AGRICULTURAL AIRCRAFT and Leland Snow by Ken Rudine
"All have seen crop duster airplanes and marveled at the pilot’s bravery or recklessness, whichever we want to call it. These aircraft are technically known as an “Ag Aircraft.” They are used for spraying, seeding, fertilizing agriculture and fire fighting - all over the World."
Tuskegee Mustangs are seen streaking over southern Germany on April 1, 1945. On this day and the preceding day, they destroyed 25 enemy aircraft with only one lost. It was a historic two-day period for the Tuskegee, of which they will always be proud.
By March of 1945, Germany was surrounded and fighting a purely defensive war. To the east, the Russian Army and Air Force rushed headlong toward Berlin, crushing any resistance in their path. In the west, the Allies had crossed the Rhine River into Germany and were pushing the battered Germany army further east. To the south, the Allies advanced north past Rome and into the Po Valley of Italy.
The Allied air forces were relentless in their bombing and destruction of any effort put up by the beleaguered Luftwaffe in these final days. Among the fighter squadrons that were involved in the missions were the Tuskegee pilots of the 332nd Fighter Group. Flying out of Ramatelli, Italy, they continued their escort duties, providing the necessary protection for the bombers to hit their targets in central Germany. Many of these missions still met enemy resistance, and some of the air battles were fierce. Starved of fuel, the German war machine staggered on when it should have ended sooner. But Hitler insisted on battling on to ultimate self-destruction, both for himself and the German population.
Taken from 'Ghost Soldiers - The Forgotten Epic Story of WWII's Most Dramatic Mission'
"As the Rangers of C Company crept ever closer to the gates of Cabanatuan, Captain Prince's fear of being detected immeasurably deepened. Then, from the northwest, a godsend. They heard a low and indistinct rumble that seemed to emanate from deep within the ground, but in a few seconds it clarified into a more familiar sound - the clean, metallic hum of prop engines. A fighter was hurtling across the sky toward them at low altitude, coming from the direction of Lingayen Gulf.
Soon the aircraft was on top of them - a strange-looking plane, black as anthracite. It had a capped snout, a swollen abdomen set with cannons, and sweeping black tails - TWO of them. There was a hooked needle stuck in its nose that looked vaguely like a stinger. Stair-stepping back from the cockpit was a confusing array of nacelles and bulbous Lucite housings. On the side of the nose was painted a zaftig nude, in the style of Vargas, with the hand-sketched moniker 'hard to get'.
This menacing, insectile-looking thing was the answer to their prayers. The Sixth Army had provided a distraction. They had come through with the most impressive new fighter in the U.S. Air Force: the P-61 Black Widow.
Aside from its wicked appearance, what was most remarkable about the Black Widow was what it harbored inside its domed fiberglass probiscis: The P-61, newly sprung from the factories of Northrop, was the first American plane to be equipped with radar - in this case, a large, cumbersome internal dish contraption known as the Radiation Laboratory SCR-720. The Air Force chose to paint the aluminum-alloy skin a matte black because the plane was expressly designed to be a night fighter, employing radar to chase down targets from dusk to dawn."
At the end of World War II with over ten million veterans returning home from war, many small aircraft manufacturers dreamed of putting an airplance in every driveway.
It was not a lack of trying that prevented aircraft builders from placing an airplane in every driveway. Manufacturers began advertising the virtues of owning your own airplane in much the same way as the automobile had been promoted as a way of shrinking the world in the 1920s. Unfortunately for aircraft makers, a speedy, luxurious, and affordable airplane did not exist in the immediate postwar years, a fact consumers quickly realized.
The two-seat Piper Cub did sell for just shy of $2,000 in 1946, making it affordable for most middle-class consumers. The larger Stinson Voyager, which could seat four, sold for slightly more than five thousand dollars. But neither of these durable, well-constructed airplanes were very quick nor luxurious.
There was also the two-seater Ercoupe for $2,900 or the more costly Beechcraft Twin Beech for a costly sum of $60,000.
Even though the excitement of affordable airplanes led to record levels of production in 1946 (over 33,000 small aircraft were sold), the number of small planes sold declined severely and by 1951 fewere than three thousand aircraft were being delivered annually to private owners.
There are many reasons for the steady decline in private airplane sales. The planes on the market that were affordable were also somewhat boring. The buying public had an appetite for aerial excitement and the small private plane seemed more noisy and uncomfortable than the family cars on the market. Also, the more spaceious, luxurious models were overpriced. For the buyer, choosing between a car and an airplane was facilitated by lack of airports in which to land.
With over 30,000 surplus aircraft available for sale in the postwar period, buying an airplane new made little economic sense and private airplanes makers found themselves in serious financial trouble by the end of the 1940s.
A favorite of business pilots was the Tri-Pacer had a plush interior and cruising speed of 130 miels per hour.
Popular business travel evolved to the Cessna 120/140 series.
Piper and Cessna survived by catering to the business pilot with the Bonanza, utilizing war-tested technology, putting the pilot behind the controls of an advanced, high-performance aircraft. With its distinguishing V-tail assembly, which greatly reduced weight an drag, the Bonanza immediately set itself apart from the rest of the small airplane family.
By the end of the 1950s, the most notable light twin was the Piper Apache, which was capable of carrying five passengers at 170 miles per hour. Aero introduced teh Commander, a medium-size, twin-engine plane unique in its deployment of a high wing. Traveling at 200 miles per hour, the Commander's high wing configuration provided its seven passengers with tremendous views and a great deal of comfort.
Instead of an airplane in every driveway, there was a growing use of the private aircraft for a wide range fo activities. The agribusiness community found many uses for the airplane, as did the forestry industry.
As an expression of individual interest and pleasure, the home-built and antique aircraft enthusiasts began reviving the classic airplanes of the two world wars.
The airplaned had found a way in almost every sector or society.
The end of World War II allowed for swift advances in jet-powered aircraft. Planes could now go farther distances faster than before.
With plenty of pilots and aircraft on hand following the end of the war, the commercial airliner quickly became a familiar sight in the skies over America.
While surplus aircraft such as the Douglas DC-3 (above) assumed important roles in the early days of commercial flight, the advent of more advanced and specialized airliners such as the Lockheed Constellation brought the flying public into the airplane in droves.
The days of propeller powered commercial aircraft such as the Douglas DC-6 were numbered with the advent of the jet engine. Borrowing on wartime technology first deployed in the Messerschmitt Me-262 and the Gloster Meteor, American aircraft designers asserted themselves in the post war period with the first airplane capable of achieving level supersonic flight, the Bell XS-1.
The idea of attaching a jet engine to an airplane had been an old one with patents for various forms of jet propulsion being granted as early as teh Wright brother's era. But the basics for advancing this technology, along with the metal to construct turbine rotors, did not yet exist. Early jet propulsion work took place in England and Germany during the war, but the German contribution to jet propulsion would be greater appreciated in the postwar years. American advancement in jet engine technology is indebted to the voluntary contribution of German scientists after the war, as well as to the capture of German scientific documents. America dominated the field of jet-powered aircraft technology well up until the early part of the 1960s.
The U.S. Air Force had entered the jet age in 1942 with the successful flight of the Bell XP-59A.
By war's end, the Lockheed P-80A Shooting Star had made its initial test flights and in 1946 crossed the United States at an average speed of 550 miles per hour.
North American first flew the F-86 Sabre in 1947 and a year later attained supersonic speed, not in level flight, but in a dive. Also in late 1947, Major Charles E. Yeager became the first man to exceed the speed of sound in level flight in the Bell XS-1.
In 1948 the Boeing B-47 Stratojet, with its swept-wing design powered by six turbojets, appeared. The benefit of applying jet power to a bomber was immediately evident, as payloads of 20,000 pounds could now be carried in smaller and faster aircraft.
The newly applied jet techcnology received its first combat experience a mere five years after the end of World War II. The first jet-against-jet combat took place in the skies over Korea in Novemnber 1950, when a Soviet Mig-15 and an American Lockheed F-80 Shooting Star locked horns in combat.
The U.S. launched the Century series of fighters that controlled the skies for almost ten years. The McDonnel F-101 Voodoo, for almost a decade the fastest plane in the world, topping out at 1,200 miles per hour.
The Convair F-106 Delta Dagger, the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter, and the Republic F-105 Thunderchief, all capable of achieving Mach 2 speed (twice the speed of sound).
The 1950s added three planes to the American arsenal of jet-powered aircraft. The Boeing B-52 Stratofortress served as the chief Strategic Air Command bomber for the great part of two decades.
The McDonnell-Douglas F-4 Phantom series began its reign as king of the fighters in 1958, with tremendous climbing ability and speed well in excess of Mach 2.
The Lockheed U-2 reconnaissance craft, traveled at 500 miles per hour at 65,000 feet and led all other aircraft in its ability to fly undetected on intelligence-gathering missions.
In 1955 Pan American Airlines shocked the industry by announcing its goal of replacing the entire fleet of propeller-driven aircraft with jet-powered airplanes, but putting the Boeing 707 into service for the first time. Powered by Pratt and Whitney J57 jet engines, the 707 quickly put the excitement back into commercial flying. Carrying up to 150 passengers more than 2,000 miles, the 707 cruised at 575 miles per hour, at 30,000 feet.
The invention of manned, powered flight was barely thirty-five years old on the eve of World War II. Yet, as the citizens of London and Dresden would soon find out, the airplane's capacity to deliver devastating blows from the sky was well advanced.
Unlike World War I, in which aviation was dominated by personalities, the heroes of World War II were the airplanes themselves.
By September 1939, the German air force was superior in the skies as was evident during the Spanish Civil War (1936 - 1939) when the Luftwaffe easily claimed air superiority with bombing runs on Spanish towns. This was backed by speed records and precedent-setting develoipments. The Messerschmitt 109R set the then new world speed record by reaching just under 470 miles per hour.
Missing from their strategy as the war began was the presence of a long-range bomber, a factor that would prove crucial in the closing years of the war.
Emphasis on dive-bombers, capabale of making quick and short runs, led to the development of a series of aircraft known as Stukas. One of the early Stukas was the Junkers JU-87 dive-bomber. Capable of reaching 200 miles per hour, the JU-87 was a fixed-gear monoplane requiring a two-man crew.
Appearing at the same time was the Masserschmitt 110, a twin-engine fighter-bomber with the capacity to reach 350 miles per hour.
While proving effective at first, the JU-87 and ME-110, eventually failed the Luftwaffe in the first major air battle of the war, the Battle of Britain.
The Luftwaffe's full-scale aerial assault on the British was devised as a prelude to eventual land, sea, and air invasion of England. But they were unable to completely destroy the Royal Air Force (R.A.F.) of England. Two British fighters were able to inflict equal damage to the Luftwaffe.
The Hawker Hurricane was a durable and highly maneuverable fighter plane capable of unleashing massive firepower from its twelve machine guns.
The Supermarine Spitfire was also highly maneuverable, and capable of reaching speeds up to 350 miles per hour. A unique feature of the Spitfire was the ability to concentrate fire from its eight machine guns on a very small portion of a target. Because of its all-metal construction, the Spitfire proved a more difficult target to disable than its partially fabricated cousin, the Hurricane (built from metal and fabric).
The Germans altered their strategy to focus on night bombings of British cities and the R.A.F. countered by unleashing the Bristol Beaufighter; a twin-engine, radar-equipped fighter that carried a crew of two. The radar enabled the Beaufighter to track Luftwaffe bombers at night.
A Bristol Beaufighter X of No.19 Squadron, SAAF, attacking the German-occupied town of Zuzemberk, Yugoslavia. The Bristol Beaufighter was the first dedicated night fighter to enter RAF Service. Superceded by the Mosquito in that role, the Beaufighter went on to serve as a deadly anti-shipping weapon, and to earn the nickname "whispering death" over the jungles of Burma.
Both England and Germany developed innovative aircraft from their wartime assembly lines during the course of the war.
The United States remained directly out of the air war until December 1941 when the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor left no other option. One of the Japanese carrier-based airplanes that carried out the assault on American naval forces in Hawaii was the Aichi Type 99. The all-metal bomber was a single-engine, fixed-gear monoplane armed with three cannons. The Zero was lightweight and much faster than the Aichi, with a maximum speed approaching 340 miles per hour. The Zero was also light on armor plating, leaving its fuel tanks susceptible to explosions.
Thus began America's three-year entry into the war. At the onset of American entry into the war, the United States Army Air Corps was reliant upon two aircraft as fighters: the Bell P-39 and the Curtiss-Wright P-40.
Bell P-39
Curtiss-Wright P-40
American naval forces began the war with the Grumman F4F Wildcat as their main carrier-based fighter. While inferior to the Zero in raw performance capabilities, the Wildcat's durability and firepower led to numerous victories over the Japanese figher in the Pacific.
During the winter of 1941, the United States Army Air Corps began taking delivery of the Lockheed P-38 Lightning, evolving into one of the classics of the war era. It operated in all theaters as an interceptor, a figher-bomber, and as a reconnaissance plane. The single-seater, built with twin engines and a twin tail assembly, operated comfortably at 20,000 feet, with a maximum speed of almost 400 miles per hour. Armed with four fifty-caliber machines guns and a twenty-millimeter cannon, the P-38 series saw extensive use as a figher in the Pacific.
Restored P-38 Lightning
American aircraft played a crucial role in emerging victorious from a succession of key air and sea battles in the Pacific during the spring and summer of 1942. The TBM Avenger and the Douglas SBD Dauntless were the two main carrier-based attack planes during the battle for Midway. A so-called "wing-bender", the Avenger actually debuted as a torpedo and dive-bomber during the June 1942 battle for Midway.
TBM Avenger
Despite suffering initial losses to Japanese Zoroes at Midway, the Dauntless emerged as a potent weapon to aircraft in the air and to ships at sea. Configured to house a rear gunner as a member of its two-man crew, the Dauntless took credit for helping sink four Japanese carriers during the four-day battle at Midway.
By the end of 1943, American naval forces had all but secured the skies over the Pacific with the introduction of teh Chance-Vought F4U Corsair and the Grumman F6F Hellcat. The Corsair had the distinction of being the heaviest carrier-based figher built up to that point. The Corsair was fast, with a maximum speed of over 400 mile per hour and was superior to the Zero in almost every respect. With six fifty-caliber machine guns and a launching capacity for eight five-inch rockets, the bent-wing Corsair was a feared and deadly nemesis to Japanese air forces.
While the Corsair and Hellcat controlled the skies, American bombers were able to launch limited attacks on the Japanese mainland. The North American B-25 Mitchell was devised as a smaller, so-called medium bomber. The twin-engine B-25 coudl carry only light payloads, but could pick up those payloads from the decks of American carriers based in the Pacific and deliver them where needed.
The European theater, being a land-based war, required a different mission for the airplane. Emphasis was put on long-range bombers and high-performance fighter escorts.
Two of the more prolific American bombers built to fulfill this mission were the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress and the Consolidated B-24 Liberator. The B-17 was a four-engine heavy bomber that saw extensive action on daylight bombing runs over Germany. Extremely durable even under heavy attack, the B-17 earned its nickname from the awesome amount of firepower it was capable of delivering in defense of itself. Outfitted with six pairs of fifty-caliber machine guns (in turrets located uner, on top, and on both sides of the aircraft, in addition to the standard nose and tail turrets), the Flying Fortress was indeed just that.
The B-24 proved its worth as a heavy bomber in all corners of the world. While carrying a larger payload over greater distances than the B-17, the Liberator's only drawback was in its lower operating altitude. More susceptible to enemy ground fire and fighter attack, the B-24 achieved its greatest success on escorted bombing runs over German industrial cities.
Two fighters that provided escort service for the Allied bombers were the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt and the North American P-51 Mustang. In many ways the Thunderbolt and Mustang made heroes out of Allied bomber pilots by providing extensive and thorough coverage for U.S. and R.A.F. bombing runs. The P-47 was a single-engine fighter made of a nearly impenetrable skin. With a top speed of over 400 miles per hour, and armed with eight fifty-caliber machine guns, the P-47 realized immediate success as a fighter and a strafer, providing aerial support for ground troops.
The Mustang was capable of operating at ceilings exceeding 20,000 feet and provided excellent excort capacity for high-altitude, long-range bombers. With a maximum speed of almsot 440 miles per hour, the highly mobile P-51 also proved a deadly foe for the Focke-Wulf 190 and the Messerschmitt 109.
The final blow to the Axis powers was delivered by a heavy bomber of the U.S. Air Force, the Boeing B-29 Superfortress. Almost 100 feet long, the wingspan of 143 feet, the B-29 was a long-range bomber capable of reaching Japan from captured territories in Saipan and Guam, over 1,000 miles away. The four-engine aircraft featured the first pressurized cockpit, allowing crew members to remain conscious and alert even in high altitudes. With twelve fifty-caliber machine guns strategically located in turrets throughout the plane, the Superfortress was indeed a fortress in the sky. It was this plane that dropped the atomic bombs on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, bringing the six-year war for world domination to a devastating end.
P-38 Lightning Photo Gallery (P-38 National Assocation & Museum)
http://www.p38assn.org/gallery.htm
With plenty of pilots and aircraft on hand following the end of the war, the commercial airliner quickly became a familiar sight in the skies over America.
The Hawker Hurricane was a durable and highly maneuverable fighter plane capable of unleashing massive firepower from its twelve machine guns.
The Supermarine Spitfire was also highly maneuverable, and capable of reaching speeds up to 350 miles per hour. A unique feature of the Spitfire was the ability to concentrate fire from its eight machine guns on a very small portion of a target. Because of its all-metal construction, the Spitfire proved a more difficult target to disable than its partially fabricated cousin, the Hurricane (built from metal and fabric).
