually its former airline livery) before being sent back to the United States for refitting with Wright R-2600 engines to replace the original R-1830s.

The airplane languished in the weeds at Baltimore’s

March 2021

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OPPOSITE PHOTOS: NEW ENGLAND AIR MUSEUM; TOP & INSET: COURTESY OF THE FAGEN FIGHTERS WWII MUSEUM; BOTTOM: SIKORSKY, A LOCKHEED MARTIN COMPANY

Friendship International Airport, stripped of parts and vandalized before being donated to the New England Air Museum in Windsor Locks, Conn., in 1972. The museum parked it outside for 40 years, where it further corroded until restoration began in 2012.

The job took eight years and more than 50,000 volunteer hours, with most of the 40-odd workers retirees from the numerous aerospace industries in the Hartford area—Pratt & Whitney, Hamilton Standard, Sikor­ sky and others. One major problem the restorers found was that an unlogged hard landing late in the airplane’s career had pushed the tailwheel up with enough force to pretzel much of the bulkhead and structure to which it was attached.

The Loadmaster has gone on static display at the museum, near Bradley International Airport. Not surprisingly, its restorers remain fans of Burnelli’s work. “The viability of the concept has been proven, if you look at the lifting fuselages of the F-14, F-15, the space shuttle,” says restoration crew chief Harry Newman, “and people are now touting lifting-body aircraft as the airplane of the future.”

Such lift, however, is what engineers call Newtonian lift, not the classic Bernoulli lift employed by the aptly named Burnelli. It is produced by the equal and opposite reaction to the impact of the airstream on the bottom of a fuselage—the hand-out-thecar-window effect—not by pressure differential.

Stephan Wilkinson

Cat out of HEll Restored by the Fagen Fighters WWII Museum, a Grumman F6F-5 Hellcat (above and inset) returned to the air on January 3.

“THE HELICOPTER’S ROLE IN SAVING LIVES REPRESENTS ONE OF THE MOST GLORIOUS PAGES IN THE HISTORY OF HUMAN FLIGHT.” –IGOR SIKORSKY

Death n’ Destruction Reigns Again

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agen Fighters WWII Museum started 2021 on a high note when a Grumman F6F-5 Hellcat joined its roster of restored warbirds in Granite Falls, Minn., after 2½ years of work by Steve Hinton Jr. of Fighter Rebuilders in Chino, Calif. On January 3 Hinton took the big carrier fighter up for its first post-restoration flight.

Accepted by the U.S. Navy on March 2, 1945, F6F-5 Bu.No. 78645 flew its first two tours with fighter squadron VF-14 and then served in a variety of units and markings, the last as a pilotless drone at Naval Air Station Squantum in Quincy, Mass. Owner Evan Fagen selected the new livery and chose the markings of F6F-5 No. 115 (Bu.No. 72534), which served with VF-83 on the aircraft carrier Essex during the Battle of Okinawa. Its pilots included a friend of Fagen’s, Don McPherson, who at age 97 had his own memories of the fighter dubbed Death n’ Destruction: “The plane had served in a land-based unit before it was transferred to us and they kept the personal marking after they repainted it in VF-83’s diamond markings. But that was an exceptional case, and it didn’t belong to any one pilot when it served aboard Essex.”

Ensign McPherson was flying two other Hellcats when he shot down five kamikazes during the Okinawa campaign, but he also flew Death n’ Destruction. He has a scale model of it and Fagen can hardly wait to introduce him to a full-scale rendition of the real thing.

Jon Guttman

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BRIEFING

Hagerstown Aviation Museum’s New Home

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aryland’s Hagerstown Aviation Museum is in the process of mov­ ing the aircraft it has acquired over the past 25 years from its current location northeast of Hagerstown Regional Airport to New Heights Industrial Park along Showalter Road, southwest of the airport. The dome hangar in which the smaller airplanes will be kept is a restored relic in its own right, having served as Fairchild Aircraft’s flight test hangar since 1943. Museum president John Seburn is confident that, within the parameters neces­ sitated by the pandemic, the newly refur­ bished hangar will reopen for visitors early this summer.

Situated between the National Air and Space Museum in the Washington, D.C./Chantilly, Va., area and the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force in Dayton, Ohio, the Hagerstown Aviation Museum serves as a reminder of a time when the city was a major aircraft manufacturer with 10,000 workers. Of the 23 historic aircraft on display, 16 were built in Hagerstown. These include a 1928 Kreider Reisner KR-31 biplane, three 1943 Fairchild PT-19 trainers, a 1953 Fairchild C-119G Flying Boxcar and the museum’s newest restoration, a 1956 Fairchild C-123K Provider.

“I consider it an honor to fly what we call the cradle of avia­ tion,” Larry Pederson, a U.S. Army pilot in Vietnam who is

MILESTONES

Last Down for a Legend

now a volunteer pilot at the historic dome hangar An artist’s rendering depicts museum, told WDVM News. the Hagerstown Aviation “A lot of the pilots during Museum’s new location in a World War II trained in these restored hangar previously airplanes and I just consider used by Fairchild Aircraft. it an honor to work on them and to be able to fly them.”

As circumstances permit, the museum will continue to host such special events as Open Airplane Afternoons, Experimental Aircraft Association fly-ins and Young Eagle Flights. Visit hagerstownaviationmuseum.org for more information.

Fatal flight Knute Rockne was among eight killed in a 1931 Fokker F-10 crash in Kansas.

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to the wing spar and contributed to the accident.

Rockne’s success had made him one of the country’s most recognized names, and his death at age 43 struck a nerve with the public. President Herbert Hoover sent a condolence tele­ gram to Rockne’s wife declaring, “Every American grieves with you.” The accident shook the public’s confidence in the embryonic air industry, in particular wooden airplanes. One immediate outcome of the crash was the quick adoption of all-metal aircraft, which were more expensive but perceived as safer. Additionally, the outcry over Rockne’s death forced investigators to go public with their findings, reversing the Department of Commerce’s established practice of keeping the results of accident investigations secret. That new transpar­ ency, along with added regulations for airplane manufacturers and airlines, eventually resulted in a safer aviation industry.

TOP: COURTESY OF THE HAGERSTOWN AVIATION MUSEUM/NICK ROTONDO; BOTTOM: BETTMANN/GETTY IMAGES; OPPOSITE TOP: U.S. NAVY; RIGHT: MIKE SIMONS/TULSA WORLD VIA AP

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t 9:15 a.m. on March 31, 1931, Trans­ continental and Western Air Flight 599 took off from Kansas City, Mo., bound for Wichita, Kan. About 75 minutes into the flight, the Fokker F-10 trimotor’s right wing detached, causing the airplane to crash in a field near the small Kansas town of Bazaar. All eight people on board were killed. Among them was one of America’s biggest celebrities of the day, Notre Dame football coach Knute Rockne.

Born in Norway, Rockne became Notre Dame’s coach in 1918. Over the next 13 seasons he led the “Fighting Irish” to a stellar 105-12-5 record and three national championships.

Names forever associated with Notre Dame teams of the era include Rockne, George Gipp (of “win one for the Gipper” fame) and the undefeated 1924 team’s backfield, dubbed the Four Horsemen.

The search for the accident’s cause was hamstrung by the fact that by the time investigators arrived at the scene, souvenir hunters had stripped the wrecked Fokker clean, leaving only the wings, propellers and engines. While a definitive explana­ tion for the crash has never been established, it soon became clear that seeping moisture had compromised the F-10’s wooden frame, causing the glue that fixed the wing to the fuse­ lage to fail. Ice and turbulence may well have added fatal stress

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Super Blues

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t Naval Air Station Pensacola, Fla., on November 16, 2020, the U.S. Navy Flight Demonstration Squadron, better known as the Blue Angels, performed its final flight in the legacy F/A-18 Hornet, which has been the team’s airplane of choice for 34 years, ever since it replaced the Douglas A-4F Skyhawk II in 1986. Taking to the sky in 2021 will be the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet.

Since the decision was made in 2018, Boeing has been engaged in converting combat-capable F/A-18E/Fs into “slow ponies” for their aerobatic role. The first of 18 F/A-18Es touched down at Pensacola on July 27, 2020.

The Super Hornets’ debut will coincide with the 75th anniversary of the Blue Angels, a span during which it has entertained and inspired more than half a billion spectators.

The Blues’ 2021 schedule includes performances at 30

Reporting for duty The first Blue Angels F/A-18E Super Hornet departs Boeing Cecil Field on July 27, 2020.

locations, starting with NAS Jacksonville, Fla., on April 10-11; Lakeland, Fla., on April 17-18; and Beaufort, S.C., on April 24-25. Another 34 shows are tentatively scheduled for 2022.

More info at blueangels.navy.mil.

Return of the Boeing 737 Max

TOP: COURTESY OF THE HAGERSTOWN AVIATION MUSEUM/NICK ROTONDO; BOTTOM: BETTMANN/GETTY IMAGES; OPPOSITE TOP: U.S. NAVY; RIGHT: MIKE SIMONS/TULSA WORLD VIA AP

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rom the time it entered service in February 1968, the Boeing 737 narrow-body short-range airliner established a sterling record for reliability and efficiency that only improved in the course of three upgrades, culminating in the 2016 debut of the fourth-generation 737 Max. The airliner designer’s dream abruptly became a nightmare, however, when a 737 Max 8, Lion Air Flight 610, crashed in Indonesia in October 2018, killing all 189 crew and passengers, followed in March 2019 by the crash of another 737 Max, Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302, killing all 157 aboard. All 737 Max aircraft were subsequently grounded and the cause of the crashes was traced to problems with the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), an automated flight-control system gone wrong.

An investigation by the House of Representatives blamed negligence on the part of both Boeing and the Federal Avia­ tion Administration, leading in early January of this year to Boeing agreeing to pay a settlement of more than $2.5 billion, $1.7 billion of which goes to the various user airlines and $500 million to the families of the dead passengers. Following the Max’s grounding, a chastened Boeing spent 18 months and hundreds of thousands of hours testing and improving the flight-control system, including software updates and changes to how the MCAS handles sensor input. It also trained 1,400

pilots to fly the revised aircraft.

In September 2020 FAA administrator Steve Dickson flew in a 737 Max and said he was “100 percent confident” that it was ready for recertification. In early December Brazil’s Gol airlines became the first national carrier to return it to service and on December 29 an American Airlines 737 Max took passengers from Miami International Airport to New York’s LaGuardia Airport. United Airlines announced that it would resume flying the 737 Max on February 11, 2021, and Southwest said it would do so “no sooner than the second quarter of 2021.”

With its return to service the Boeing 737 Max has won a second chance to earn the confidence of its patrons, although in a recent poll 57 percent of passengers asked said they were “not likely” to fly in the plane, as opposed to 37 percent saying they would be “likely” to. Only time—and a flawless record here­ after—will tell in Boeing’s quest to restore the 737 Max’s credibility and its century-old reputation for aerospace innovation.

As we approached press time, however, on January 10 Boeing faced another disaster when a 737-500 of Sriwijaya Air that has just left Jakarta crashed in the Kepulauan Seribu Islands, killing its 12 crew and 50 passengers. An investigation was underway to determine the cause of the 26-year-old air­ liner’s crash.

BAck in the saddle Boeing’s revamped 737 Max returned to service in December 2020.

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AvIATORS

An Early Birdman

PIONEER AVIATOR BUD MARS THRILLED AIRSHOW CROWDS, NARROWLY ESCAPING DEATH ON SEVERAL OCCASIONS, AND WAS AMONG THE FIRST TO FLY AIRPLANES IN THE FAR EAST

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n September 1910, prior to a San Francisco air meet, the American News Service touted James Cairn Mars of Muskegon, Mich., as “the most daring of American aviators.” Mars, better known as “Bud,” had gained a reputation for death-defying flights in early airplanes, but unlike some of his contemporaries he managed to live to old age.

Mars began his career at 16 as a featured “carny” high-diver and over the next decade morphed into a balloonist and an innovative parachutist, advertising the use of a “self-steering” chute he dubbed the “fool killer.” From 4,000 feet he could steer it in any direction and land on the same spot from which he had ascended. By 1907 he had cofounded the American Airship and Balloon Company, which landed a contract to build the first Army “war airship,” a non-rigid blimp powered by a 50-hp engine, with a light gun affixed to the framework.

In 1910 Mars was a member of the Curtiss aviation team and like all early “birdmen” faced his fair share of mishaps. At the Memphis air meet on April 11, the engine on his Curtiss biplane stopped while he was flying at 75 feet. Mars lost control and plunged into an automobile. The touring car’s

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ladies’ man Top: Bud Mars takes his wife Edna for a flight on August 19, 1910. Inset: Mars also took fellow aviator Eugene Ely’s wife Mabel (second from right) up that day.

canopy top saved the occupants—three women and two children—and the aviator was only slightly injured. In Denver’s thin air on Nov­ ember 20, he wrecked his biplane during his third takeoff attempt but was unhurt.

In December, while he was attempting to set a new altitude record at Fresno, Mars’ engine quit at 4,000 feet. In a

free glide he narrowly missed crashing into a row of cars and landed safely.

At a meet in Sheepshead Bay, N.Y., Mars took his wife Edna on a flight. Aviator Eugene Ely considered it too risky to take his wife Mabel up, so she appealed to Mars, who obliged and took her aloft. During a nighttime flight at Sheepshead Bay, he was blinded by a mosquito that “landed in his eye and for some time made things more interesting than agreeable,” according to the New York Daily Tribune. Upon landing, Mars wondered, “What would happen if two mosqui-

PHOTOS: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

BY DANIEL J. DEMERS

March 2021

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Mars mission Spectators line Moanalua Field as Mars makes a flight in 1911. He was the first pilot to fly an airplane in Hawaii.

toes got in both my eyes?”

Mars wowed the crowd at the Montana State Fair by shutting off his engine as he came in for a landing. The River Press of Fort Benton reported, “When he was only a few feet above the ground the aviator suddenly turned on the power, the machine soared upward and then gently alighted on the grass.”

On November 12, 1910, Mars planned to fly from the deck of the HamburgAmerica ocean liner Penn­ sylvania. Perched on an 85-foot ramp above the deckhouse, his plane would roll down the makeshift runway and into the air. The stunt was to be performed 50 miles

out at sea, with Mars flying to shore with what would have been the first airmail delivery. Unfortunately, someone had left a tin pipe below the engine that got sucked into the wooden propeller and damaged the aircraft during an engine runup. Two days later his fellow Curtiss team member Ely made history by being the first man to fly from the deck of a ship, the light cruiser USS Birmingham.

During preparations for the January 1911 San Francisco international air meet, promoters announced that Mars would fly between buildings down some of the city’s cavernous streets and then “circle the Dewey monument and alight in the park in front of the Hotel St. Francis.”

But Mars abruptly “jumped his contract” and went to Honolulu, announcing it would be the first exhibition

site of a world flying demonstration tour that would earn him $50,000 compared to his $5,000 contract for the San Francisco air meet.

Glenn Curtiss was not amused, cutting his ties with the aviator. The six-month tour eventually netted Mars $110,000 (about $3 million in today’s dollars).

After making the first flights in Hawaii, Mars visited 11 foreign countries: the Philippines, Japan, China, Korea, Singapore, Siam (Thailand), Sumatra, Java, India, Russia and Poland.

According to a June 19, 1911, New York Times report, he “was the first man to carry the vision of aviation to the Far East.” Going aloft 250 times, he suffered three accidents but emerged unscathed. In many of these countries his aircraft were the first ever seen.

Mars told the Times his tour’s best reception was in Japan. Some 750,000 spectators turned out in Osaka to see their first flying machines.

He said the Japanese army owned four airplanes but didn’t know how to operate them. He trained the first two Japanese army pilots (though both died in an accident four months later) and even took 11-year-old Prince Hirohito, the future World War II emperor, up for his first airplane flight. The Japanese, he said, “wanted to know how

soon they could get a fleet” of airplanes.

In Tientsin, as his plane rose in the air, 25,000 Chinese peasants “scrambled in every direction and beat it.” Filipinos regarded him with “superstitious awe… [and] as a messenger from the devil [while] the Moros [Filipino Muslims] thought him a supreme being and bowed down.”

In Bangkok, Mars took the king of Siam on a 12-mile flight. The king, he related, “was a good fellow and an Oxford man.” In Calcutta, while attending a wedding, Mars reportedly “jumped a foot” when the band struck up “Yip-I-Addy-I-Ay,” a popular Western song.

During World War I, Mars was made an Army lieutenant by a special appointment from President Woodrow Wilson and trained pilots at Fort Omaha. He also offered the government one of his inventions—a wireless torpedo “capable of sustaining itself in the air automatically, while guided by wireless to the subject to be destroyed.” After the war Mars involved himself in real estate, flying schools and aeronautical inventions.

When Bud Mars died in California in 1944 at age 68, his wife Edna related that he regretted taking Japan’s Hirohito aloft, wishing the craft had “cracked up.”

ABOVE: HAWAII STATE ARCHIVES; BELOW: HISTORYNET ARCHIVES

AvIATORS

best reception Mars prepares for a flight demonstration in Japan, where he drew his biggest crowds.

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Sh Se

RESTORED

Forgotten X-Plane

RESCUED FROM A SCRAP HEAP, THE BELL X-14 IS NOW A PRIZED MUSEUM PIECE AFTER A TWODECADE RESTORATION EFFORT

BY RICK ROPKEY AND A TEAM OF DEDICATED VOLUNTEERS

BY DOUGLAS G. ADLER

W

hile experimental aircraft such as the Bell X-1 and North American X-15 are familiar to most aviation history enthusiasts, some other X-planes remain unheralded or even obscure. Among these lesserknown aircraft is the X-14, which was designed as a testbed to study vectored thrust and vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL). Only one was ever built, and after years of use it fell into disrepair. Today that X-14 is being given a new lease on life.

Designed and built by Bell Aircraft between 1955 and 1957, the X-14 was originally known as the Type 68. The goal was to create an aircraft that could take off vertically and hover, transition to horizontal flight and return to hover mode for landing.

The X-14 had an unusual, somewhat ungainly appearance, the result of its VTOL mission and rapid creation. The body mainly consisted of components from two Beechcraft airframes: a T-34 military trainer and a civilian Bonanza.

The heart of the X-14 was its two Armstrong Siddeley turbojets, mounted side by side, which were connected to

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thrust diverters that could deflect the exhaust a full 90 degrees toward the ground for vertical flight. These original engines were considered underpowered and were replaced with a pair of General Electric J85s.

The X-14 had an unusually long research lifespan under various agencies, most notably NASA, from 1957 to 1981. Among the test pilots who flew it were such luminaries as Joe Walker and Neil Armstrong. Upgrades included a digital fly-by-wire system and a computer control system that was directly related to the Apollo guidance computer.

After a hard landing and

Salvage operation Earmarked for disposal after a career-ending 1981 crash (above), Rick Ropkey’s unique Bell X-14 is being restored to near-mint condition (top).

an associated fuel tank rupture and fire seriously damaged the X-14 in 1981, it never flew again. With its wings removed, it was covered in plastic sheeting and mothballed in the enormous Hangar 1 (originally designed to house airships) at Moffett Field in Santa Clara, Calif. At some point the U.S. Army took possession of the airframe. Transported by flatbed truck to Fort Rucker in Alabama to be displayed,

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ALL PHOTOS: ROPKEY ARMOR AND AVIATION MUSEUM, EXCEPT ABOVE LEFT: NASA

it then sat outdoors in abject neglect for more than a decade. The remnants of the plane were eventually labeled as “residue” and earmarked for disposal.

Enter Rick Ropkey, owner of the Ropkey Armor Museum in Crawfordsville, Ind., and a lifelong aviation enthusiast. A friend of his who was in flight training at Fort Rucker found the X-14 sitting in a pile of scrap and recognized it for what it was—a true X-plane— despite the fact it had been splattered with olive drab paint. The friend called Ropkey and told him the aircraft was within days of being destroyed, prompting Ropkey to immediately call Fort Rucker and then fly down to Alabama to negotiate a deal to take possession of the X-14. Ropkey was successful and arranged for the airplane to be transported to his museum.

By then the X-14’s engines and landing gear had been removed. These and other parts had to be individually tracked down and obtained from other sites. Amazingly, the engines were both in one location. The signature intake nozzles were still on the aircraft. The seat is original and still covered in green military-issue duct tape, just as it was decades ago. The original six-foot-long air data pitot probe was found inside an

X Factor Clockwise from above: The X-14 tests its hover function in 1976; Rick Ropkey (in the cockpit) and a volunteer work on the X-14; the restored fuselage gets a lift.

access panel in the fuselage.

Ropkey contacted Lloyd Corliss, project manager for the X-14 program, who proved invaluable in helping him locate additional missing parts and records. Through Corliss and other contacts at NASA, Ropkey obtained the original paper files for the X-14 program, which collectively weighed several hundred pounds. The records are amazing in their detail and include the logbooks for the engines, maintenance records, all the details about the engine changes, foreign object damage reports and other minutiae. Ropkey also managed to take possession of the original manuals, flight logs and checklists for the plane (which were littered with mentions of Walker and Armstrong).

Ropkey wants the X-14 to be a living, breathing machine once again. He and his team have worked tirelessly to restore it to a pristine state, with the ultimate goal of restarting its engines someday. There are no plans to return the X-14 to flight given the risks involved in its operation.

The X-plane has been extensively rebuilt with inventoried and tagged original pieces whenever possible.

The wings had buckled and required extensive time and effort to restore; the port wing has already been refinished and the starboard wing is being worked on. The inlet cowling has been smoothed out and repaired as well. The cockpit interior has purposely not been restored and other than undergoing a thorough cleaning remains as it was when Ropkey took possession of the aircraft. He considers the cockpit a special place, almost sacred, that should be preserved as it was found.

The engines are currently mounted in the aircraft and will be further restored in the future by a company with J85 experience. Ropkey is

still hunting for some specific engine parts, but he believes he will be able to obtain them.

To date the restoration has spanned more than 20 years. With the help of a team of highly dedicated volunteers and a significant cash infusion, the X-14 is in dramatically better shape than when Ropkey obtained it. “The most important thing is we saved this old airplane,” said Ropkey. “People are fascinated by the fact that there’s a bigger story than just a goofy-looking airplane that hovered. People love that Neil Armstrong flew it. It’s the little airplane that could.” The X-14 is currently the only X-plane in private hands. It can be viewed by appointment at the Ropkey Armor and Aviation Museum, now located in Indianapolis.

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EXTREMES

Telescoping-Wing Airplanes

BEFORE JETS SPORTED SWING WINGS, AN EARLY RUSSIAN DESIGNER TOOK A NOVEL APPROACH TO VARIABLE-GEOMETRY WINGSPANS IN A SERIES OF FRENCH-BUILT AIRCRAFT

BY ROBERT GUTTMAN

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waiting in the wings Top: The Makhonin Mak-10 rests with its telescoping wings retracted. Above: The improved Mak-101 of 1935.

proposed an airplane with telescoping wings that could extend in span from 42 feet 8 inches to 69 feet, increas­ ing the wing area from 230 to 360 square feet. French government officials were sufficiently intrigued to fund construction of a prototype.

First flown on August 11, 1931, the Makhonin Mak-10

was a large, two-seat, lowwing monoplane. The wings’ center section, which was cleanly faired into the fuse­ lage, terminated in thick rein­ forced cuffs through which the outer wing panels pro­ truded slightly. Ailerons were attached to the trailing edge of the center section, as was the neatly faired fixed landing gear. The outer wing panels extended and retracted on a set of bearings along the wing spars inside the center section, either pneumatically or, if that system failed, man­

ALL PHOTOS: HISTORYNET ARCHIVES

T

he notion of altering the geometry of an airplane’s wings in flight to enhance its performance has long interested aircraft designers. They’ve understood that a plane with smaller wings could fly faster, but larger wings would permit lower stalling, takeoff and landing speeds as well as higher altitudes. Over the years many novel forms of variable geometry have been devised to get the best of both worlds from one set of wings. Among the more unusual approaches was a concept pioneered by Russian engineer Ivan Makhonin (sometimes referred to in France as Jean Makhonine) during the interwar years.

Born in St. Petersburg in 1885, Ivan Ivanovich Makhonin graduated from engineering school before World War I. Dur­ ing that conflict he helped design a variety of weapons for the Russian military, including rockets, armor-piercing bullets and aerial torpedoes. After the Russian Revolution he worked to restore the national railroad system, including the design of new locomotives. Some of his railroad projects did not work out as well as expected, however, and a new giant airship that he designed ended up being cancelled. Finding himself out of favor with the new government, Makhonin and his wife emi­ grated to France in 1921.

Makhonin persuaded the French government to back an idea he had for distilling liquid fuel out of coal. He set up a distillation plant in 1926, but it was shut down the next year due to harmful levels of toxic emissions.

In 1929 Makhonin entered the aeronautic field when he MArch 2021

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ually. Exactly how Makhonin managed to relieve the stress on the outer panels is unclear.

The May 13, 1932, issue of the British aviation magazine Flight published a detailed article extolling the Mak-10’s unique design: “To us it seems that if one is to derive any worthwhile benefit from a variable wing, the better way to tackle the problem is via the variable span.

After all…we know that span loading plays a very large part in the efficiency of a wing, especially at low speeds, where we know that the span loading determines the induced drag. One admires M. Makhonine for a very daring and ingenious piece of work, and hopes that he will be able to continue this interesting experiment.”

The Mak-10 was powered by a single 450-hp Lorraine-Dietrich 12Eb 12-cylinder liquid-cooled engine. Weighing in at 11,023 pounds gross, the aircraft was somewhat underpowered, but with the outer wing panels retracted it reached a speed of 233 mph. In any case, the Mak-10 was never intended for production; it was an experimental testbed to prove the feasibility of its telescoping wing panels.

After four years of test flying, the Mak-10 was returned to the factory for improvements. In 1935 it emerged as the Mak-101 with enclosed cockpits, retractable landing gear and an 800-hp GnomeRhône 14K Mistral Major radial that increased speed to 240 mph.

MAKHONIN MAK-123

Makhonin’s ideas captured the imaginations of at least some among the French aeronautical community.

In 1937 Charles Gourdou, formerly codirector of the aircraft manufacturer Gourdou-Leseurre, designed a single-seat fighter with Makhonin-style telescoping wings. Powered by a 1,050hp Hispano-Suiza 12Y liquid-cooled engine, the G-11 C-1 was expected to reach 422 mph at 22,000 feet, with a range of 1,242 miles.

Gourdou’s own company had gone out of business three years earlier, however, and he

was unable to obtain financial backing. Consequently, the G-11 was never built.

The Mak-101 continued flying until Germany overran France in June 1940. The Germans, in turn, ordered testing to continue and in 1941 they decided to fly the Mak-101 to Rechlin for further study. Makhonin persuaded them to permit one final check flight before its departure, during which his test pilot deliberately crashed-landed it. Stored in a hangar at Villacoublay, the damaged Mak-101 was eventually destroyed during an

American bombing raid.

In spite of his act of sabotage, Makhonin survived the war and reappeared in 1947 with yet another Frenchfunded telescoping-wing prototype. The Mak-123 was an even larger single-engine, low-wing monoplane with seating for four in tandem within an enclosed cockpit. Powered by a surplus German 1,800-hp BMW 801 radial, the aircraft weighed 15,432 pounds empty and 22,046 pounds fully loaded.

The wingspan varied from 42 feet 8 inches to 65 feet 7 inches, and the wing mechanism was powered by its own ¼-hp motor.

During one test flight, the pilot allegedly switched off the engine at 13,000 feet, extended the wings and glided for an hour. On a subsequent flight, however, the Mak-123 suffered an engine failure and crash-landed in a farmer’s field, damaging the prototype beyond repair.

With Makhonin unable to secure further funding from the French government, that accident marked the termination of his interesting experiments in variable geometry. In any case, the jet age had arrived and the emphasis had switched from varying wingspan to varying the angle of sweep.

Experiments with variablesweep wings on the Bell X-5, first flown in 1951, eventually led to production swingwing aircraft such as the General Dynamics F-111, Grumman F-14 Tomcat and Panavia Tornado.

ALL PHOTOS: HISTORYNET ARCHIVES

proof of concept The Mak-10’s wings could be extended and retracted pneumatically or manually.

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STYLE We marvel at the detail of illustrator Steve Karp’s cutaway art, and watch as Porsche takes to the skies.

Republic F-105D Thunderchief cutaway, by Steve Karp

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STYLE ART

A Cut Above

Born in Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley, Steve Karp tinkered with mechanical devices from an early age.

“All through my childhood, much to my parents’ chagrin, I would take everything apart,” says Karp. That fascination led to building plastic scale models of famous aircraft and flying balsa wood airplanes. Karp recalls one of his more ambitious projects was a remote-controlled robot that he constructed using parts salvaged from broken kitchen appliances.

After graduating from college, he began his art career painting book covers.

Karp returned to his love for space and aviation when he started creating his trademark technical cutaway illustrations—some taking as many as 300 hours. His work has appeared on behalf of NASA and in numerous magazines, including Car and Driver, Boating, Reader’s Digest, Field & Stream and frequently Aviation History.

A new poster featuring his airplane cutaways (opposite) is available through his website, stevekarpart.com.

Rocketdyne F-1 Saturn V engine

Cessna 172 cutaway

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MARCH 2021

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ALL ILLUSTRATIONS COURTESY OF STEVE KARP

STYLE STYLE

Steve Karp Cutaways 18-by-24-inch poster, $59.95 plus S&H, signed, stevekarpart.com

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STYLE FUTURE

Flying Porsche

TRAVEL

Power Couple

For the anyone with the means, Embraer and Porsche have created Duet—pairing a limitededition Embraer Phenom 300E aircraft and Porsche 911 Turbo S. Only 10 business jet– sports car sets will be produced (not sold separately). They feature matching exterior and interior color schemes.

Ownership includes a custom Duet pilot’s bag, two weekenders and a special-edition Porsche Design 1919 Globetimer UTC titaniumcase watch inspired by the aircraft’s cockpit.

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RENDERINGS COURTESY OF BOEING

In the not too distant future, cars will fly and Porsche wants to lead the charge. Teaming with Boeing, the world’s largest aerospace company, Porche is exploring the premium urban air mobility market. “Porsche and Boeing together bring precision engineering, style and innovation to accelerate urban air mobility worldwide,” said Steve Nordlund, VP and general manager of Boeing NeXt. Along with Boeing’s Aurora Flight Sciences, the team is also developing a concept for a fully electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicle.

The Phenom 300E features the largest windows in its class and the comfort of fully reclining and adjustable seats.

The cabin is enhanced by the best pressurization among light jets (6,600 ft. maximum cabin altitude). The aircraft also has distinct temperature zones for pilots and passengers, a wardrobe and refreshment center, lavatory, voice and data communications options, and an entertainment system.

MARCH 2021

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RENDERINGS COURTESY OF BOEING

STYLE

Opposite and above: The PorscheBoeing aerocar prototype concept

Porsche Design 1919 Globetimer UTC titanium-case watch

PHOTOS COURTESY OF EMBRAER & PORSCHE

AVHP-210300-STYLE.indd 23

The Phenom 300E is the fastest and longest-ranged single pilot jet, with a high-speed cruise of 464 knots and a five-occupant range of 2,010 nautical miles with NBAA IFR reserves. Powered by two Pratt & Whitney Canada PW535E1 engines with 3,478 pounds of thrust each, the aircraft is capable of flying at 45,000 feet.

MARCH 2021

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LETTER FROM AvIATION HISTORY

AVIATION TO THE RESCUE

I

historic delivery Pilot Houston Mills (left) and first officer Neal Newell fist bump after flying the first containers of covid-19 vaccine from Lansing, Mich., to Louisville, Ky., on December 13.

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n our January 2016 feature “Angels of Mercy” (see historynet.com/angels-of-mercy.htm), con­tributing editor Stephan Wilkinson wrote, “These 10 great aerial rescues demonstrate that aircraft serve a far nobler purpose than hauling passengers and cargo or dealing death from the skies.” This issue and recent events underscore the utility of aircraft for lifesaving missions in all corners of the world.

Wilkinson noted that a few aerial rescues were performed during World War I, “almost as afterthoughts,” but it took the next war to spur the creation of aircraft and procedures dedicated to air rescue. While those aircraft were developed primarily for saving airmen who ditched in the sea, in “Angels From Above” (P. 36), Gavin Mortimer describes how some Allied special forces commanders took it upon themselves to adapt singleengine airplanes for medical evacuation of wounded soldiers. The commanders knew that the capability to quickly evacuate wounded to a field hospital provided a tremendous boost to their men’s morale.

The air rescue mission didn’t fully mature until the Korean War and the corresponding rise of the heli­copter. But as Eileen Bjorkman points out in “Leave No Man Behind” (P. 44), many of the lessons learned in Korea had to be relearned and refined in Vietnam. With the improved helicopters and other equipment (see “Aero Artifact,” P. 72) developed during the Vietnam War, today we take for granted images of Coast Guard helos plucking sailors from sinking ships or Air National Guard aircraft rescuing firefighters from burning forests.

On December 13, 2020, a United Parcel Serv­ ice Boeing 757 crew performed an aerial rescue

mission of another sort when they flew the first refrigerated containers of the covid-19 vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech from the manufacturing facility in Lansing, Mich., to Louisville, Ky. It was perhaps fitting that two former military pilots were at the 757’s controls. UPS Vice Presi­ dent of Flight Operations and Safety Houston Mills, a U.S. Marine Corps major who spent 11 years flying F/A-18 Hornets, served as command pilot and Neal Newell, a U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel who flew F-16s, was his first officer.

“We’re mission oriented,” Mills told Jim Moore, web editor for the Aircraft Owner and Pilots Asso­ ciation. “We have this mindset of service before self,” a hallmark of America’s military that they have brought to their jobs at UPS. As Moore noted, “It will take all hands to maintain the air bridge dis­tributing the vaccines....”

General aviation has already played a role in flying covid-19 vaccines to small airports and inaccessible areas. WBTW News13 in Florence, S.C., reported on one GA pilot, Robby Hill, who volunteered to deliver vaccines in his Piper M350. Hill, who normally volunteers for Angel Flight, picked up a cooler in Fayetteville, N.C., and flew it across state to Asheville, where he was met by another volunteer pilot who carried it on to Nashville, Tenn.

“Any pilots out there with planes, I encourage them to spend all their free time doing as much as they can to help with this logistical challenge that our nation has right now,” Hill said. “I feel a responsibility as an American, as a citizen of South Carolina and as a pilot to do everything in my power to help our country get back to normal....”

“We’re moving towards closure,” predicted UPS V.P. Mills. Let us all hope so.

UPS INC.

BY CARL VON WODTKE

march 2021

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GARY GALLAGHER ON GETTYSBURG’S CONFEDERATE MONUMENTS H

An Army Wiped Out Bicycles at War Testing the A-Bomb Soviet Female Ace Battle in Paradise Invasion Stripes

HISTORYNET.COM

PHILIPPINES, DECEMBER 8, 1941

Thomas Taylor of the 8th Louisiana was seriously wounded in the Cornfield fight.

SEPTEMBER 17, 1862

ANTIETAM NEW LOOK AT THE DEADLY CORNFIELD MCCLELLAN AT THE FRONT UNTOLD STORY OF A BATTLEFIELD GRAVE

WHY DID MACARTHUR WAIT FOR THE ENEMY TO STRIKE FIRST?

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DOUBLE TROUBLE

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A UNION CAPTAIN’S HORRIBLE DAY

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TOMCATTING U.S. NAVY AIRCREWS AND RECRUITERS LOVED THE GRUMMAN F-14 TOMCAT, BUT A CAREFUL REVIEW OF ITS RECORD SUGGESTS THE TOP GUN MOUNT WASN’T ALL IT WAS CRANKED UP TO BE BY STEPHAN WILKINSON

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swinging couple Two Grumman F-14D Tomcats from U.S. Navy fighter squadron VF-213 fly with swing wings fully extended off Virginia Beach’s Naval Air Station Oceana in 2004.

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shaky start Top: The second F-14 prototype takes off from Grumman’s Calverton, Long Island, airfield in August 1971.

The first prototype crashed on its second flight. Inset: Mike Pelehach (left), the father of the Tomcat, and fellow Grumman engineers look over the first F-14 during its construction.

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The B turned out to be too complex, underpowered and heavy for carrier ops, however. It was also a bomber, and the Navy needed a fighter.

In the career-ending words of Vice Adm. Tom Connolly, in response to a senator’s question as to whether more powerful engines might make the F-111B acceptable, “Mister Chairman, all the thrust in Christendom couldn’t make a fighter out of that airplane.” Some claim that the Tomcat’s name is a tribute to Connolly’s falling-on-hissword honesty.

The Navy was seeking a replacement for the McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom, which no longer had the range or weapons needed to protect carrier battle groups. Soviet advances in bombers

and anti-ship cruise missiles required an inter­ ceptor that could fly far and fast, with long loiter time, powerful radar and brutish missiles that could strike far beyond the range of Sidewinders and Sparrows.

Grumman, which had worked with General Dynamics on the F-111’s variable-geometry wing, had already begun work on a fighter, the G-303, that became the Tomcat. It utilized the 111’s swing-wing concept as well as its Pratt & Whitney TF30 engines—unique in being the world’s first afterburning fighter turbofans.

Grumman, a swing-wing pioneer, had built the rotund and underpowered XF10F Jaguar to test the concept of a wing that could be unswept for

PREVIOUS SPREAD: PHOTO BY ERIK HILDEBRANDT; ALL PHOTOS THIS SPREAD: CRADLE OF AVIATION MUSEUM

IN 1961, WHEN U.S. SECRETARY OF DEFENSE ROBERT MCNAMARA PROPOSED THE GENERAL DYNAMICS F-111 AARDVARK AS A SWISS ARMY KNIFE SUITABLE FOR ALL THREE MAJOR FLYING SERVICES, THAT INCLUDED A NAVY VERSION, THE F-111B.

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matic and rapid, some Air Force F-15 and F-16 pilots who flew against the F-14 claimed the wings’ position telegraphed the airplane’s energy state as it lost momentum during air combat maneuvers.

The main reason for that lost momentum during ACM was the dismal .68-to-1 thrust ratio of the early TF30 engine.

The fuel-efficient engines (plus swing wings that could be unswept at max-loiter airspeeds) allowed the Tomcat to linger longer over the battlefield, with a bigger ordnance load than any fighter in the world, but they had a failing that had already cropped up during the F-111’s career. F-111s weren’t expected to fly as extreme a flight envelope as were Tomcats, so the problem was not a major consideration. But the fact remained that TF30s were never intended to be fighter engines; they were not meant to deal with the constant and rapid throttle movements and high angle-of-attack situations that modern combat involved.

early efforts Above left: Grumman pilot Corky Meyer (shown in an F9F) flew the XF10F Jaguar swing-wing testbed and considered it fun “because there was so much wrong with it.”

Above: The Pratt & Whitney TF30 turbofan engine (here displayed with a full-scale F-14 mockup) was the source of most of the Tomcat’s difficulties.

Below: A mockup of the G-303, Grumman’s F-14 predecessor, at the Calverton facility.

PREVIOUS SPREAD: PHOTO BY ERIK HILDEBRANDT; ALL PHOTOS THIS SPREAD: CRADLE OF AVIATION MUSEUM

carrier landings and takeoffs, and swept for inflight speed. Grumman test pilot Corky Meyer was the only person to fly the sole XF10F and he pronounced it fun “because there was so much wrong with it.” His work nonetheless carried over to the F-111 and the F-14.

The father of the Tomcat, Grumman engineer Mike Pelehach, saw his first MiG-21 at a 1960s Paris Air Show and knew the U.S. would need a fighter that could defeat it. Pelehach paced off the dimensions of the MiG and went back to the company’s Beth­page headquarters to begin work on a MiG-beater. Ultimately, he drew together all the concepts and options that resulted in the Tomcat.

A highly regarded engineer, Pelehach once had dinner with a group of his Chinese counterparts, who asked if it would be possible to modernize their own MiG-21s. Pelehach quickly sketched a design and some details on the tablecloth. At the end of the evening, the Chinese engineers stripped the silverware and took the tablecloth with them.

The variable-geometry wing, however, was not one of Pelehach’s best ideas. In practice the swing wing has been called a major aeronautical engineering blunder. On the Tomcat, it was complex and heavy, and though its movement was auto-

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TECH TECH NOTES NOTES

GRUMMAN F-14A TOMCAT

SPECIFICATIONS ENGINES Pratt & Whitney TF30-P412A/414A afterburning turbofans producing 34,154 lbs. maximum thrust (41,800 lbs. on afterburner) WINGSPAN 64 feet 1½ inches (unswept)

LENGTH 62 feet 8 inches

SERVICE CEILING 50,000 feet

HEIGHT 16 feet

COMBAT RADIUS 500 nautical miles (typical strike profile)

WEIGHT 40,104 lbs. (empty)

RANGE 1,730 nautical miles (maximum ferry with two external tanks)

72,000 lbs. (maximum takeoff)

38 feet 2½ inches (swept)

SPEED ARMAMENT One M61A1 20mm cannon with 675 1,544 knots (Mach 2.38) at 36,000 ft. rounds; six hardpoints for AIM-7 (maximum) Sparrow, AIM-9 Sidewinder or AIM-54 481 knots (cruise) Phoenix air-to-air missiles

WING AREA 565 square feet

WING SPAR BOX PIVOT SUPPORT

RADAR INTERCEPT OFFICER’S MARTIN-BAKER GRU-7A ZERO-ZERO EJECTION SEAT

INTAKE BYPASS DOOR

REAR-HINGED CANOPY

HUGHES AN/AWG-9 X-BAND RADAR REFUELING PROBE PILOT’S MARTIN-BAKER GRU-7A ZERO-ZERO EJECTION SEAT

UPWARDHINGED RADOME

RETRACTABLE FOLDING CREW STEP AMMUNITION DRUM (675 ROUNDS)

ALQ-100 ANTENNA/TV OPTICAL UNIT

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M61A1 20MM VULCAN ROTARY CANNON

CATAPULT LAUNCH BAR

FOLDABLE CREW LADDER

AIR INTAKE

CENTRAL FUEL TANK

NOSE GEAR

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TAIL NAVIGATION LIGHT

ELECTRONIC COUNTERMEASURES (ECM) ANTENNA LOW-VOLTAGE FORMATION LIGHTING

SPOILERS

ECM ANTENNA

REAR FUSELAGE TANKS

SPEED BRAKE RUDDER

VARIABLE-AREA, CONVERGENT/DIVERGENT EXHAUST NOZZLE AN/ALR-45 TAIL WARNING RADAR ANTENNA

TAILPLANE

TAILPLANE ACTUATOR OUTBOARD MANEUVER FLAPS

SPOILERS

AIM-9 SIDEWINDER INFRARED MISSILE WING GLOVE WEAPONS PYLON AIM-54 PHOENIX RADAR-GUIDED MISSILE INTAKE BYPASS DOOR

PRATT & WHITNEY TF30-P412 TURBOFAN ENGINE

WING PIVOT MOUNTING

LEADINGEDGE SLATS

INTEGRAL WING TANK LOW-VOLTAGE FORMATION LIGHTING

ILLUSTRATION BY ADAM TOOBY

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tomcat’s bird Top: An F-14 carries four AIM-54 Phoenix missiles under its fuselage, along with AIM-7 Sparrows and AIM-9 Sidewinders on wing hardpoints.

Above: A Phoenix test missile awaits loading onto an F-14.

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The TF30 was prone to compressor stalls and surges when operated at high angles of attack or yaw if the power levers were moved too aggressively—common during air combat maneuvering.

The Tomcat’s engines were mounted about nine feet apart, to allow room between them for missile carriage and to create a large lifting surface.

(More than half of an F-14’s total lift comes from what Grumman called the pancake—the surface area between the engine nacelles.) So when one of the engines lost power from a compressor stall, the resultant yaw could be sudden and scary, sometimes resulting in an unrecoverable flat spin.

Compressor stalls led to the loss of more than 40 F-14s. Had the early Tomcats ever gone into serious combat, more of them might have been lost to compressor stalls than to enemy action.

Some Tomcat crews described their mount as “a nice aircraft powered by two pieces of junk.” For the sake of airframe longevity, the Tomcat was in practical terms limited to 6.5 Gs, while an F-15 could pull 9 Gs. (So could a Tomcat, at high enough speeds, but the airplane then had to undergo a complex over-G inspection.) The difference was also attributed to TF30 engine limitations.

The F-14 was a difficult airplane to handle in the final stages of a carrier landing, in part because of its tendency to hunt laterally while trying to achieve a stabilized approach. The fact that the F-14 had spoilers rather than ailerons didn’t help, nor did its high pitch inertia, which made it float during the final stages of an approach. (These problems were ultimately corrected when Tomcats were fitted with digital flight-control systems.)

The TF30 was never intended to be the F-14’s duty engine. It was used simply to get the Tomcat project airborne and into flight test and initial service. The TF30 was to be replaced by an ephemeral Advanced Technology Engine that was being developed for the F-15—the Pratt & Whitney F401.

The ATE never materialized, so Tomcats sailored on with the TF30 until near the end of the production run, when a good General Electric engine, the F110, became available and created the F-14D as well as some retrofitted A models that were labeled F-14A+ (later redesignated F-14Bs).

In 1984 Secretary of the Navy John Lehman, a former naval aviator, said the TF30/F-14 combo was “probably the worst engine-airplane mismatch we have had in many years. The TF30 is just a terrible engine....”

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OPPOSITE PHOTOS: PF-(AIRCRAFT)/ALAMY; RIGHT PHOTOS: U.S. NAVY

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he Tomcat was built around an enormous super-missile, the AIM-54A Phoenix, which weighed almost half a ton, was 13 feet long and 15 inches in diameter and cost half a million dollars to fire. At the time it was the most sophisticated and expensive air-to-air missile in the world. The Tomcat could carry six, but since four was the most that could be brought back to the ship, that was the normal loadout. The Phoenix was originally designed for use against slow-moving bombers with huge radar signatures and it wasn’t nearly as much of a threat to fighters with savvy pilots.

The F-14 was the only aircraft ever to use Phoe­ nixes operationally. In a carefully orchestrated live-fire test, a Tomcat loosed all of its Phoenixes within 38 seconds at a distant skyful of pilotless airplanes and target drones. One of the missiles failed, but of the five that flew, four scored direct hits and the fifth detonated near enough to its target to be considered a “lethal miss.” Unfortunately, combat is not so carefully orchestrated. In Janu­ ary 1999, a pair of Tomcats fired two Phoenixes at Iraqi MiG-25s south of Bagh­dad. Both missed.

Eight months later, an F-14 launched a Phoenix at an Iraqi MiG-23. Again, it missed as the target fled. It was the last time the Navy ever fired a Phoenix in anger.

Had the live-fire test been a failure, the Tomcat program might have been aborted, since it was already in trouble from cost overruns, schedule slippage and several test-flight crashes. The most notorious crash took out the first prototype on only its second flight, when a vibratory failure of all three hydraulic systems—main, backup and a limited “combat backup” system—rendered the airplane uncontrollable on short final to Grumman’s Calverton, Long Island, airfield. The crew ejected and came within an ace of parachuting into the Tomcat’s fireball.

The Phoenix followed an eject-launch flight path rather than being rail-launched. “Firing” it meant dropping it like a bomb, since its powerful engine needed to be well below the F-14 before igniting. Once the solid propellant lit off, the Phoenix immediately soared to 80,000 feet and accelerated to Mach 5 toward its target. Above that target and coasting, the Phoenix dove steeply down on it, substituting kinetic energy for the spent force of its motor.

The Phoenix’s maximum range has been quoted as 125 miles, but effectively it was somewhat less.

Target acquisition and missile launch assumed that the two aircraft were beak-to-beak at high speed, so the actual impact would take place when the Tomcat’s opponent was substantially closer. An effective Phoenix countermeasure was to simply turn away from the missile and let it expire, assuming an attacker had an accompanying AWACStype overseer to call out the Phoenix launch.

naval ops From top: A Tomcat from the VF-111 “Sundowners” launches an AIM-54C; a flight director guides an F-14 into position for launch from USS Saratoga; flight deck personnel confer with a Tomcat crew during a preflight inspection.

An essential component of the Phoenix system was the F-14’s planar-array Hughes radar. When the Tomcat went into fleet service, the yard-wide AWG-9 dish was capable of tracking 24 targets simultaneously and directing missiles at six of them. At the time that was unprecedented, but the Hughes radar was still a complex, hard-to-maintain, 1960s analog system.

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iranian top guns Top left: Six Iranian pilots credited with at least 31 victories during the Iran-Iraq War pose with an F-14.

Above: The Iranians adapted the classic Tomcat logo for their “Ali-Cat” patch.

Above right: Crewmen remove a Tactical Air Reconnaissance Pod System (TARPS) from an F-14 aboard USS George Washington in March 2000.

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Air Force’s fourth-generation fighters, the F-15 and F-16. The Tomcat was increasingly an analog airplane in a digital age. The advent of the F-14B and then the F-14D solved those issues.

The D model was in fact an all-digital strike fighter. It carried a remarkable new radar “that gave it an enormous increase in effectiveness…against stealthy aircraft,” wrote Rear Adm. Paul T. Gillcrist in his comprehensive book Tomcat! “Its capability against all types of targets in an electronic warfare environment [was] vastly improved.” The F-14D also had IRST (Infrared Search and Track), a passive sensor that was accurate at shorter ranges and almost impossible for opponents to detect. The fighter’s new glass cockpit, digital avionics and greatly enhanced datalink increased the crew’s situational awareness. The F-14D was a true multi-mission aircraft and its proponents believed it was a better strike fighter than the vaunted F-15E Strike Eagle.

Unfortunately, the F-14D didn’t reach the fleet until 1990, a year before Tomcat production was defunded, and only 37 units were built.

As it was, the complex F-14 was difficult to service and maintain aboard carriers. Most estimates held that Tomcats required anywhere from 30 to 60 hours of maintenance per hour flown—about three times as much as the F/A-18 Hornets that replaced them. One result was that Grumman, Hughes, Raytheon and other companies sent civilian tech reps to carriers to do the heavy lifting, which gave the Navy’s own sailors too little opportunity for on-the-job training.

The F-14 was assigned to fleet defense but its main task became establishing air superiority, and it took on the duties of an interceptor and tactical attack fighter with all-weather capability and great range. With excellent visibility (the Tomcat was the first U.S. fighter since the Korean War with a 360-degree-view canopy), 20mm cannon, automatic maneuvering flaps and dogfight radar

mode, it was well suited to the task. Recon capability followed as the Navy phased out its Vought RF-8 Crusaders and North American RA-5 Vigilantes. Toms were fitted with big belly pods called TARPS (Tactical Air Reconnaissance Pod System). A TARPS was more than 17 feet long and weighed almost a ton, filled with electronic and photo-snooping gear.

The final iteration of the F-14 was nicknamed the “Bombcat.” It was fitted out as a fighterbomber intended to serve as a self-escorting ground-attack aircraft. The Bombcat saw more action over the Balkans, Iraq and Afghanistan against the Taliban and al Qaeda than the F-14 ever did as an air-superiority fighter.

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ere it not for the Shah of Iran, there might never have been an F-14. Iran was the only foreign country ever to operate Tomcats, and it does to this day. The Iranians purchased an armada for $2 billion in 1974—at the time the single highest-value sale of military equipment in U.S. history—back when the shah was one of America’s few allies in the Mideast. But he had to make sure Grumman stayed in business in order to get his airplanes.

The company had signed a fixed-price contract with the Navy to produce the fighter, but the early 1970s were an inflationary time, and the price of materials—particularly titanium—rose so rapidly that Grumman was at one point losing a million dollars on each Tomcat it built. Things looked bad for the airframer, until the shah stepped in with a $75 million loan.

The shah wanted the Grumman product, but a flyoff against the F-15 Eagle had to be arranged to at least give the appearance of a competition. The F-15, besides being the darling of the Air Force fighter community, had a higher thrust-to-weight ratio and would have outperformed the Tomcat, all things being equal.

But they weren’t. A coin toss allowed the Air Force crew to fly first, and while they did, the F-14 sat waiting its turn on a distant run-up pad. The pilot had set his power levers as far forward as he dared, and while the Eagle flew its strictly defined 12-minute program, he burned off part of his fuel load and took off a good bit lighter than the demo rules had postulated.

The Grumman crew had also noted during its weather briefing that there was a distinct wind shear at 1,000 feet, with the flow nearly reversing itself from what was happening on the ground. So they flew their demonstration pattern in the oppo-

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OPPOSITE: (TOP LEFT) HISTORYNET ARCHIVES, (TOP RIGHT) PJF MILITARY COLLECTION/ALAMY, (PATCH) GUY ACETO COLLECTION; ABOVE: U.S. NAVY; INSET: VITAL ARCHIVE/ALAMY

site direction from what the Air Force had done, and their slow-flight passes abeam the shah’s viewing bleachers appeared far more graceful than the Eagle’s, thanks to the headwind. The shah was sold.

Delivery of the Iranian Tomcats began in 1976, accompanied by 284 Phoenix missiles.

The Iranians had far better results from Phoenix launches, shooting down dozens of Iraqi opponents during their 1980s war.

Three years later, the shah was deposed and the F-14s became the property of the Iranian revolutionary air force. Seventy-nine of the 80 purchased, plus the missiles, had been delivered, but most of them soon became unflyable. The U.S. refused to support the complex airplanes and Iran quickly ran out of spare parts. Hangar queens were cannibalized and eventually only a dozen Iranian F-14s remained flyable.

Beginning in the late 1990s, illicit F-14 parts were finding their way from the U.S. (and Israel) to Iran. In 2007 federal agents seized four intact Tomcats in California. Three were in museums and a fourth was in the hands of the TV series “JAG,” which used the airplane in ground scenes numerous times. The stir ultimately resulted in the destruction of virtually all of the 150-odd retired Tomcats parked at the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base boneyard.

Today, however, Iran has put some 40 Tomcats back in the air carrying an improved Iranian version of the Phoenix, thanks to advances in the country’s capabilities and the use of such technologies as 3D printing for the manufacture of spares.

They are the only active F-14s in the world. Many are virtually new, having been unflown for decades.

But they’d be no match for F-22 Raptors or F-35s, or even Navy F/A-18 Hornets and Super Hornets.

For all its faults, no airplane has ever done as much for the Navy as a recruiting tool as did the Tomcat—not even the Blue Angels’ various

mounts. The Blues never flew F-14s, which were far too expensive to maintain for a non­ com­b at PR team, nor were their swing wings adaptable to close-order formations. In the year after the 1986 Tom Cruise film Top Gun was released, Navy recruitment jumped by 500 percent, and the sea service added an unexpected 16,000 uniformed personnel to its ranks. Every air-minded kid in the country wanted to grow up to fly a Tomcat.

Like James Bond’s Aston Martin, the Tomcat’s cinematic notoriety considerably exceeded its real-world accomplishments. The program was canceled in 1991 after 712 units had been manufactured, versus 5,195 of its F-4 predecessor and 1,480 of the F/A-18 Hornet successor (both of which have flown in more than one U.S. military branch and multiple foreign services).

The demise of the Tomcat meant the end of Grum­man as an airframer. The company was bought by Northrop in 1994 and found itself in the space and electronics business, leaving the Navy with Boeing, which had merged with McDon­nell Douglas, as its sole-source fighter supplier.

No matter how many Top Gun fans proclaimed that the Tomcat was “so cool,” nothing could save even the much-improved F-14D. Proving once again that coolness is not a mission requirement.

attack role Top: In the aftermath of Operation Desert Storm, an F-14A from VF-114 flies over oil well fires in Kuwait in August 1991. Above: A Tomcat releases a GBU-24 laser-guided bomb during ordnance testing off Naval Air Station Patuxent River in Maryland.

For further reading, contributing editor Stephan Wilkinson recommends: Grumman F-14 Tomcat Owners’ Workshop Manual, by Tony Holmes; F-14, by Mike Spick; Tomcat! The Grumman F-14 Story, by Rear Admiral Paul T. Gillcrist; and F-14 Tomcat, by David F. Brown.

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ANGELS FROM ABOVE ALLIED SPECIAL FORCES UNITS IN FAR-FLUNG THEATERS PIONEERED AIR EVACUATION OF WOUNDED IN WORLD WAR II, PROVIDING A NEEDED BOOST TO THE MEN’S MORALE BY GAVIN MORTIMER

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desert deliverance Pilot Trevor Barker (third from right) enjoys a smoke before evacuating Peter Burke, a wounded member of the British Long Range Desert Group, from Libya to Cairo, Egypt, on November 28, 1942.

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rat patrols Above: Lt. Col. Guy Prendergast, the LRDG commander from 1941 to 1944, purchased two Waco biplanes for liaison, resupply and evacuating wounded.

Here they wait in the Western Desert after delivering supplies to a patrol. Inset: A group of LRDG men pose for a photo after crossing the Tunisian border.

Opposite bottom: An LRDG patrol takes a break with their Chevy trucks in May 1942.

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From Merrill’s Marauders in the U.S. Army to the British Special Air Service (SAS) and Ger­ many’s Fallschirmjäger, all the major combatants exploited the great technological innovations of the interwar years in communications, weapons and transport to develop specialized units—“pri­ vate armies” in WWII parlance—capable of fighting deep inside enemy territory. Some senior Allied commanders regarded special forces as renegades, fighting an irregular warfare unbe­ coming of their nation’s proud military history, but in fact these private armies were pioneers, not just in waging a new form of warfare, but also in the treatment of their wounded.

The inaugural SAS operation in November 1941 was a disaster. Of the 55 men who para­ chuted into Axis-held Libya, only 21 returned.

The rest were killed or captured, victims of a freak desert storm that coincided with their mission against enemy airfields. Several men were badly injured on landing and had to be left by their comrades, who faced a long trek across the des­ ert to reach their rendezvous point. “Sergeant Jock Cheyne was my best friend and he broke his back,” remembered Jimmy Storie, one of the sur­ vivors from that operation. “We had to leave him

with a bottle of water and a revolver. We had been told that if you broke a leg and couldn’t make it, you just had to crawl to the nearest roadside and hope. But there’s nothing there in the desert.”

To abandon a comrade, no matter how prag­ matic the decision, is a violation of the soldier’s code of honor. It was demoralizing, particularly in a tight-knit special force. But commanders soon realized that if aircraft could be used to take men to their target, surely they could also be used to evacuate them if wounded.

The first special forces commander to grasp that fact was Lt. Col. Guy Prendergast of the Long Range Desert Group (LRDG), a British reconnais­ sance unit established in June 1940. Prendergast was a professional soldier, as was the LRDG’s founder, Ralph Bagnold, and together the pair had explored the Libyan Desert in Model T Fords when they were stationed in Africa during the 1920s and early ’30s. Prendergast was several years younger than Bagnold and more in tune with the evolution of the airplane between the wars. “I learnt to fly privately in 1931 and owned

PREVIOUS SPREAD & OPPOSITE TOP & MIDDLE: COURTESY OF GAVIN MORTIMER; ABOVE: IWM HU 25081; INSET: IWM HU 16497; RIGHT: IWM E 12385

SPECIAL FORCES CAME OF AGE DURING WORLD WAR II.

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to stay in touch with his men, but his request was rebuffed, so Prendergast took matters into his own hands. “Obtaining enough money from army funds…I nosed about in Almaza Airport, Cairo, and found three Wacos which belonged to rich Egyptians,” he recounted.

Prendergast had enough money to purchase two for $73,000, one of which had a Jacobs 285hp engine and the other a 225-hp Jacobs. They

pioneering work Top: Prendergast, who with Barker piloted the Wacos, helps load one of the biplanes. Above: LRDG medical unit leader Captain Richard Lawson stands beside a Waco in 1942.

PREVIOUS SPREAD & OPPOSITE TOP & MIDDLE: COURTESY OF GAVIN MORTIMER; ABOVE: IWM HU 25081; INSET: IWM HU 16497; RIGHT: IWM E 12385

various private aircraft from then until the war started,” recalled Prendergast. “I was stationed in the Sudan for five years and used to fly home on leave and used my aeroplane [a de Havilland Puss Moth] for flying all over the Sudan.”

In the spring of 1941 the LRDG’s headquarters was in Cairo but the bulk of the unit was stationed at Kufra, a remote Libyan oasis 700 miles southwest of the Egyptian capital that was out of radio range. To reach it required traversing the Great Sand Sea, an area about the size of Indiana with huge dunes and deep valleys that in some cases were 500 feet from trough to crest. Bagnold had asked the Royal Air Force if they would be willing to give him the occasional lift to Kufra in order

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unconventional command Above: The LRDG’s founder, Ralph Bagnold, had explored the Libyan Desert with Prendergast while they were stationed in Africa during the 1920s and early ’30s.

Top: Graham Rose (left) and Jimmy Storie prepare their weapons prior to a raid. Above right: Wounded LRDG men await the Wacos’ arrival at Kufra Oasis in September 1942.

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both had a ceiling of 16,000 feet and a range of 480 miles, but the more powerful engine delivered a cruising speed of 146 mph, 16 mph faster than the 225-hp engine yielded.

Nicknaming them “Big Waco” and “Small Waco,” Prendergast had them modified by engineers at Almaza, as described in the chief inspector’s report: “Tail wheel unit removed, original tail wheel fork reconditioned, reassembled and fitted. Landing lights removed and leading edges of wings faired off. Passengers’ lap belts modified to give more clearance to control cables in fuselage.” The modifications reduced the airplanes’ range in the desert to 300 miles.

Prendergast found a pilot for the second Waco, New Zealand army Private Trevor Barker. He had been taught to fly by Australian aviator Charles Kingsford Smith, feted in 1928 for making the first transpacific flight from California to Australia.

“We taught one another to fly these aircraft at Almaza,” said Prendergast, who would sit in one of two bucket seats with a steering yoke that could be moved back and forth between the pilot and copilot. Behind the pilot was a bench facing forward, but it was removed and replaced with a fold-up canvas seat.

The Wacos were painted in camouflage but a furious row erupted when the RAF refused to allot the LRDG identification numbers to go with their roundels. Fine, replied Prendergast, we’ll fly without them, but the RAF, believing all airplanes belonging to the British empire should be under its control, threatened that “they would shoot us down.” When General Archibald Wavell, commander-in-chief in the Middle East, heard of the RAF’s threat he “told them to think again” and the LRDG got their roundel numbers. But the antagonism remained, and when the Wacos started suffering wear and tear in 1942 due to the desert sand, the RAF refused to ship over new engines from the United States. Ever inventive,

Prendergast “got my chaps to do a midnight raid on an army dump at Cairo, where I had spotted some crates containing new Continental engines for American tanks with which the British army was equipped.”

The Wacos’ 300-mile range meant that landing grounds had to be established on the routes over which they flew. These sites were stocked with fuel, and a small dump of food and water was situated every 15 miles on the route in the event the Wacos were forced down. But the greatest hazard was the prospect of getting lost in the immense, featureless desert. “Navigation was of the utmost importance,” noted Prendergast. “We had good compasses and drift indicators and I had taught myself how to find my position on the ground by means of position lines from shots of the sun taken by a sextant. We carried an RAF bubble sextant that we had ‘liberated’ somehow and a yachtsman’s sextant with an artificial horizon.”

A chronometer and chart tables were also installed in the Wacos and one of the LRDG’s skilled navigators always accompanied a flight.

“Their job was to take accurate drift readings and plot our progress on a map,” said Prender­gast.

“Also to help with refueling at our dumps and to help with the astro-nav if we had to land to fix our position.”

For the first few months the Wacos chiefly ferried supplies to Kufra and the other isolated LRDG bases. The flights were also an opportunity for Prendergast to issue orders and boost the men’s morale with a pep talk and the delivery of letters from home and other reading material.

In 1942 the desert war became more fluid— and ferocious—as Axis and Allied forces fought each other back and forth across Libya. It soon became clear that the Wacos could be pressed into service for lifesaving medical evacuations. By then the LRDG had its own medical unit, headed by Captain Richard Lawson, who kept a diary chronicling his work. In June 1942 he described the plight of one soldier who fell ill with appendicitis shortly after the Wacos had left with two wounded men.

Knowing that it would be 24 hours before the aircraft could return, Lawson decided to operate. “I found I had all the equipment necessary except sterile swabs and fine catgut,” he wrote, adding that the soldier’s commanding officer acted as his surgical assistant. The operation went well and a Waco evacuated the soldier the next day. Sixteen days later he returned to base duties.

Most of Lawson’s patients had been wounded in combat or injured in vehicle accidents caused by the terrain. Occasionally, when the Wacos were unavailable due to maintenance issues, it wasn’t

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OPPOSITE: (TOP LEFT) SAS REGIMENTAL ASSOCIATION, (TOP RIGHT) COURTESY OF JOHN VALENTI, (INSET) BAGNOLD PAPERS, BGND E 55; ABOVE LEFT: NATIONAL ARCHIVES; TOP & BOTTOM RIGHT: COURTESY OF GAVIN MORTIMER

possible to evacuate by air. One soldier who suffered compound leg fractures traveled more than 1,000 miles in the back of a truck. “The desert surface varied from firm smooth stretches of many miles to atrocious rough limestone belts or deep soft sand from which the trucks must be dug,” Lawson noted.

The introduction of the Wacos was an immense boost for the men’s morale according to Lawson, who described the evacuation procedure in his diary. “A small landing ground would be marked out for the colonel [Prendergast]. His plane would carry two sitting cases and the pilot. On other occasions, e.g. a fractured spine in the middle of the Sand Sea, the patient was taken to the nearest flat space suitable for a larger plane and was evacuated direct to Cairo.”

The North Africa campaign ended in May 1943 with victory for the Allies, and the Long Range Desert Group subsequently served with distinction in Italy and the Balkans. But North Africa was where their skills, courage and innovation most made their mark, none more so than in the pioneering use of aircraft. “The Wacos earned their keep over and over again in visits to Middle East and to Army Headquarters…and in bringing in wounded men and taking spare parts out to the patrols,” wrote LRDG intelligence officer Bill Kennedy-Shaw. “And it says a lot for the skill of the pilots and navigators that there was never a disaster or anything approaching one.”

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s challenging as the desert was for air evacuation, the jungle presented an even more formidable foe, one that Merrill’s Marauders conquered in 1944. Assembled in August 1943 in response to President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s call for men willing to undertake “a dangerous and hazardous mission,” the 3,000 volunteers were initially desig-

nated the 5037th Composite Unit (Provisional). It was a prosaic name for a force that was sent into Burma in February 1944 as the spearhead of an American-Chinese operation to reopen the land route to China.

Their nominal leader was Brig. Gen. Frank Merrill, but since he was dogged by ill health, his second in command, Lt. Col. Charles Hunter, led the Marauders in Burma, which was fortunate for the men under his command.

In late 1943 in India, the Marauders had been schooled in jungle warfare by their British counterparts, the Chindits, who were commanded by Brigadier Orde Wingate. Earlier in the year the Chindits had trekked into Burma to launch a series of guerrilla attacks against the Japanese, and on Wingate’s orders they had been compelled to leave several of their number behind. “Sick and wounded had been left to their own resources, and some mortally wounded had been killed by their own men,” said Captain James Hopkins, one of the Marauders’ medical officers. “We knew of no better plan for 1944…all available information indicated that our wounded and sick would be left with natives or would have to accept the vague promise that they would get whatever help was possible.”

Hunter was a career soldier, with a tough exte-

puddle jumpers The Piper L-4 was wellsuited to operations in Burma, where it could be easily camouflaged among jungle foliage (above left) and fly into and out of hastily prepared airstrips (above and top).

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temporary bases Above: The airstrip at Hsamshingyang, deep in the Burmese jungle, was cleared by Merrill’s Marauders for the L-4s that evacuated their wounded. Below: L-5 Sentinels of the 5th Liaison Squadron stand ready at Myitkyina, Burma, in 1944.

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rior concealing a sharp and sensitive mind. He had heard about the LRDG’s pioneering efforts in North Africa, and so arranged for aerial support from the 71st Liaison Squadron based in Ledo, in northeast India. The aircraft assigned to the Marauders was the Piper L-4 Grasshopper, the military version of the 1930s J-3 Cub. Measuring just 22 feet long and considerably less powerful than the Waco, the L-4 had a 65-hp Continental O-170-3 flat-four air-cooled engine that gave it a maximum speed of 92 mph and a range of 260 miles. An observer sat behind the pilot and usually faced the rear with a table before him on which he could plot their course. If the observer’s chair and table were removed there was just enough space for a stretcher case.

The L-4 (“L” stood for liaison) was dubbed the “puddle jumper.” Though the lightplanes were slow and unarmed, the Army believed they could serve as artillery spotters, couriers and coastal patrollers. (In fact the L-4 was so slow that enemy fighters found them hard to shoot down because

of the vast discrepancy in airspeed.)

By early 1944 the U.S. Army Air Forces had 2,079 L-4s in service, and a handful were assigned to Merrill’s Marauders as they fought their way south through the Burmese jungle. Their presence was swiftly required by the Marauders after a fierce engagement at Walawbum on March 4.

Eight Americans had been wounded, two seriously, and Hunter requested their evacuation by air. As the L-4s took off from Ledo for Walawbum, approximately 95 miles southeast, Hunter had his men clear a landing strip in the jungle. One of them, Bob Passanisi, had an idea. “In order to communicate with the L-4s that were used for artillery spotting and liaison, we had to set up a 284 radio, the only one that covered the aircraft frequencies,” recalled Passanisi, one of only seven Marauder veterans still alive. “I instituted the idea of strapping an SCR-300 to the pilot’s seat so we could communicate with greater ease.”

In the hands of a skilled pilot the L-4 proved capable of landing on sandbars or rice paddies, but mostly they used hastily cut jungle strips, as they did at Walawbum. “Although Lionel Paquette and Pete Leightner died before and during evacuation, six wounded men who could not return to duty were successfully evacuated,” said “Doc” Hopkins.

“The knowledge that our sick and wounded could be taken out by plane from improvised airstrips was a big boost to the morale of the men.”

The aircraft had another purpose that Hunter put to use at the end of March when his radio stopped receiving incoming messages at a critical moment in the campaign. Unable to locate one of his three battalions, Hunter summoned an L-4 at first light. Once he was airborne he soon spotted a column of troops moving south through the jungle.

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OPPOSITE TOP & BOTTOM RIGHT: COURTESY OF GAVIN MORTIMER; LEFT, ABOVE LEFT & TOP RIGHT: NATIONAL ARCHIVES

“Urging the pilot to get down on the deck, I could tell it was McGee [the battalion CO] and that he had been in a fight,” recalled Hunter. “I could see one man, a blood-soaked bandage on his head, riding a horse, as well as several wounded being carried on improvised litters.”

The men were successfully evacuated by L-4s, as was Kermit Busher when he was shot on April 5. “It was a light machine gun,” said Busher. “And I must have got about 15 or 20 bullets…they blew out my leg completely. I lost the bone and it was just hanging there.” Busher was brought to Hopkins, who thought that a surgeon at a base hospital could yet save his leg.

An L-4 arrived a few hours later at a place called Hsamshingyang and Busher was loaded on board.

“They tied the tail down to something that would hold it and then they let the engine rev up as much as possible,” recalled Busher. “They chopped the rope holding the tail and it had a catapult action.

We didn’t get to rise that quickly because I remember looking off to the side and there were monkeys looking around before we got above the trees.”

A day after being shot, Busher was at the 20th General Hospital in Ledo recovering from a successful operation to save his leg.

The airstrip at Hsamshingyang was set up close to a hill village, Nhpum Ga, where for two weeks the Japanese besieged the Marauders’ 2nd Battalion. A day after the siege was lifted on April 9, Hopkins wrote in his diary: “Eighty seven wounded were carefully checked and prepared for evacuation by the small L-4 planes. The evacuation process was slow but otherwise efficient, and all were taken out by the end of the day.”

As the Marauders cleared the battlefield, they searched the bodies of the dead enemy for intelligence. One document came to the attention of Hopkins, who remarked on its contents. It listed the policy priorities of the Japanese military forces in Burma:

1. Abide by the Imperial prescripts 2. Strict and rigid discipline and courtesy 3. Cooperation (highest) 4. Health For the Marauders, the health of the soldiers was of paramount importance and a crucial psychological weapon in a brutal campaign against a cruel enemy in an unforgiving environment.

“We had the highest respect for the pilots of those small planes,” said Bob Passanisi from his home in Brooklyn. “They would land in some of the most difficult places to help our wounded.”

marauder leader Above left: Lt. Col. Charles Hunter, the de facto leader of Merrill’s Marauders, points a stick to orient General Joseph Stilwell (left), who has just arrived at Myitkyina. Top and Above: Marauders load wounded into L-4 Grasshoppers.

British historian Gavin Mortimer is the author of The Long Range Desert Group in World War II and Merrill’s Marauders, both of which are recommended for additional reading. His next book, a biography of SAS founder David Stirling, will be published this fall.

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LEAVE NO MAN BEHIND HAMPERED BY INADEQUATE EQUIPMENT AND TRAINING, RESOURCEFUL AMERICAN AIRCREWS IMPROVISED COMBAT SEARCH-AND-RESCUE TECHNIQUES EARLY IN THE VIETNAM WAR BY EILEEN A. BJORKMAN

Above and Beyond The crewman of a Kaman HH-43 Huskie helicopter hoists a wounded American soldier from the Vietnamese jungle. U.S. search-and-rescue teams overcame numerous hurdles to expand and improve extraction procedures in the war’s early years.

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air-sea team Top: Grumman’s amphibious SA-16B Albatross, developed specifically for SAR missions, began service in the Korean War. Inset: Airmen in Korea transfer a patient from an Albatross to a Sikorsky H-5G helicopter.

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Amphibious aircraft, originally designed for maritime patrol, were repurposed for search and rescue, augmented with pursuit and small liaison airplanes for searching and bombers retrofitted for dropping life rafts and other supplies. In the last months of the war, tiny helicopters introduced in the China-Burma-India Theater proved their worth for picking up airmen downed on land.

Search and rescue came of age during the Korean War with the advent of more-capable helicopters and an amphibious aircraft designed specifically for the SAR mission, the Grumman SA-16 Albatross. In Korea the U.S. Air Force’s Air Rescue Service extracted nearly 1,000 personnel from hostile territory. After the war, however, military strategies centered on nuclear weapons,

and SAR during a nuclear war seemed ludicrous: There would be no one left to rescue. Air Rescue Service crews no longer trained for combat conditions and mostly flew support missions following peacetime accidents.

In November 1961, USAF crews began training South Vietnamese pilots in counterinsurgency operations using older aircraft such as North American T-28 trainers and Douglas B-26 bombers. Despite the stated goal of training, U.S. crews were soon flying combat missions against the Viet Cong.

The Air Force was initially reluctant to station dedicated SAR aircraft in Vietnam since their presence would indicate U.S. involvement in combat. Instead, a handful of assigned rescue

PREVIOUS SPREAD: LARRY BURROWS/THE LIFE PICTURE COLLECTION VIA GETTY IMAGES; TOP: NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE U.S. AIR FORCE, COURTESY OF RON OLSEN; ALL OTHER IMAGES THIS SPREAD: U.S. AIR FORCE

DURING WORLD WAR II THE U.S. MILITARY DEVELOPED RUDIMENTARY CAPABILITIES TO RESCUE DOWNED AIRCREW MEMBERS WHO DITCHED IN THE SEA—A SCENARIO THAT UNTIL THEN HAD USUALLY AMOUNTED TO A DEATH SENTENCE.

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tenure. When searchers couldn’t find downed airmen, Saunders suspended the mission and aircraft then often dropped leaflets offering rewards. The rewards were for turning in equipment, not people, since the Geneva Conventions forbid ransoms. Saunders figured it was okay to say, “We’ll give you 35,000 dong for the parachute if the man is with it, or…17,000 dong if he isn’t with it.” The leaflets rarely worked; he was aware of only one instance when a leaflet drop resulted in someone coming forward, and that information turned out to be useless.

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n March 26, 1964, Captain Richard L. Whitesides, who months earlier had become the first Vietnam War recipient of the Air Force Cross, took off from Khe Sanh, just south of the DMZ, in a single-engine Cessna O-1 for a two-hour visual reconnaissance mission. Army Special Forces Captain Floyd J. Thompson accompanied him as observer.

After the O-1 failed to return, dozens of flights searched for 16 days around mountainous ter-

dangerous liaison Flying a Cessna O-1 (below), Captain Richard Whitesides (above) was killed and observer Captain Floyd Thompson captured in 1964 when the Viet Cong shot them down.

Top: Thompson returns from captivity in 1973.

PREVIOUS SPREAD: LARRY BURROWS/THE LIFE PICTURE COLLECTION VIA GETTY IMAGES; TOP: NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE U.S. AIR FORCE, COURTESY OF RON OLSEN; ALL OTHER IMAGES THIS SPREAD: U.S. AIR FORCE

coordinators relied on Army helicopters and the CIA’s Air America, neither of which had crews trained for combat SAR. Even if the Air Force had been willing to send SAR aircraft to Vietnam, Air Rescue Service equipment was woefully inadequate, suited mostly for fire-fighting support and rescues near a base.

Air Force Major Alan W. Saunders arrived at Tan Son Nhut Air Base near Saigon in June 1963 to work at Detachment 3, Pacific Air Rescue Center. Saunders knew from his WWII experience in Burma that finding downed aircraft in jungles could be difficult. When an airplane hit the jungle canopy, the trees opened up, the machine dropped in and the trees closed back over with nary a dent in the foliage. Even a fire usually left no burn mark.

By the time Saunders arrived, scores of servicemen had been lost. That September, the major and his staff wrote a report to justify the use of professional Air Force SAR units and sent it up the chain of command. As the report crawled through layers of bureaucracy, Saunders fumed at what he viewed as ineptitude that cost lives. In November a U.S. Army helicopter crashed into the ocean at night off the South Vietnamese central coast. All four crew members survived the crash, but while they swam about in their floatation gear expecting to be rescued, the Army’s higher-echelon commander decided not to send helicopters: His pilots weren’t trained to fly at night, which is what had caused the accident in the first place. The copilot swam to shore with a broken arm and hid overnight in bushes. The other three crewmen drowned.

Despite the primitive conditions and equipment, Saunders’ unit found all but two of the nearly 250 aircraft they searched for during his

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rescue huskies Above: An HH-43B sits on the Marston Mat at Nakhon Phanom Royal Thai Air Force Base near the Thailand-Laos border. Right: An HH-43, called “Pedro” by its crewmen, rescues a downed airman from enemycontrolled jungle.

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rain covered with dense jungle teeming with Viet Cong. More than 200 South Vietnamese soldiers and U.S. Special Forces personnel joined a ground search, which turned up several villagers who claimed they had seen a small aircraft flying just above treetop level, spewing smoke. More searching and the offer of a reward turned up nothing.

The search was suspended on April 11 and 200,000 leaflets were dropped. On May 21 a defector reported having seen Viet Cong forces shoot down an O-1 in late March. He said one of the Americans was killed in the crash and the other was wounded and captured. The report renewed a flurry of searching, but two weeks later the jungle still refused to surrender the O-1.

On June 2 the U.S. dropped an additional 100,000 reward leaflets. Radio Hanoi broad-

cast a statement on November 4 from Captain Thompson, who had been captured by guerrillas.

He was released in 1973 at the end of the war. It took another four decades to recover Whitesides; his remains were identified in 2014.

After months of Air Force and Army wrangling over ownership of the search-and-rescue mission, Saunders finally received approval to move SAR units to Southeast Asia. He wanted four units with Kaman HH-43B Huskie helicopters, but Air Rescue Service planners instead chose only two units with Sikorsky CH-3s, which Saunders considered too big for Vietnam’s jungles and rugged terrain. And more than two units were needed to cover the vast north-south distances in Vietnam.

Still, it was better than nothing.

Throughout the summer of 1964, Saunders continued advocating for HH-43Bs, even though they, like the CH-3s, weren’t outfitted for combat and were primarily used for crash rescue. When an aircraft crashed, a Huskie was airborne in less than 90 seconds. Slung beneath the helicopter was a fire-suppression kit, nicknamed “Sputnik,” that carried a spherical fire extinguisher about three feet in diameter, hoses and other rescue equipment. At the crash site, the HH-43B crew dropped off the Sputnik and one or more firefighters, who laid a path of foam toward the burning wreckage while the helo pilots hovered 10 feet above, using air from their contrarotating rotors to push the foam along the path and create a safe corridor for rescuers to pull survivors to safety.

Saunders asked that any Huskies sent to Viet­ nam be modified for combat with upgraded engines, self-sealing fuel tanks, shatterproof glass, armor plating and gun mounts on the doors. But Kaman told the Air Force it would take another three months to modify the helicopters, so it would be at least September before the newer aircraft, the HH-43F, arrived.

In June 1964 two unmodified HH-43Bs from Okinawa arrived at Nakhon Phanom (NKP) Royal Thai Air Force Base (RTAFB) near the ThailandLaos border. Two Albatross amphibians (now designated HU-16s) also arrived at Korat RTAFB near Bangkok, followed by two more HU-16s at Da Nang Air Base on South Vietnam’s east coast.

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few days after the Gulf of Tonkin Inci­ dent in August, Detachment 2 of the Central Air Rescue Center at Minot AFB in North Dakota got orders to deploy to Vietnam. The unit had only two helicopters and they both needed major maintenance, so someone borrowed two serviceable HH-43Bs from nearby Grand Forks AFB. Maintenance personnel at Minot disassembled the loaners and loaded them onto a Douglas C-124 cargo plane as Huskie pilot 1st Lt. John Christianson and his squadron mates rushed about, getting their per-

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sonal affairs in order and collecting equipment for their deployment.

After hopscotching on a C-130 across the U.S. and Pacific, the detachment finally landed at Da Nang, where Christianson recalled the base commander greeted them with, “Who the hell are you and what are you doing here?”

There wasn’t much action at first for the HH-43Bs. The Huskies were assigned to missions over land but many downed aircrews made it to the Gulf of Tonkin, where the Albatrosses or Navy helos picked them up.

In November a unit equipped with the HH-43F models that Saunders coveted arrived from the U.S. to replace Christianson’s unit. Rather than return to the States, Christianson, along with another pilot, Jim Sovell, went to NKP in Thailand to replace two pilots.

On November 18, right after Christianson and Sovell arrived at NKP, F-100 Super Sabre pilot Captain Bill Martin was downed by anti-aircraft artillery while escorting a reconnaissance mission in Laos. He ejected near the border with North Vietnam and his wingman radioed for help. An Air America aircraft responded first, but an HU-16 soon arrived, followed shortly by two Navy Douglas A-1 Skyraiders. The “Spad” pilots took out the gun emplacements with their 20mm cannons and spotted the F-100 wreckage. The HU-16 called NKP and asked for helicopters to fly to the wreckage and pick up Martin.

After two HH-43s were refused entry into Laos because the U.S. ambassador in Vientiane hadn’t given his permission to cross the border, someone called the embassy to get authorization. Christianson and Sovell got in on the action, flying their Huskies straight across the Mekong River into Laos to meet the waiting Spad and HU-16 pilots, who escorted them to the crash site. But an extensive search came up empty-handed.

Overnight the SAR center coordinated 31 aircraft to search the next morning: 13 USAF Republic F-105 fighters, eight F-100s, six Navy Spads, two HH-43s and two Air America helicopters. At that point, it was the largest number of aircraft assembled for a SAR mission in Vietnam.

By mid-morning an HU-16 and four F-105s had sighted Martin’s parachute near his F-100 on a prominent limestone karst outcrop. As the F-105s attacked a nearby gun emplacement, the HU-16 brought in the two Air America helicopters, escorted by four T-28s. The copilot of one of the helicopters was lowered on a hoist to the parachute, but Martin was dead, having apparently succumbed to injuries from landing on the jagged limestone terrain.

The rescue forces mourned Martin’s death, but the coordinated effort that found and recovered his body proved that SAR in Southeast Asia was starting to mature.

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n February 13, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson authorized the campaign of airstrikes in North Vietnam designated Operation Rolling Thunder. USAF aircraft poured into Southeast Asia, along with additional Navy ships and aircraft carriers.

Albatrosses operating from Da Nang had a brief heyday during Rolling Thunder, rescuing 35 U.S. airmen and one South Vietnamese pilot who bailed out over the Gulf of Tonkin. Every day an HU-16 departed Da Nang just before sunrise and orbited in a racetrack pattern about 20 miles off the coast of North Vietnam until noon, then a later shift orbited from noon until sunset. The HU-16’s navigator helped maintain the aircraft’s position via radio using the Tactical Air Navigation (TACAN) system carried aboard a Navy destroyer in the gulf.

As the Albatross flew its pattern, armed aircraft orbited near it in a rescue combat air patrol (RESCAP), using their guns if needed to ward off hostile boats or land forces that might converge on any downed aircrew. The low-and-slow propdriven A-1s were best for RESCAP. A Spad pilot could spot ground targets more easily than a jet pilot and the A-1 usually carried more ammunition, could loiter longer and its armor-plated underbelly could take a huge amount of punishment from small-arms fire.

If an aircraft went down, the pilot’s wingman broadcast its position over the radio. The Alba­ tross and RESCAP aircraft headed toward the location, with the speedier RESCAP aircraft usually arriving first. They fired warning shots across the bow of any threatening sampans or junks and shot the boat if it kept approaching. If survivors weren’t in immediate danger and a Navy helicop-

stable platform Top: The interweaving rotors of the HH-43, seen here during a training mission, made the traditional tail rotor unnecessary.

Above: The patch of the 3rd Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Group’s Detachment 14, based at Tan Son Nhut Air Base near Saigon, reflected the squadron’s preference for the nimble HH-43 over the larger Sikorsky HH-3 Jolly Green Giant.

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Star power Top: This HU-16B crew, including pilots Dave Westenbarger and Dave Wendt (second and fourth from left), earned Silver Stars for a November 1, 1965, rescue mission. Above: A Douglas A-1E escorts an Albatross off the Mekong Delta.

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ter happened to be nearby, Albatross crews usually waited for the helo to make the pickup, since the HU-16 was prone to damage during water landings. The Albatross crew might drop a smoke flare to mark the spot, or in some cases they dropped the flare away from the pilot and circled above the smoke to deceive any hostile forces.

On November 1, 1965, an Albatross crew earned Silver Stars for a rescue under fire. Captain Dave Westenbarger and copilot Captain Dave Wendt had been almost ready to return to Da Nang at the end of their shift when an Air Force F-101 Voodoo

was shot down. Two A-1s from the carrier Oriskany orbiting with them headed for the downed pilot, Norman Huggins. He had landed in the water but was close to an island and swam ashore, where North Vietnamese spotted him and chased him back into the water. While he used his .38 pistol to keep his attackers at bay, the Albatross arrived.

The HU-16 crew had to jettison their external fuel tanks before they could land on the water, but the left tank didn’t drop away. Westenbarger and Wendt decided to land anyway, and as they lowered their flaps and slowed down, the tank fell off.

Then two sampans fired at the Albatross and one of the Spad pilots launched several rockets at the lead boat, destroying it. The HU-16’s propellers made a sickening sound as they shredded the sampan’s wooden debris, but the Albatross emerged unscathed. The second sampan turned and fled.

After chasing away another enemy swimming toward Huggins, the HU-16’s pararescue jumper, Airman 1st Class James Pleiman, went into the water and pulled him to safety. Westenbarger and Wendt delivered him to Da Nang, where the grateful pilot bought drinks for everyone. Four months later, Pleiman was killed during an attempt to rescue an F-4 crew from the gulf.

By late October 1965, several Navy crews back in the States were training for combat operations in Kaman UH-2 Seasprites that had been modified with armor and more powerful engines.

But as combat operations in the gulf increased,

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OPPOSITE PHOTOS: COURTESY OF DAVE WENDT; ABOVE LEFT: COURTESY OF EILEEN BJORKMAN; ABOVE RIGHT: SAN DIEGO AIR AND SPACE MUSEUM

commanders began to ask more from unmodified Seasprites already in theater. On November 8 a UH-2 from helicopter squadron HC-2 was sent to the frigate Richmond K. Turner as a last-ditch backup for an overland combat SAR mission that had kicked off on November 5 after an F-105 crashed.

Two A-1s and a CH-3 were shot down during the rescue attempt, and an SH-3 helicopter crashlanded on a 4,000-foot mountain after running out of fuel. The desperate task force commander dispatched the only helicopter he had left, the UH-2 sitting on Turner. Arriving at the mountaintop, the underpowered helo pulled two of the four downed aircrew aboard. An Air Force helicopter arrived later to rescue the remaining crewmen.

The UH-2 had been staged on Turner for a single mission, but someone soon decided to routinely keep helicopters onboard smaller, more maneuverable ships that could operate farther north and closer to Vietnam’s shore than lumbering aircraft carriers. Exactly who made the decision is lost to history, but on November 8 a UH-2 from Oriskany’s squadron HC-1 was dispatched to the guidedmissile cruiser Gridley.

Pilots Lieutenant Tom Saintsing and Lt. (j.g.)

Jim Welsh, along with Airman James Hug and Petty Officer 3rd Class John Shanks, were the guinea pig crew. They landed on Gridley’s fantail, on a spot barely big enough for one helicopter. Saint­ sing recalled Gridley’s captain greeting them with: “I know nothing about helicopters. You’re going to have to tell me what to do and how to do it.”

With limited rescue experience and no combat time, Saintsing and Welsh barely knew what to do themselves. But once aboard Gridley they didn’t have long to wait for some action. Weather closed in the second day of their stay and waves tossed the cruiser about. At about 2 a.m. someone woke the crew and sent them to retrieve Lt. Cmdr. Paul

Merchant, who had ditched his Spad about a mile offshore in the gulf after taking groundfire during a night reconnaissance mission.

A little over an hour later, Saintsing and his crew skimmed 200 feet above the black water. The weather was terrible, with 25-foot waves rising and merging with the dark sky. They were up against two North Vietnamese fishing boats and enemy forces on the beach who fired at them as they approached. Blue streaks from tracer fire filled the sky. No one on the helicopter had been shot at before and they didn’t even wear flak jackets. Their armament consisted of two Thompson submachine guns tossed aboard almost as an afterthought.

The helicopter won the race. Hovering above Merchant, the two enlisted crewmen lowered a rescue sling and reeled the pilot aboard.

Dangerously low on fuel, Saintsing turned back toward Gridley. Before they took off, he noted the Seasprite wouldn’t have enough fuel to fly the more than 200-mile round trip, so he asked the crew to steam toward the coast. Just before Saintsing touched down again around 4:15 a.m., the lowfuel light illuminated the cockpit.

On November 28 the first Seasprites equipped with armor plates and Navy crews specifically trained for the SAR mission arrived in the Gulf of Tonkin. Although SAR crews, equipment and techniques continued to improve throughout the war, the arrival of the modified Seasprites and the detachments of helicopters on smaller ships signaled that SAR in Southeast Asia was finally a mature mission.

Retired U.S. Air Force officer and former flight test engineer Eileen Bjorkman is a freelance writer and author of Unforgotten in the Gulf of Tonkin: A Story of the U.S. Military’s Commitment to Leave No One Behind, which is recommended for further reading.

flying from the fantail Above left: Lieutenant Tom Saintsing and his UH-2 Seasprite crew were dispatched from the carrier Oriskany to the cruiser Gridley to test the feasibility of SAR operations from smaller ships. Above: An armed and armored UH-2A takes off from a warship in the Gulf of Tonkin.

NO ONE ON THE HELICOPTER HAD BEEN SHOT AT BEFORE AND THEY DIDN’T EVEN WEAR FLAK JACKETS. MARCH 2021

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eastward bound Newfoundlanders gather around the Stinson SM-1 Pride of Detroit on August 27, 1927, to see off William Brock and Edward Schlee on their world flight attempt.

THE GREATEST FLIGHT IN 1927, ON THE HEELS OF LINDBERGH’S TRANSATLANTIC SUCCESS, TWO MIDWESTERNERS ATTEMPTED TO FLY AROUND THE WORLD IN A SINGLE-ENGINE STINSON BY BARRY LEVINE

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THE MID-1920S WAS AN ERA MARKED BY AVIATION CHALLENGES, AS PILOTS PUSHED THEMSELVES AND THEIR AIRPLANES TO THE LIMIT ON RECORD-BREAKING FLIGHT ATTEMPTS. interested parties From left: Aviation industry pioneers Eddie Rickenbacker, unknown, Brock, Schlee, Henry Ford and Edsel Ford confer in Dearborn, Mich., beside Schlee and Brock’s SM-1 Detroiter.

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In April 1924 four Douglas World Cruiser biplanes, each with a two-man crew, began an around-the-world trip, taking 175 days to fly almost 24,000 miles, with two of the aircraft completing the circumnavigation. Charles Lind­ bergh’s May 1927 transatlantic crossing took less than 34 hours, earned him a $25,000 prize and sparked even more interest in challenging, high-risk, over-ocean flights. Three months after Lindbergh’s celebrated flight, Ed Schlee and Bill

Brock attempted to fly around the world in an aircraft not much larger than Lindbergh’s Ryan NYP Spirit of St. Louis—a truly herculean effort.

Edward F. Schlee was born in Detroit in 1887 and with his brothers formed the Wayco Oil Corporation after World War I, eventually owning about 100 gas stations in the metro area.

Schlee learned to fly and also owned an air taxi service using Stinson biplanes. His chief pilot was Bill Brock.

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PREVIOUS SPREAD: CONCEPTION BAY MUSEUM ARCHIVES; OPPOSITE: WALTER F. REUTHER LIBRARY, ARCHIVES OF LABOR AND URBAN AFFAIRS, WAYNE STATE UNIVERSITY; ABOVE LEFT: SAN DIEGO AIR AND SPACE MUSEUM; ABOVE RIGHT: THE HENRY FORD

Born in 1895, Ohioan William S. Brock had at age 15 traveled to Glenn Curtiss’ flying school in Hammondsport, N.Y. Brock didn’t have the $150 tuition, so Curtiss told him to write home for funds.

In the interim, he worked in the kitchen to cover his board. Unknown to Curtiss, Brock took flying lessons from one of the instructors and was soloing in less than a week. It didn’t take long before the instructor said, “Kid, you’re as good as I am.”

Advances in aviation technology were supported by many influential people of the day, including industrialist Henry Ford and his son Edsel. Based in Dearborn, Mich., the Fords sponsored an annual Ford National Reliability Air Tour competition beginning in 1925 to help build the public’s trust in safe air travel. The 1927 tour, held from June 27 to July 12, covered more than 4,000 miles and was won by the same Stinson SM-1 Detroiter that Schlee and Brock would use on their flight. Eddie Stinson, co-founder of Stinson Aircraft, was the pilot, accompanied

by Schlee, Schlee’s wife and other passengers.

Originally named Miss Wayco after Schlee’s company, the airplane was rechristened Pride of Detroit for the around-the-world attempt.

Like Henry and Edsel Ford, Schlee wanted to prove the reliability of air travel. “Our flight is not a stunt,” he said. “Our main purpose is to demonstrate, dramatically perhaps, but definitely, how practical and serviceable travel by air is today.”

An additional goal was to beat the round-theworld record, which at the time was about 28½ days. That effort had been completed in 1926 by Linton Wells and Edward Evans, who used steamships, trains, cars and aircraft for their multi-modal trip. Schlee and Brock planned for their trip to be 100 percent airborne.

Flying around the world with 1920s technology presented significant challenges. The flight would be costly; Wayco’s profits enabled Schlee to provide $100,000 of funding. He also organized the route and identified refueling, maintenance and rest stops. These and other logistics took about a year to organize, dealing with slow communications, language translations and foreign govern-

dynamic duo Above: Bill Brock (left) was Pride of Detroit’s primary pilot while Ed Schlee financed their world flight and spelled Brock at the controls. Right: The pair pose with Miss Wayco, as their SM-1 was known before they renamed it for the trip.

ment bureaucracies. The U.S. Navy promised assistance for the Pacific Ocean flight segments.

T FLYING AROUND THE WORLD WITH 1920S TECHNOLOGY PRESENTED SIGNIFICANT CHALLENGES.

he SM-1 Detroiter chosen for the journey cost $12,000 off the assembly line and held up to six passengers. It was 33 feet long, had a 45.8-foot wingspan and was powered by a 220-hp Wright J-5 Whirlwind engine that delivered a maximum speed of 122 mph.

The reliable Wright Whirlwind was a real asset for long-distance aviation efforts. The 9-cylinder air-cooled radial weighed less than liquid-cooled engines, allowing extra fuel to be carried. More­ over, its simpler and lighter design meant less could go wrong.

All available cabin space would be used for fuel and oil storage. The instrument panel featured various engine gauges, an airspeed indicator, an altimeter and an earth inductor compass that was more stable than previous devices, making it easier to hold a heading over long periods in the air. No radio was on board.

Concerned that the Detroiter’s loud engine would lull them to sleep, the aviators installed balsa wood in the cabin to muffle the noise. Felt was placed over the gas tank in the fuselage for a bit of comfort during sleep time. Brock, who was short, thought he had sufficient space but that the taller Schlee would have to be a contortionist to fit in that limited area. Auxiliary five-gallon gas cans stored in the cabin added to the cramped conditions.

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jumping-off point Top: Newfoundland residents constructed a 4,000-foot airstrip for the aviators’ use.

Above: Schlee and Brock take a break during their journey.

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able in Tokyo in case they needed a replacement.

A conversion table with time and distance on the axes and data points for different airspeeds enabled the aviators to estimate distances traveled.

The official start point for the flight would be Harbour Grace, Newfoundland, but there was a problem with that location: It didn’t have an airstrip. To rectify the situation, Stinson’s Fred

Koehler traveled to Newfoundland to meet with residents. A location near Crow Hill was selected and city officials approved construction of the airstrip on July 25, 1927, with local citizens and the Newfoundland government making contributions. Beginning in early August, workers cleared an area about 4,000 feet long and 300 feet wide.

Extensive manual labor and horse-drawn carts were involved in hauling away rock and other debris from what became the landing field. It was finished shortly before Pride of Detroit arrived.

Schlee and Brock did not appear to be averse to publicity. A July 1927 letter from Warner Adver­ tising to Schlee indicated that press releases about the flight had been sent to local magazines and other publications. Various advertisements promoting their use of Shell gasoline were produced, as Wayco was a Shell distributor.

The aviators left Ford’s Dearborn airfield on August 23, with stops in New York and Maine, before arriving at Harbour Grace (it is unclear why the fliers did not simply designate Dearborn as their official starting point). Brock was confident they could complete the trip in less than 18 days— flying just over 22,000 miles in about 240 air hours, for an average speed of 92 mph. For good measure he brought along a lucky rabbit’s foot.

Schlee and Brock took off from Harbour Grace on August 27, heading to England. They made landfall 24 hours later, but did not know where—

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so far, so good Above: After their transatlantic crossing, Schlee shakes hands with an official at England’s Croydon aerodrome while Brock looks on. Below: Shell Oil made the most of the abortive flight.

gas from reserves into the main tanks.

Weather presented its own set of challenges.

The crew dealt with a gale in the eastern Atlantic, heat and dust in southern Persia and severe storms in India and Southeast Asia. Brock later stated that the most dangerous part of the flight was when they encountered a monsoon after leaving Shanghai and “were tossed about unmercifully.”

After leaving China, thunderstorms forced them down on Japan’s Kyushu Island. By the time they

OPPOSITE TOP: CONCEPTION BAY MUSEUM ARCHIVES; OPPOSITE BOTTOM: SAN DIEGO AIR AND SPACE MUSEUM; ABOVE RIGHT: WATFORD/MIRRORPIX VIA GETTY IMAGES; RIGHT: THE HENRY FORD

England, Wales, Ireland or even France. They dropped a message, weighted down by an orange, to a few onlookers at a small fishing village. When the residents retrieved a large Union Jack flag and waved it at them, the aviators knew they were over England and were able to get their bearings and land at Croydon.

Many miles of flying lay ahead. After leaving England, their stops included Germany, Yugoslavia, Turkey, Iraq, Persia (Iran), Pakistan, India, Burma, Indochina, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Japan. Schlee and Brock overcame numerous challenges, any of which could have resulted in disaster. They could not find Stuttgart’s airfield, which they later learned was 15 miles south of the city, so they opted instead for Munich. In Hong Kong they faced a very risky takeoff, as heavy rain the night before departure left the dirt field in poor condition, especially for a heavily laden aircraft. Maintenance was a constant concern. Once, after a day of flying, Brock spent more than three hours fixing a magneto and adjusting the engine’s tappet rods and rockers.

Neither of the men anticipated getting much rest. “If we get five hours a night, we’ll be satisfied,” said Brock. Food would be whatever was available.

Language was not a concern, he said, as “we know the motions and gestures.” While Brock did most of the flying, Schlee calculated drift and pumped

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ocean. After Midway, two more long-haul overwater flights would be required: 1,440 miles to Honolulu and then 2,400 miles to San Francisco.

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quitting while they were ahead Above: A telegram from Schlee’s children helped convince them to call off the flight.

Below: Pride of Detroit is offloaded at San Francisco after the fliers returned by ship.

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reached Tokyo on September 13, they had covered more than 12,000 miles in 19 days of travel. But the long Pacific crossing lay ahead.

The transpacific leg would be extraordinarily challenging and risky. After leaving Tokyo, Schlee and Brock would have to find Midway Atoll, about 2,500 miles distant. Midway consists primarily of two small islands, each about two miles long and a half-mile wide, with a maximum elevation of 45 feet—essentially specks of sand in the

y this time in 1927, a series of tragedies had the public questioning transoceanic flying. Four days before Schlee and Brock left Newfoundland, Paul Redfern set out from Sea Island, Ga., in a Stinson Detroiter on a flight across the Caribbean Sea to Rio de Janeiro and disappeared in the Amazon jungle (see “Lost Flight to Brazil,” January 2021). Canadian aviators Terrence Tully and James Medcalf attempted a flight from London, Ontario, to London, England, in August. At some point after leaving Newfoundland on September 7, their Detroiter disappeared into the Atlantic. In another tragedy, 10 people lost their lives during the August Dole Air Race from California to Hawaii. The Navy spent millions of dollars searching for these lost fliers, but abandoned the effort due to very limited budgets. As a result, the Navy rescinded its offer to help Schlee and Brock. Navy

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OPPOSITE TOP: COURTESY OF BARRY LEVINE; LEFT: SAN DIEGO AIR AND SPACE MUSEUM; TOP RIGHT: GEORGE RINHART/CORBIS VIA GETTY IMAGES; BOTTOM RIGHT: THE HENRY FORD

Secretary Curtis Wilbur said the service would no longer “aid and abet any man who attempted to commit suicide.”

Meanwhile, hundreds of telegrams were sent to the U.S. embassy in Tokyo, pleading for the fliers to call it quits. Press and aviation experts began calling the trip a suicide flight. One telegram in particular, received by the American consul, may have tipped the scale. It was from Schlee’s young children, Rosemarie and Teddy, and read: “Daddy dear please take boat home to us. We miss you.”

Schlee’s wife hoped that the fliers would be “sensible and take a Vancouver boat.”

Given the mounting pressure, on September 15 Schlee and Brock decided to call off the remainder of the flight. Heeding Mrs. Schlee’s advice, they took a passenger ship back to the United States, along with the partially disassembled Pride of Detroit. Arriving in San Francisco, Schlee indicated public opinion, as well as the Navy’s change of heart, had influenced their decision: “[A]fter we got about 800 cablegrams from friends and relatives telling us it would be suicidal…we decided to give it up.”

The two aviators had their aircraft reassembled in San Francisco and flew home. Following several stops, they landed in Dearborn on October 4. Friends and family hosted a parade and then a reception that evening, where Schlee collapsed from exhaustion.

The Detroit Free Press summarized their achievement: “Schlee and Brock flew more than halfway around the world with only brief stops, traversing oceans and continents, mountain ranges and deserts, combating fierce storms in strange lands and waters. Their skill and courage never failed them and their machine proved staunch. They demonstrated the practicability of sustained, longdistance flying. All these things combine to make their trip ‘the greatest flight.’”

Schlee and Brock enjoyed a fair amount of celebrity after the flight. In an appearance in Lan­ sing, Mich., their message to attendees was “aviation today is safe, is sane, and practical.” In 1928 Schlee sold the Wayco Oil Corporation and used the proceeds to underwrite ventures such as the Schlee-Brock Aircraft Corporation, which, among other things, sold Lockheed Vegas. The two men undertook various long-distance flights around the country, but nothing compared to their globegirdling effort.

When the aviation industry fell victim to the Depression, Pride of Detroit was auctioned off in 1931 to satisfy a debt. At one point it was stored in a cow shed. The aircraft was subsequently restored and is now displayed at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn—very close to where Schlee and Brock set out on their round-the-world attempt.

Bill Brock succumbed to cancer in 1932, at age 36. Ed Schlee worked as an aircraft inspec-

tor at Packard during World War II and died in 1969. Their flight and those of countless men and women since then have led to tremendous advancements in aviation technology and safety.

Round-the-world travel can now be completed in just a couple of days, with minimal stops and with a level of comfort and safety that Schlee and Brock could only have imagined.

alive and well Top: Schlee and Brock wear leis presented to them upon their arrival in San Francisco.

Above: Their Stinson is now displayed at the Henry Ford Museum.

Barry Levine works at the Henry Ford Museum in Dear­born; volunteers at the Yankee Air Museum in Belle­ville, Mich.; and writes on a variety of aviation and history topics. For further reading, he recommends: Detroitland: A Collection of Movers, Shakers, Lost Souls, and History Makers From Detroit’s Past, by Richard Bak. MARCH 2021

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Northward BOund The semi-rigid airship Norge floats near the mooring mast at Ny-Ã…lesund, Norway, on the island of Spitsbergen in May 1926, prior to its voyage to the North Pole.

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INTO COLD AIR OF THE MULTIPLE EARLY EXPLORERS WHO CLAIMED TO HAVE REACHED THE NORTH POLE, ONLY THE CREW OF THE AIRSHIP NORGE DEFINITIVELY ACHIEVED THEIR GOAL

BY MICHAEL ENGELHARD

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A notch in his belt Famed explorer Roald Amundsen, the first man to reach the South Pole and navigate the Northwest Passage, added the North Pole to his list of storied accomplishments when Norge and its crew crossed the pole 16 hours after leaving Spitsbergen on May 11.

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ON FRONT STREET, OUTSIDE CITY HALL, A BRONZE BUST OF NOME’S MOST FAMOUS VISITOR, EXPLORER ROALD ENGELBREGT GRAVNING AMUNDSEN, GREETS TOURISTS AND FELLOW ADVENTURERS— MUSHERS AT THE IDITAROD TRAIL SLED DOG RACE’S FINISH LINE. 1/13/21 9:04 AM

ALL PHOTOS: NATIONAL LIBRARY OF NORWAY, EXCEPT WHERE NOTED

The beak-nosed old salt looks a bit green around the gills, and gulls sometimes treat him unkindly.

He deserves better.

Amundsen last set foot in this town at 5 a.m. on May 16, 1926, in the company of four men, delivered to shore by the launch Pippin. He had departed Ny-Ålesund, Norway, on Spitsbergen’s westernmost tip five days earlier aboard the semirigid airship Norge with 15 others bound for the North Pole. Norge, named after Amundsen’s home­ land, had departed Rome on March 29 and journeyed to Svalbard’s Norwegian-ruled islands via London and Leningrad. The silver-cigar hulk, dull pewter when clouds shuttered the sun, was the brainchild of Colonel Umberto Nobile, an aeronautical engineer and World War I Italian air service officer whose bearing befitted his last name. With its 347-foot-long rubberized membrane braced by a metal frame fore and aft and plumped by 670,000 cubic feet of pressurized hydrogen—the equivalent of more than seven Olympic-size pools—Norge was no mere blimp, no manatee. The airship could travel at 62 mph, half the top speed of that era’s fastest racecars.

With Nobile as pilot, Amundsen as the expedition leader and Lincoln Ellsworth, the American sponsor-sportsman son of a millionaire, Norge cast off at 8:55 a.m. on May 11 to make history.

It was smooth sailing at 3,000 feet. Ink-black water gaped in the fanged pack ice below. Polar bears startled by the monstrous apparition dove into the sea, belugas hid under floes. Near the magnetic pole, Norge’s compass twitched nervously.

The scene transported Amundsen back to 1906, when he and his crew of six had sailed the sloop Gjøa through the long-sought Northwest Passage between Greenland and Alaska. Jailed by ice and “wild with eagerness to get to a telegraph office

and send the news to the world,” he’d sledded from Herschel Island to the city of Eagle, Alaska, 700 miles round trip, his quest all but completed.

Having found his stride, he’d then led the first group to the South Pole in 1911.

At 6 p.m., Norge’s port engine stalled. The switch to the third, starboard engine—silenced thus far to save fuel and as a reserve—went smoothly. It started with a roar and the mechanic attending the dead one, cussing for hours, found the glitch: Ice had clogged the fuel line.

Polar pioneers Top: Amundsen, framed by Norge’s control cabin door, meets the press prior to the historic flight.

Above: Umberto Nobile (right), the airship’s Italian pilot, awaits departure at Ciampino aerodrome outside Rome before the journey to Norway.

Left: The expedition’s financial backer, American Lincoln Ellsworth, wears traditional Nordic garb on Spitsbergen.

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staying the course Above: Norge’s enclosed keel stowed a variety of expedition and emergency gear.

Right: Norwegian navy captain Hjalmar Riiser-Larsen gets a fix on the airship’s position with the help of a sextant, later used to confirm Norge had reached the pole.

At midnight, Ellsworth turned 46. Ninety minutes later, on May 12—16 hours after leaving Ny-Ålesund—Norge’s shadow fell on the pole, as sextant readings confirmed. The crew dropped three weighted flags from a window: Norway’s indigo, white-bordered cross on a red field; Italy’s Tricolore; and Old Glory, a nod to Ellsworth funding the venture. They relished their single hot meal: meatballs from a thermos cask, swimming in grease. Their hydrogen gas and engine fuel cargo made cooking and smoking too risky.

Norge, sniffing safety, pointed its blunt muzzle south, toward Alaska.

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las, conditions deteriorated inside and out. Relations between Amundsen and Nobile, already strained in the cramped, freezing, noisy cockpit, worsened when the Norwegian noticed that the Italian flag fluttering pole-ward was bigger than the other two.

Since that milestone, ice had sheathed Norge’s exterior guide wires. As vibrations flaked off shards, the propellers hurled them against the behemoth’s fabric, where, sounding like gunshots, they tore ragged cuts. The sleep-deprived crew rubber-patched several. Under the mental strain and pelted by snow—as if in a disaster flick in which things progressively fall apart—they imagined seeing the mainland.

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First land materialized west of Barrow at 6:45 a.m. on the 13th. Norge droned over the whaling community of Wainwright a little later. Amundsen and his engineer, Oskar Omdal, recognized a cabin in which they’d stayed during the 1922-23 Maud Expedition. Through snow-streaked windows, they saw figures on the roof of the small house waving at them.

Near Teller, Norge followed a ravine amid the landscape’s milky monotony. Without warning, a blast of wind pushed the airship toward a flanking hill. The windows had fogged up, so Nobile, taking over the wheel, ordered the navigator to stick his head out. A warning of impending doom came almost too late. Nobile, pulling into a steep climb, managed to dodge the hill but feared he’d lost an engine gondola. The engineer in that pod swore he could have touched the rocky crest.

Next, the sun caused the hydrogen to expand, lifting Norge like a child’s runaway Mylar balloon. The increasing pressure threatened to burst Amundsen’s bubble. Nobile opened valves to bleed the envelope. The airship, however, rose faster than gas could be released. “Fast to the bow” sent crew members scrambling up the tilted keel, shifting the balance. Norge’s nose dropped, ending the deadly climb seconds before the gasbag would have ripped.

At 3:30 a.m. on May 14, Norge reached Teller, an Inupiaq-Eskimo coastal settlement 63 miles northwest of Nome. Residents spotting the airship from their windows first mistook it for an odd cloud in the shape of a whale. Amund­sen chose to end the flight here, 3,393 miles from Ny-Ålesund. They’d been awake more or less for three days, fueled by coffee and sandwiches, though with subzero temperatures the coffee was cold and the sandwiches brittle shingles.

All 100-some villagers crowded onto the sea ice, including 14-year-old Elizabeth “Betty” Pinson, who’d lost both legs to frostbite at age six when the 1918 influenza pandemic killed the grandparents whom she’d been visiting in their sod igloo. (Kindhearted folks had ordered and paid for prosthetics.) The kids around Betty clung to each other or to their mothers or clapped hands over their ears to drown out the racket. Some hid in closets, thinking the world was about to end. Most of the assem-

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bled Inupiaq only even knew cars from pictures.

A voice from up high—Amundsen’s boosted by megaphone—announced the imminent descent, whereupon one storeowner grabbed the bowline and headed Norge into the wind. The airship hoisted several people off their feet, bucking, reluctant to conclude its voyage.

ABOVE RIGHT: COURTESY OF BRET CORRINGTON

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he two men who emerged from Norge’s belly couldn’t have been less alike.

Nobile—in full uniform, with medals, jackboots polished, slender, dark-eyed, clean-shaven—cradled his terrier Titina, an adopted orphan that hated flying and trembled despite her wool jersey. Amundsen may have disembarked first, in a ratty old parka and earflap hat, unsmiling as ever, the irises above his gray handlebar moustache blue as the ice of which he had seen so much. In fact, to coordinate the mooring, the mechanic Ettore Arduino already had parachuted in, mistaken by Betty for a falling door. His two superiors were no longer on speaking terms and would bunk separately with their crews in the two local stores’ dorms.

Still, Amundsen probably felt like the “Three Lucky Swedes” who’d unleashed Nome’s gold rush (one of whom actually was Norwegian).

Nobile ordered Norge’s gasbag to be deflated by pulling the release cords right away, to avoid damage. A gust nevertheless rolled the airship, which to Betty sounded “as if a million tin cans were rattling around inside.”

The crew handed out cookies, candy and Ital­ ian oranges. “It was like Christmas all over again,” Betty remembered. Amundsen, this time spared a 700-mile slog, used a small radio in the village to report their safe landing to Nome.

For weeks afterward, Teller buzzed with news of the handsome European strangers who became friends and romantic interests. And it seemed as if every woman in town wore a blouse or dress of airship silk from the hull.

In Nome, the welcome differed from the one Amundsen had received with Gjøa two decades earlier. Then, he’d paraded through town in a wagon, feted by burghers and boisterous miners, toasted at the Golden Gate Hotel. This time, he’d let them down. Bunting was scrapped, disappointment openly voiced. The reception committee disbanded. Teller, not gale-force winds, in their view had stolen the glory.

Dismantled by the Italians, Norge’s salvaged parts were crated and stored in a two-story woodframe building in Teller to await shipment to Seattle. The storage house, listed in the National

Register of Historic Places, still stands.

Nobile was promoted to general and hailed for his “conquest” as a hero of Benito Mussolini’s fascist state. In 1928, two years after they landed in Teller, seeking fame for himself and his country exclusively, he crashed Norge’s sister ship Italia northeast of Spitsbergen, stranding Titina and nine surviving crewmen on the ice.

Putting aside old grudges, Amundsen set out on a rescue mission from Tromsø, Norway, in a Latham 47 flying boat with Norwegian pilot Leif Dietrichson and four Frenchmen…never to return. Except for a wing float and fuel tank off Norway’s coast, no trace of the men or seaplane was ever found. It would take 48 days for all the Italia crash survivors to be rescued.

Discussing dirigibles in 1926, Ellsworth and Amundsen had agreed that in addition to carrying heavier loads and being able to stay airborne longer, airships had other advantages. Airplanes had to land if an engine failed; an airship crew might repair one aloft. And touchdown by plane through fog, on ice, spelled “certain death.”

Perhaps Amundsen sensed that he’d used up all his lives. “If only you knew how splendid it is up there,” he told a journalist in 1928. “That’s where I want to die.”

Nobile, heavily criticized for the Italia flight and disgraced in his native country, continued to work with airships in the Soviet Union.

Amundsen had unmoored Norge at Svalbard just two days after Richard E. Byrd and Floyd Bennett returned from their polar flight in the Fokker F.VIIa/3m trimotor Josephine Ford. Byrd’s claim, like those of Frederick Cook (1908) and Robert Peary (1909), has been disputed. Norge’s accomplishment, the first polar transit from Europe to America, soars beyond doubt.

Michael Engelhard writes from Fairbanks, Alaska, and is the author of Ice Bear: The Cultural History of an Arctic Icon. He was surprised to learn that blueeyed Elizabeth Pinson, the main source on Norge’s time in Teller, was the daughter of an Inupiaq mother and a shipwrecked German sailor who became a trader there.

Additional reading: Alaska’s Daughter: An Eskimo Memoir of the Early Twentieth Century, by Elizabeth Pinson; First Crossing of the Polar Sea,

by Roald Amundsen and Lincoln Ellsworth; and My Polar Flights: An Account of the Voyages of the Airships Italia and Norge, by Umberto Nobile.

out of gas Left: Norge’s crew assembles after their transpolar flight. From left in the foreground are Riiser-Larsen, Amundsen, Ellsworth and Nobile, holding his terrier Titina.

Above: After landing in Teller, Alaska, the crew deflated Norge and crated up its salvageable parts.

Many of Teller’s Inupiaq residents repurposed pieces of the airship’s silk hull to make clothes.

THE SUN CAUSED THE HYDROGEN TO EXPAND, LIFTING NORGE LIKE A CHILD’S RUNAWAY MYLAR BALLOON. MARCH 2021

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REvIEWS

TOMCAT RIO

A Topgun Instructor on the F-14 Tomcat and the Heroic Naval Aviators Who Flew It

This memoir is the latest in a trilogy from retired naval flight officer Dave Baranek. The first two books were well-received, covering the author’s early career, including his evolution as a radar intercept officer and his duty as an instructor in the U.S. Navy’s elite Topgun training program. > > The new installment in this autobiographical series picks up where the last one left off: After completing his Topgun assignment as a mid-level lieutenant, Baranek rejoins an F-14 Tomcat squadron (VF-2) and applies his expertise and gung-ho attitude, rising to command another such squadron (VF-211).

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The narrative provides an intimate look at the adrenaline-pumping world of seaborne air power from someone who was immersed in it, relishing the flying and the associated camaraderie, from the 1980s through the 1990s. With a dry wit, the author introduces readers to the ready room, flight

deck and the backseat of the F-14 on harrowing missions that conclude with a thump trapping aboard a pitching carrier at night. This is the real deal in unadorned prose that puts you inside the mission briefings and alongside aircrew for the flights.

In writing a memoir about his years as both flier and

Navy staff officer, the author has rendered an insightful historical record of late-20thcentury naval aviation and an engaging portrait of the warriors at the forefront of America’s national defense.

The illuminating text is augmented by dramatic full-color air-to-air photos shot by the author from his special perch of years ago. The book will appeal to history enthusiasts, veterans and young people seeking a candid guide to a career in the Navy.

Philip Handleman

REUTERS/ALAMY

tailhooking Tomcatters A Grumman F-14D Tomcat from the VF-31 makes a flight deck recovery aboard USS Abraham Lincoln after a patrol over Iraq in 2003.

by Dave “Bio” Baranek, Skyhorse Publishing, 2020, $27.99.

March 2021

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“ABLE MABEL” Martin AM-1/-1Q Mauler

by Bob Kowalski, Ginter Books, 2020, $37.95.

Combat experience in World War II compelled the U.S. Navy to reassess its carrierbased aircraft. In 1943 it issued a new requirement for a carrier-based strike plane to replace both the existing dive and torpedo bombers with a single-seat aircraft that would be faster and could carry a heavier ordnance load.

Originally designated “BT” for “bomber/torpedo,” the new category was later simplified to “A” for “attack.”

Two aircraft designed to meet that new requirement reached the production

stage. Of those, the Martin AM-1 Mauler was built in only modest numbers and was eclipsed by its more successful competitor, the Douglas AD Skyraider, which served the Navy for more than 20 years in two major wars.

“Able Mabel” recounts the development and operation of Martin’s forgotten naval attack contender. Although larger and heavier than the competing Skyraider, the AM-1 was also faster, flew higher and carried more weight. The Skyraider, how-

HAWKEYE

REUTERS/ALAMY

The Enthralling Autobiography of the Top-Scoring Israel Air Force Ace of Aces

by Brigadier General Giora Even-Epstein, Grub Street, 2020, $32.95.

As a former fighter pilot and air attaché to Israel, I had high hopes for this book, and it did not disappoint. Hawkeye is not just an autobiographical collection of “there I was” war stories (though there are plenty of those), but also touches on the history of the state of Israel, its conflicts with Arab neighbors and Israel Air Force (IAF) training and tactics.

The author describes his early desire to be a fighter pilot and the frustrations he faced, both medical and bureaucratic, before he entered pilot training at the age of 25½—a year older than the maximum age at the time—while in between he joined the paratroopers and became a world class skydiver.

Soon after Even-Epstein became a fighter pilot, he moved to the delta-wing Mirage III beginning in 1966, a mount in which he would score all his victories.

After the Six-Day War in June 1967, the IAF began a war of attrition with Egypt, which led to regular dogfights over the Suez Canal. During this conflict Even-Epstein began to shine because of his incredible eyesight, which allowed him to see enemy aircraft long before his fellow pilots and lead the attack.

When the 1973 Yom Kippur War began, Even-Epstein witnessed firsthand the chaos that ensued when Israel was caught by surprise. He split his time between headquarters and flying combat missions, eventually increasing his score to a final total of 17. He later flew for El Al Israel Airlines, trained U.S. Navy Topgun pilots to fly an Israeli fighter the U.S. bought for training and qualified as an active F-16 pilot at age 59!

Marshall Michel

ever, was deemed easier to fly and maintain and better all-around for carrier operations. Consequently, despite

the fact that it found that the AM-1 “substantially meets the contract guarantee,” the postwar Navy could not support two parallel production programs, so the AM-1 was cancelled after only 155 were built.

This latest addition to the Specialty Press “Naval Fighters” series expands on a previous volume it had published on the AM-1 with more detailed information, including a description of all Mauler mishaps and accidents. Backed by a treasure trove of illustrations, it will undoubtedly prove a useful reference source for modelers and anyone interested in naval aviation.

Robert Guttman

MACARTHUR’S AIR FORCE

American Airpower Over the Pacific and the Far East 1941–51

by Bill Yenne, Osprey Publishing, 2019, $30.

Within a few months of the Japa­ nese attack on Pearl Harbor, the American position in the Far East had turned from precarious to grim. On May 6, 1942, Lt. Gen. Jonathan Wainwright surrendered Corregidor, capping the debacle that had begun in April with the infamous Bataan Death March. Regaining the initiative fell in large measure to General Douglas MacArthur, who had withdrawn from the Philippines to Australia to reestablish his base of operations. The story of how the U.S. Army Air Forces contributed to making good on MacArthur’s legendary promise—“I shall return”—is masterfully told by aviation historian Bill Yenne. In his thoroughly researched and highly detailed history of MacArthur’s application of air power in both World War II and the Korean War, the author sheds light on the leader’s complex personality and brings to life such important figures as Far East Air Forces commander George Kenney and Fifth Air Force weapons innovator Paul Irvin “Pappy” Gunn.

Nearly five years after the end of WWII, the U.S. found itself unprepared again when war broke out in Korea, which prompted MacArthur’s hurried efforts to avert disaster, including the buildup of air power in the theater of operations.

Yenne’s book provides a balanced treatment of MacArthur’s controversial moves that led to his unceremonious dismissal by an irate President Harry Truman, followed by the famous general’s indelible address to Congress in which he said that “old soldiers never die; they just fade away.” But, as the author deftly observes, MacArthur “has never faded away.”

Philip Handleman March 2021

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REvIEWS VIDEO TOMCAT TALES Speed & Angels Productions, 2020, $19.95 DVD, $29.95 BluRay, also available for streaming at f14tomcats.com.

TAKING FLIGHT

The Nadine Ramsey Story

By Raquel Ramsey and Tricia Aurand, University Press of Kansas, 2020, $29.95.

Nadine Ramsey dropped out of high school to work as a secretary, helping support her family in the aftermath of her father’s suicide.

But the blossoming aviation industry of 1930s Wichita, Kan., soon inspired the energetic redhead to a new, and at first secret, objective: flying. Aware that her mother disapproved of women flying, Nadine managed to squirrel away enough money to pay for lessons at the Beechcraft factory at Wichita Municipal Airport. She soloed in a Velie Monocoupe after just 6½ hours of instruction. For Nadine, the sky was always a magnet after that.

Ramsey soon joined the growing ranks of women demonstrating aircraft in the wide-open Midwestern skies, appearing as a barnstormer whenever opportunity offered. In May 1938 she was one of a handful of women who took part in National Air Mail Week, marking airmail’s 20th anniversary in the U.S. By the fall of 1940, Ramsey had moved to southern Cali­ fornia, working for aircraft manufacturers and insurers. One afternoon she was taking Gertrude Snow, a prospective buyer, on a demonstration ride when a freak downdraft forced her two-seater into a tree in the mountains near Los Angeles. It could very well have been the final flight for the young pilot, who suffered a broken back, fractured ribs and head injuries.

Both her legs had been crushed as well, and doctors pushed her to let them amputate the one in worst shape. Nadine adamantly refused, however, backed by friends and family who 68

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LANTIRN (Low Altitude Navigation and Targeting Infrared for Night) pod integration alone makes it worthwhile.

Original Grumman footage was remastered and augmented throughout the video from mission recorders and aircrew cameras.

The final segments pay tribute to the steadfast maintenance personnel who kept these complex fighters flying and to the aviators who lost their lives in Tomcat mishaps—reminders of the cost of military aviation of any type. My vote for the best line of the video: A carrier approach in an F-14 “was like flying a high school gymnasium half-full of water,” says Commander Dave “Sledge” Richter, a West Coast F-14 pilot.

Tomcat Tales is a must-watch for aviation enthusiasts, especially fans of Grumman’s Big ’Cat. Dave Baranek apparently took her at her word that she would “rather die if she could not fly again.”

Though she would be aided in a months-long recovery by her brother Edwin, who moved to the West Coast to offer support, Nadine was distressed by all the publicity following her crash. To make matters worse, Snow—whose multiple injuries did result in an amputated leg—sued her, claiming that the pilot had been drinking before their flight. The entire episode left Nadine bitter and uncertain about the future, but she managed to climb back into the cockpit by January 1941 in time to join the ranks of American women pilots supporting the war effort.

Ramsey joined the Civil Air Patrol the following spring, becoming an instructor, and later the Women’s Flying Train­ ing Detachment, soon to be known as the Women Airforce Service Pilots—the first American women to fly military aircraft. Experienced aviators were then in great demand to train new pilots and ferry aircraft from manufacturers to military bases. Nadine would become one of only 26 WASPs who qualified to fly the P-38 Lightning as well as a long list of other combat planes, including the P-39 Airacobra, P-63 Kingcobra and P-51 Mustang.

Nadine Ramsey’s biography will likely inspire any modernday adventurer who is happiest in the clouds. But Taking Flight is in fact a “three-fer,” filled with entertaining details from the careers of Nadine’s highly successful mom and brother as well.

Mother Nelle founded a successful cosmetics business in the aftermath of a disastrous marriage. Brother Edwin, who in 1942 led the U.S. Army’s last cavalry charge and commanded more than 40,000 guerrillas during the Japanese invasion of the Philippines, later wrote an autobiography, Lieutenant Ramsey’s War: From Horse Soldier to Guerrilla Commander, upon which the 2016 film Never Surrender was based. All in all, theirs was a remarkable family.

Nan Siegel

STOCKTREK IMAGES, INC./ALAMY

Did you ever wish you could hang out with Tomcat pilots and RIOs (radar intercept officers) telling stories at the O-club? Well, now you can…almost, thanks to Tomcat Tales. The two-hour documentary features exciting stories told by the aircrews themselves, backed by historical video.

Tomcat Tales is the work of the Vizcarra brothers, Mark and Michael (a former F-14 pilot and RIO, respectively). The brothers tell a story or two and share the screen with 25 pilots and RIOs who recount their own aviation drama. A few, such as Dale “Snort” Snodgrass, will be recognized by airshow attendees and F-14 fans, but most were simply Navy aviators doing their jobs. They share secrets of flying airshows; riveting combat missions above Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq; carrier ops that quickly went from routine to life-threatening—these and more will have you smelling the jet exhaust and feeling the Gs. And the coordination between pilot and RIO that makes a good crew lethal comes through onscreen.

The video also summarizes the early development of the F-14 and its later evolution into a strike fighter. The story of

March 2021

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Wings Over Iraq - A new historical novel

VIETNAM’S FINAL AIR CAMPAIGN

by Eric B. Forsyth

STOCKTREK IMAGES, INC./ALAMY

Operation Linebacker I & II May–December 1972

by Stephen Emerson, Pen & Sword Books, 2019, $22.95.

Nearing the end of his first full term as president in 1968, Lyndon B. Johnson faced the reality that the United States was bogged down in the morass of Vietnam and opted not to seek reelection. The conflict in Southeast Asia had become a quagmire in which America’s powerful military was surprisingly confounded by the tenacious forces of a distant back­water nation. Throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s, the unpopular war preoccupied President Richard Nixon and his national security adviser Henry Kissinger, who desperately sought a way out that would save face, allowing “peace with honor.”

While the U.S. pursued negotiations to achieve that kind of exit, both sides jockeyed for the upper hand on the battlefield to secure an advantage in the bargaining process. In the spring of 1972, things turned dire when North Vietnamese troops surged across the Demilitarized Zone in the so-called Easter Offensive.

How the U.S. answered the challenge with two aerial bombardment campaigns is told exactingly by Stephen Emerson, the son of a naval attack pilot who flew combat tours in the war.

With the peace talks deadlocked in mid-December 1972, the Nixon administration launched Linebacker II, an 11-day offensive that pummeled the enemy’s key facilities with 15,287 tons of bombs. Centered around 729 B-52 sorties, the “Christmas Bombings” camAVHP-210300-001 Books.indd paign drove the opposition backYacht to the negotiating table and on January 27, 1973, a peace accord was reached. But the war concluded little more than two years later in a humiliating rout for the South Vietnamese, sparking the question: How might it have gone if the full weight of American air power had been unleashed at the beginning rather than close to the end?

Philip Handleman

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A gripping story of RAF bombers in Iraq during the period leading up to WWII. The country is wracked by rebellious Arab tribes, prompted by German intelligence posing as an archeological expedition. Newly qualified RAF pilot Allan Chadwick is posted to a squadron trying to maintain the flow of vital oil using obsolete Vickers Vimys. Set against the rise of fascism in Europe, Chadwick is soon exposed to the harsh realities of an undeclared war, as well as the pleasures awaiting a young man coming of age in a turbulent country.

The author was an RAF pilot and is an award-winning sailor and retired engineer. His previous book, “An Inexplicable Attraction: My Fifty Years of Ocean Sailing,” was among Kirkus’s 100 Best Memoirs of 2018.

Available worldwide wherever books are sold online, including www.YachtFiona.com Published by Yacht Fiona Books ISBN Paperback: 978-0-578-65299-3 ISBN eBook: 978-0-578-68800-8

THE LAST JAPANESE HOW MANY TIMES SOLDIER HAS THEFROM DESIGN WORLD OF THE WAR U.S.IIFLAG SURRENDERED CHANGED? IN THIS YEAR 27, 31, 36 or 40?

1

- 1945 - 1947 - 1950 - 1974 For more,search visitDAILY QUIZ For more, WWW.HISTORYNET.COM/ at HistoryNet.com.

MAGAZINES/QUIZ HistoryNet.com

ANSWER: 1974. PRIVATE TERUO NAKAMURA, A TAIWANESE NATIONAL,27.

ENLISTED IN THE JAPANESE ARMY IN 1943.

ANSWER: THE CURRENT DESIGN HAS BEEN IN HE HELD OUT ON 1960 MORTAI IN INDONESIA HE WAS CAPTURED PLACE SINCE WHEN THE FLAGUNTIL WAS MODIFIED IN DECEMBER 1974. EARLIER THAT YEAR, HIRO ONODA, WHO TO INCLUDE THE 50thFINALLY STATE. SURRENDERED. HELD OUT INHAWAII, THE PHILLIPINES,

1/14/21 4:45 PM

FLIGHT TEST

VARIABLE GEOMETRY

MYSTERY SHIP

Can you identify this swing-wing bomber? See the answer below.

John A.D. McCurdy

FLYING FIRSTS

Match the pilot who first achieved sustained, controlled, heavier-than-air flight with the country in which he did it.

A. René Vallon B. Alberto Santos-Dumont C. Yoshitoshi Tokugawa D. Alberto Braniff E. Samuel Franklin Cody F. Hans F. Dons G. Albert Kimmerling H. Colin Defries I. John A.D. McCurdy J. Vivian Walsh

1. Great Britain 2. Norway 3. Canada 4. Japan 5. New Zealand 6. France 7. China 8. Mexico 9. South Africa 10. Australia

2. How did the 1940 NikitinShevchenko IS-2 alter its wing area?

A. Changed its wingspan B. Changed its wing chord C. Retracted its lower wing D. Swept its wing forward 3. What was the first European jet airplane incorporating swing wings to fly?

A. Messerschmitt P.1101 B. Panavia Tornado C. Vickers Swallow D. Dassault Mirage G 4. What is the mostproduced variable-sweep airplane built?

A. MiG-23 B. Panavia Tornado C. General Dynamics F-111 D. Grumman F-14 5. What is the world’s largest variable-sweep airplane?

A. Rockwell B-1 B. Tupolev Tu-160 C. General Dynamics F-111 D. Tupolev Tu-22M

ANSWERS: MYSTERY SHIP: Tupolev Tu-22M3M. Learn more about it at historynet.com/aviation-history FLYING FIRSTS: A.7, B.6, C.4, D.8, E.1, F.2, G.9, H.10, I.3, J.5. VARIABLE GEOMETRY: 1.D, 2.C, 3.D, 4.A, 5.B. 70

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TOP: DMITRY TEREKHOV; BOTTOM: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

>

1. What biplane could extend its wing leading and trailing edges to alter its wing area?

A. Makhonin Mak-10 B. Messerschmitt P.1101 C. Arsenal VB.10 D. Gérin Varivol

march 2021

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Gina Elise’s

PIN-UPS FOR VETS

Megan, USAF Veteran

Pin-Ups For Vets raises funds to better the lives and boost morale for the entire military community! Buy our 2021 calendar and you contribute to Veterans’ healthcare, helping provide VA hospitals across the U.S. with funds for medical equipment and programs. We support volunteerism at VA hospitals, including personal bedside visits to deliver gifts, and we provide makeovers and new clothing for military wives and female Veterans. All that plus we send care packages to our deployed troops.

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AERO ARTIFACT

lifesaver

Initially conceived during World War II, U.S. military combat search-and-rescue tools and techniques came of age during the Korean War. More reliable helicopters and the introduction of Grumman’s amphibious SA-16 Albatross helped save at least a thousand American lives in Korea.

SAR continued to develop and mature during the Viet­ nam War (story, P. 44). New challenges quickly presented themselves, however, as extracting injured or trapped servicemen by air from the dense jungle thickets of South­east Asia proved problematic. The 1966 introduction of the Kaman Rescue Seat, known as the “jungle penetrator,” served as a literal lifeline for the injured, replacing a horse-collar device that kept getting snagged while being lowered through the forest canopy from a hovering helicopter. The penetrator, a 34-inch-long aluminum and steel device painted bright yellow for visibility, held three 12-inch retractable seat paddles. With the paddles closed, the penetrator was only eight inches in diameter and could easily slip down through the tropical thicket to the jungle floor. Once it reached the injured, the paddles were extended and secured by spring-loaded retaining latches, while three webbed safety straps, stored within the penetrator’s canvas cover, could be extended to hold rescued individuals securely in place—even if they were unconscious. The penetrator could also be used to lower down a paramedic to assist the injured.

Best practice was for one man to straddle two of the penetrator’s paddles, one under each leg, for hoisting or lowering (see inset photo), so while the specs allowed a maximum of three men weighing 200 pounds each on a lift, a more realistic scenario was two men.

And even then the National SAR Academy recommends only one survivor be hoisted at a time, noting the difficulty and danger for a single helicopter crew chief to maneuver “two subjects into the aircraft alone.” However, under fire, comfort and even safety could easily be exchanged for expediency.

extraction tool This Kaman Rescue Seat, used by the Seventh Air Force to airlift U.S servicemen from Vietnam’s jungles, was donated to Ohio’s National Museum of the U.S. Air Force in 1973.

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March 2021

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ABOVE: NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE U.S. AIR FORCE/KEN LAROCK; INSET: U.S. AIR FORCE

1/19/21 3:56 PM

Bad to the Bone Full tang stainless steel blade with natural bone handle —now ONLY $79!

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he very best hunting knives possess a perfect balance of form and function. They’re carefully constructed from fine materials, but also have that little something extra to connect the owner with nature.

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The blade is full tang, meaning it doesn’t stop at the handle but extends to the length of the grip for the ultimate in strength. The blade is made from 420 surgical steel, famed for its sharpness and its resistance to corrosion.

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This Is the End

The U.S. Silver Dollar Is About to Change...Forever!

E

ach year, millions of collectors and silver stackers around the word secure freshly struck American Eagle Silver Dollars. Minted in one Troy ounce of 99.9% pure U.S. silver, these legal-tender coins are perhaps the most widely collected silver bullion coins in the world... and they’re about to change forever.

Final Release of Original Silver Eagle Design

Since 1986, the design of the “Silver Eagle” has remained unchanged: Adolph A. Weinman’s classic 1916 Walking Liberty design paired with former U.S. Mint Chief Engraver John Mercanti’s stunning eagle reverse. But in mid-2021, the U.S. Mint plans to replace the original reverse. This initial release is the FINAL appearance of the U.S. Silver Eagle’s original design! $27 $26 $25 $24 $23 $22 $21 $20 $19 $18 $17 $16 $15 $14

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Silver Trend Chart: Price per ounce based on monthly averages.

Collectors are Already Going Wild for This “Final” Release!

For any popular coin series, two dates tend to rise to the top of demand: the first and the last. This coin represents not just the final issue of perhaps the world’s most popular silver coin, but also its 35th anniversary — an additional draw for collectors, who are already chomping at the bit, ready to secure as many coins as possible.

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Higher Values + Slowed Production = DEMAND!

In the last 12 months, average monthly values of silver bullion have increased nearly 38%! At the same time, the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in the U.S. Mint slowing production of freshly struck Silver Eagles. Add in the final issue of the original design, and you have a trifecta of demand that has buyers around the world ready to pounce.

Timing is Everything This is a strictly limited release offer for one of the world’s most popular silver coins. As the last mintage to feature the original, 35-year-old design, it represents the end of an era at a time when silver values have seen a massive increase.

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GovMint.com • 14101 Southcross Dr. W., Suite 175, Dept. LRE206-01 • Burnsville, MN 55337 GovMint.com® is a retail distributor of coin and currency issues and is not affiliated with the U.S. government. The collectible coin market is unregulated, highly speculative and involves risk.

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AVHP-210300-005 GovMint 2021 ASU BE Just Released.indd 1

12/17/20 10:13 AM