17 December 1984: At Dobbins Air Force Base, Georgia, Jesse Thomas Allen set a Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI) World Record for the Greatest Payload Carried to a Height of 2,000 Meters (6,562 feet), lifting 111,461.57 kilograms (245,730.70 pounds) aboard a Lockheed C-5A Galaxy.¹
During the same flight, Allen established a National Aeronautic Association United States National Record for the Greatest Recorded Weight at Which Any Airplane Has Ever Flown of 920,836 pounds (417,684 kilograms), after the Galaxy had refueled in flight.
The U.S. National Record remains current.
¹ FAI Record File Number 8901
© 2017, Bryan R. Swopes
17 December 1984,
Re: C-5A
“During the same flight, Allen established a National Aeronautic Association United States National Record for the Greatest Recorded Weight at Which Any Airplane Has Ever Flown of 920,836 pounds (417,684 kilograms), after the Galaxy had refueled in flight.”
The U.S. National Record remains current.”
See You Tube, https://youtu.be/IzAwWdIivVg
Mike
Thanks, Mike. I just rechecked the NAA records database and it does still show John T. Allen’s C-5A record as the current U.S. National Record. Checking both NAA and FAI databases, there are no World or National Records shown for Mark Feuerstein, Paul Stemer, or the Boeing 747-8. Contemporary sources do state that B747-8 # RC521, flown by Feuerstein and Stemer, did takeoff from Victorville, California, 16 August 2010, at a gross weight of 1,002,000 pounds. While that certainly exceeds the weight of the C-5A back in 1984, for some reason there was not an official record set. There could be a number of reasons for that, but I don’t know why that is so in this specific case. I appreciate your bringing this to my attention. It will make a good subject for a future article on TDiA. —Bryan