This is the place where the majority of the warbird (aircraft that have survived military service) discussions will take place. Specialized forums may be added in the new future
Tue Feb 12, 2019 9:38 am
junkman9096 wrote:In the 1960's I saw them flying over my house on a regular basis. I lived about 1/2 between Travis AFB and the Pacific Ocean. A very distinctive sound from the 4 turboprops. Strange that they always seemed to fly about 10K-15K feet above ground level, never higher. Maybe just training flights.
Imagine they would still be in climb or let down until well offshore, not a huge rate of climb. Also wonder if there was some effort to limit pressure cycles on the hull, thus keeping at lower altitudes for circuit work? Cracks were a known issue even before the catastrophic failure in 1970.
Wed Feb 13, 2019 8:32 am
The C-133 seemed to be plagued with issues.
Odd, considering who built it. After all, Douglas held a near monopoly on military-specific (not converted airliners) long range transports with their reliable C-74/C-124 series and if anyone would have known how to build a large aircraft then, it was Douglas.
It would have been interesting to see how the C-132 would have turned out.
And although it's safety record seems to have been less than great, it would be interesting to see how it compared with large Soviet turboprop transports of the period. Wiki lists just two AN-22 crashes, (one recent and one civil-registered example lost over the Atlantic in the '70s -- that they had to admit to--but predictably, they list no military losses during the Cold War period, so there may be unreported crashes and mishaps).
I don't believe a Shorts Belfast was lost in RAF service, but their utilization was probably quite a bit less.
Good thing the C-141 was just around the corner.