North American Aviation test pilot George S. Welch, flying the first of three XP-86 prototypes, serial number 45-59597. (North American Aviation, Inc.)
26 April 1948: At Muroc Field (now known as Edwards Air Force Base), in the high desert of southern California, North American Aviation test pilot George Welch put the prototype XP-86 Sabre, 45-59597, into a 40° dive and broke the Sound Barrier. It is only the second U.S. aircraft to fly supersonic. The first was the Bell X-1, piloted by Chuck Yeager, only a few months earlier.
Or, maybe not.
In his book, Aces Wild: The Race For Mach 1, fellow North American Aviation test pilot Albert W. Blackburn makes the case that George Welch had taken the prototype XP-86 Sabre supersonic on its first flight, 1 October 1947, and that he had done so three times before Chuck Yeager first broke the Sound Barrier with the Bell X-1 rocketplane, 14 October 1947. Blackburn described two runs through the NACA radar theodolite with speeds of Mach 1.02 and 1.04 on 13 November 1947.
Mr. Blackburn speculates—convincingly, in my opinion—that Secretary of the Air Force W. Stuart Symington, Jr., ordered that Welch’s excursions beyond Mach 1 were to remain secret. However, during a radio interview, British test pilot Wing Commander Roland Prosper (“Bee”) Beamont, C.B.E, D.S.O. and Bar, D.F.C. and Bar, stated that he had flown through the Sound Barrier in the number two XP-86 Sabre prototype (45-59598). Once that news became public, the U.S. Air Force released a statement that George Welch had flown beyond Mach 1 earlier, but gave the date as 26 April 1948.
Test pilot George S. Welch, wearing his distinctive orange helmet, in the cockpit of the prototype XP-86. This photograph was taken 14 October 1947. (U.S. Air Force)
It wasn’t long after the first flight of the XP-86 on October 1, 1947, that Welch dropped into Horkey’s [Edward J. Horkey, an aerodynamicist at North American Aviation] office at the Inglewood plant. He wanted to talk about his recent flight and some “funny” readings in the airspeed indicator. He had made a straight-out climb to more than 35,000 feet. Then, turning back toward Muroc Dry Lake, he began a full-power, fairly steep descent.
“I started at about 290 knots,” Welch was explaining to Horkey. “In no time I’m at 350. I’m still going down, and I’m still accelerating but the airspeed indicator seems stuck like there’s some kind of obstruction in the pitot tube. I push over a little steeper and by this time I’m through 30,000 feet. All of a sudden, the airspeed indicator flips to 410 knots. The aircraft feels fine, no funny noises, no vibration. Wanted to roll off to the left, but no big deal. Still, I leveled out at about 25,000 and came back on the power. The airspeed flicked back to 390. What do you think?”
“. . . You may be running into some Mach effects. . . .”
— Aces Wild: The Race For Mach 1, by Al Blackburn, Scholarly Resources Inc., Wilmington, Delaware, 1999, at Pages 147–148.
The “funny” reading of the airspeed indicator became known as the “Mach jump.” George Welch was the first to describe it.
The Sabre became a legendary jet fighter during the Korean War. 9,860 were built by North American, as well as by licensees in Canada, Australia and Japan.
George Welch had been recommended for the Medal of Honor for his actions as a P-40 Warhawk fighter pilot in Hawaii, December 7, 1941. He was killed while testing a North American Aviation F-100A Super Sabre, 12 October 1954.
Test pilot George S. Welch with a North American Aviation F-86 Sabre. (San Diego Air and Space Museum Archives)
NACA pilots Robert Apgar Champine, on left, and Herbert Henry Hoover with the Bell X-1-2, 46-063, 1 September 1949. (NASA E49-0005)
10 March 1948: National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) chief test pilot Herbert Henry (“Herb”) Hoover became the first civilian pilot to exceed the Speed of Sound when he flew a Bell X-1 supersonic research rocketplane near Muroc Air Force Base (Edwards AFB after 1949) in the high desert of southern California.
Hoover was flying the second of the three X-1s, serial number 46-063. Dropped from a B-29 “mother ship” on a stability and loads test, Hoover climbed to 42,000 feet (12,802 meters) while using three chambers of the rocketplane’s Reaction Motors XLR11-RM-3 engine. At 0.93 Mach (613.614 miles per hour/987.516 kilometers per hour), he fired the fourth chamber and accelerated to Mach 1.065 (702.687 miles per hour/1,130.865 kilometers per hour).
Hoover glided to a landing on Rogers Dry Lake. The rocketplane’s nose wheel would not extend, so Hoover held the nose up as long as possible before it settled onto the hard sand surface. 46-063 suffered minor damage.
This was the seventy-second flight of the X-1 series.
Bell X-1-2, 46-063, with the Boeing B-29 drop ship, B-29-96-BW Superfortress 45-21800. Originally painted orange, 46-063 was repainted white in 1948. (National Aeronautics and Space Administration E49-0004)
The 4 March 1948 flight Hoover’s eleventh in an X-1. Hoover had been the first NACA pilot to fly an X-1, having made a glide flight 21 October 1947. He made a total of fourteen X-1 flights before moving on to other flight test programs.
For this flight Herbert H. Hoover was awarded the Octave Chanute Award by the Institute of Aeronautical Sciences for “contributions to the application of flight test procedures to basic research in aerodynamics, and the development of methods for scientific study of transonic flight.” The award was presented at the Hotel Ambassador, in Los Angeles, California, 16 July 1948, by John Knudsen (“Jack”) Northrop, founder of the Northrop Corporation. Hoover was the initial recipient Air Force Association’s David C. Schilling Award, then known as the Flight Trophy, also awarded in 1948. In 1949, he was awarded the Air Medal by the United States Air Force, “for meritorious achievement while participating in aerial flight on March 10, 1948.” The medal was presented by President Harry S. Truman.
NACA Chief Test Pilot Herbert Henry Hoover, with a North American P-51 Mustang, December 1948. (NASA)Herbert H. Hoover, 1929
Herbert Henry Hoover was born 18 May 1912 at Knoxville, Tennessee. He was the son of Benjamin Roscoe Hoover, railway conductor, and Zella Mae Edington Hoover. He attended Central High School in Knoxville, graduating in 1929.
In 1930, Hoover was employed as a civil engineer’s assistant. He then attended the University of Tennessee, graduating from the College of Engineering, 24 August 1934, with a bachelors degree in mechanical engineering.
Herbert Henry Hoover
Joining the United States Army Air Corps, Hoover was trained as a pilot at Randolph and Kelly Fields, San Antonio, Texas. Completing training, he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Air Corps Reserve and assigned to Mitchel Field, Long Island, New York.
Released from active duty in 1937 after three years of service, Hoover was employed by the Standard Oil Company as a pilot, flying in South America.
After returning to the United States, on 16 December 1940, Hoover became an experimental test pilot for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics at the NACA Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory, Hampton, Virginia.
Ruth Anadda Rhyne
Hoover registered for Selective Service (conscription), 4 April 1942. On his draft registration card, he was described as 5 feet, 7 inches (170 centimeters) tall, 175 pounds (79 kilograms, with blond hair, gray eyes, and a light complexion.
On 29 August 1942, Hoover married Miss Ruth Anadda Rhyne at the Stanley Presbyterian Church, River Bend, North Carolina. The ceremony was presided over by Rev. R.H. Ratchford. They would have two children, Anadda Susan Hoover and Herbert Henry (“Hank”) Hoover, Jr.
Experienced at flying in bad weather, Hoover volunteered to fly the Lockheed XC-35 Supercharged Cabin Transport Airplane, 36-353, the first airplane to be built with a pressurized cabin, through thunderstorms for weather research.
Lockheed XC-35 Supercharged Cabin Transport Airplane 36-353, the first airplane built with a pressurized cabin.
In July 1943, while flying a Curtiss SB2C Helldiver on an instrument calibration flight, Hoover was badly injured when the airplane’s canopy came loose and struck him in the head. He was able to safely return to Langley.
A Curtiss SB2C-1 Helldiver at the NACA Langley Memorial Aeonautical Laboratory, 31 May 1944. (NASA EL-2000-00241)
A 1948 Newport News, Virginia, newspaper article described the incident:
In illustrating the infrequency of mishaps in test flights, Hoover recalls that he was the principal in the first accident involving a NACA test pilot. This incidentally was his only air accident, and occurred in July 1943, while he was calibrating 1,700 pounds[771 kilograms]of instruments to be used in flight instrument investigations of the Navy Helldiver.
The canopy over the cockpit of the Helldiver tore loose and as it fluttered away, an edge of the structure smashed through Hoover’s helmet and goggles. He found his sight blurred by blood streaming from his forehead. Although in pain and almost blinded, Hoover kept his seat in the now open airplane, turned back to Langley and put his ship into a maneuver that would attract attention. The men on the ground instantly understood that something was wrong and cleared the afield of other aircraft, and Hoover brought the Helldiver to a safe landing.
—Daily Press, Vol. LIII, No. 188, 15 July 1948, at Page 8, Columns 1 and 2
On another occasion, while firing a rocket-propelled model during a 0.7 Mach dive, the rocket exploded and seriously damaged Hoover’s North American Aviation P-51 Mustang. The Mustang’s coolant tank was punctured, but he was able to make a successful forced landing.
Hoover was appointed NACA’s chief test pilot. He was assigned to the NACA Muroc Flight Test Unit at Muroc Air Force Base, California, to begin NACA flight testing of the Bell X-1. He made his first flight in the X-1 one week after Captain Charles Elwood (“Chuck”) Yeager broke the “sound barrier” flying the number one Bell X-1, 46-062, 14 October 1947.
Herb Hoover was killed when the North American Aviation B-45A-1-NA Tornado, 47-021, “NACA 121,” suffered a structural failure in flight near Burrowsville, Virginia 14 August 1952. It is believed that he struck the aircraft, or parts of the aircraft, during ejection. His body was found with his parachute unopened, but with his hand on the rip cord’s “D”-ring. The airplane’s copilot, John A. Harper, survived with minor injuries.
NACA 121, a North American Aviation B-45A-1-NA Tornado, 47-021, photographed at the NACA Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory, Hampton, Virginia, 6 November 1949. NACA test pilot Herb Hoover was killed when this airplane suffered a structural failure of its right wing, 14 August 1952. (NASA EL-2000-00269)
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported:
PIONEER JET FLYER KILLED IN PARACHUTING
Herbert H. Hoover and Colleague Testing B-45 Bomber When It Catches Fire
BURROWSVILLE, Va., Aug. 15 (AP)—One of the pioneers of faster than sound flight fell to his death yesterday from a crippled B-45 jet bomber.
He was test pilot Herbert H. Hoover, the first man to fly the Bell X-1, and experimental prototype of the present day supersonic aircraft.¹
The heavy four-jet aircraft caught fire over this south-eastern Virginia community and Hoover and a companion, J.A. Harper bailed out.
Harper landed safe, except for a bruised shoulder. Searchers found the crumpled body of Hoover, his hand clutching the ripcord of his unopened parachute.
Both men were employed by the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics Laboratory at Langley Field, Va., for which they were testing aircraft.
Officials of the NACA said the crash was caused by the failure of the outboard panel of the right wing of the bomber. A spokesman, asked about a published report that the plane exploded, said, “there was no explosion.”
Officials who had talked with Harper said an overload was imposed during a maneuver to check research instruments and as a result the panel failed.
They said that there was afire following the wing panel’s collapse, but “it is not believed that the fire had any material effect on the accident.”
Hoover was the first pilot to exceed the speed of sound in an NACA aircraft and the second to break the sound barrier in any plane.
He had made more than a dozen flights in all. He received the Air Force Association award for 1948 for that year’s most notable achievement in flight contributing to the nation’s air defense.
Hoover served in the Army Air Corps from 1934 to 1937. He was a member of the first active long-range reconnaissance unit, the Eighteenth Reconnaissance Squadron, then stationed at Mitchel Field, N.Y.
—St. Louis Post Dispatch, Vol. 104, No. 323, 15 August 1952, Page 39, Column 4
In eighteen years of flying Herbert Henry Hoover had flown more than 100 aircraft types. He was the third NACA test pilot to be killed.² His remains were interred at the Peninsula Memorial Park, Newport News, Virginia.
Bell X-1 46-063 with its B-29 carrier aircraft. (Flight Test Historical Foundation)
The Bell XS-1, later re-designated X-1, was the first of a series of rocket-powered research airplanes which included the Douglas D-558-II Skyrocket, the Bell X-2, and the North American Aviation X-15, which were flown by the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Navy, NACA and its successor, NASA, at Edwards Air Force Base to explore supersonic and hypersonic flight and at altitudes to and beyond the limits of Earth’s atmosphere.
The X-1 has an ogive nose, similar to the shape of a .50-caliber machine gun bullet, and has straight wings and tail surfaces. It is 30 feet, 10.98 inches (9.423 meters) long with a wing span of 28.00 feet (8.534 meters) and overall height of 10 feet, 10.20 inches (3.307 meters).
46-062 was built with a thin 8% aspect ratio wing, while 46-063 had a 10% thick wing. The wings were tapered, having a root chord of 6 feet, 2.2 inches (1.885 meters) and tip chord of 3 feet, 1.1 inches (0.942 meters), resulting in a total area of 130 square feet (12.1 square meters). The wings have an angle of incidence of 2.5° with -1.0° twist and 0° dihedral. The leading edges are swept aft 5.05°.
The horizontal stabilizer has a span of 11.4 feet (3.475 meters) and an area of 26.0 square feet (2.42 square meters). 062’s stabilizer has an aspect ratio of 6%, and 063’s, 5%.
The fuselage cross section is circular. At its widest point, the diameter of the X-1 fuselage is 4 feet, 7 inches (1.397 meters).
46-062 had an empty weight is 6,784.9 pounds (3,077.6 kilograms), but loaded with propellant, oxidizer and its pilot with his equipment, the weight increased to 13,034 pounds (5,912 kilograms).
The X-1 was designed to withstand an ultimate structural load of 18g.
The X-1 was powered by a four-chamber Reaction Motors, Inc., 6000C4 (XLR11-RM-3 ) rocket engine which produced 6,000 pounds of thrust (26,689 Newtons). This engine burned a 75/25 mixture of ethyl alcohol and water with liquid oxygen. Fuel capacity is 293 gallons (1,109 liters) of water/alcohol and 311 gallons (1,177 liters) of liquid oxygen. The fuel system was pressurized by nitrogen at 1,500 pounds per square inch (103.4 Bar).
The X-1 was usually dropped from the B-29 flying at 30,000 feet (9,144 meters) and 345 miles per hour (555 kilometers per hour). It fell as much as 1,000 feet (305 meters) before beginning to climb under its own power.
The X-1’s performance was limited by its fuel capacity. Flying at 50,000 feet (15,240 meters), it could reach 916 miles per hour (1,474 kilometers per hour), but at 70,000 feet (21,336 meters) the maximum speed that could be reached was 898 miles per hour (1,445 kilometers per hour). During a maximum climb, fuel would be exhausted as the X-1 reached 74,800 feet (2,799 meters). The absolute ceiling is 87,750 feet (26,746 meters).
The X-1 had a minimum landing speed of 135 miles per hour (217 kilometers per hour) using 60% flaps.
There were 157 flights with the three X-1 rocket planes. The number one ship, 46-062, Glamorous Glennis, made 78 flights. On 26 March 1948, with Chuck Yeager again in the cockpit, it reached reached Mach 1.45 (957 miles per hour/1,540 kilometers per hour) at 71,900 feet (21,915 meters).
The second X-1, 46-063, was later modified to the X-1E. It is on display at the NASA Dryden Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base. Glamorous Glennis is on display at the Smithsonian Institution National Air and Space Museum, next to Charles A. Lindbergh’s Spirit of St. Louis.
The third X-1, 46-064, made just one glide flight before it was destroyed 9 November 1951 in an accidental explosion.
Bell X-1E 46-063 on Rogers Dry Lake. (NASA)
¹ This is incorrect. The first pilot to fly the Bell X-1 was Bell Aircraft Corporation Senior Experimental Test Pilot Jack Valentine Woolams. Please see This Day in Aviation at https://www.thisdayinaviation.com/19-january-1946/ Herb Hoover had been the first NACA pilot to fly an X-1.
² The first was Howard Clifton (“Tick”) Lilly, when the compressor section of a Douglas D-558-I Skystreak exploded 3 May 1948. Please see TDiA at https://www.thisdayinaviation.com/3-may-1948/
North American Aviation production test pilot George Franklin Smith with a North American F-100A Super Sabre (NASM)
26 February 1955: Although it was his day off, North American Aviation production test pilot George Franklin Smith stopped by the office at Los Angeles Airport (today, known as Los Angeles International airport, or simply “LAX”, its FAA airport identifier). The company’s flight dispatcher told him that a brand-new F-100A-20-NA Super Sabre, serial number 53-1659, was sitting on the flight line and needed to be test flown before being turned over to the Air Force.
North American Aviation production test pilot George F. Smith (left) walks away from an F-100 Super Sabre. (Photograph courtesy of Neil Corbett, Test and Research Pilots, Flight Test Engineeers)
Smith was happy to take the flight. He departed LAX in full afterburner and headed off shore, climbing to 35,000 feet (10,668 meters) over the Pacific Ocean to start the test sequence.
A North American F-100A-1-NA Super Sabre, 52-5757 (the second production airplane) takes off at Los Angeles International Airport. (This airplane, flown by NAA test pilot Bob Hoover, crashed east of Palmdale, California, 7 July 1955, when he could not recover from a flat spin. Hoover safely ejected but the Super Sabre was destroyed.) (North American Aviation, Inc.)
But it was quickly apparent that something was wrong: The flight controls were heavy, and then there was a hydraulic system failure that caused the Super Sabre pitch down into a dive. Smith couldn’t pull it out of the dive and the airplane’s speed rapidly increased, eventually passing Mach 1.
Smith was unable to regain control of the F-100. He had no choice but to bail out. As he ejected, Smith read the instruments: the Mach meter indicated Mach 1.05—785 miles per hour (1,263 kilometers per hour)—and the altitude was only 6,500 feet (1,981 meters).
Smith recovering in hospital after his supersonic ejection. (Getty Images)
The force of the wind blast hitting him as he came out of the cockpit knocked him unconscious. Estimates are that he was subjected to a 40 G deceleration. His parachute opened automatically and he came down approximately one-half mile off Laguna Beach. Fortunately he hit the water very close to a fishing boat crewed by a former U.S. Navy rescue expert.
The F-100 dived into the Pacific Ocean approximately ¼-mile (0.4 kilometers) offshore between Dana Point and Laguna Beach.
George Smith was unconscious for six days, and when he awoke he was blind in both eyes. After four surgeries and seven months in the hospital, he recovered from his supersonic ejection and returned to flight status.
North American Aviation, Inc. F-100A-20-NA Supre Sabre 53-1646. This fighter is from the same production block as the Super Sabre flown by George F. Smith, 53-1659, 26 February 1955. (Unattributed)
George F. Smith appears in this brief U.S. Air Force informational film:
The North American Aviation F-100 Super Sabre was designed as a supersonic day fighter. Initially intended as an improved F-86D and F-86E, it soon developed into an almost completely new airplane. The fuselage incorporated the “area rule,” a narrowing in the fuselage width at the wings to increase transonic performance, similar to the Convair F-102A.
The Super Sabre had a 49° 2′ sweep to the leading edges of the wings and horizontal stabilizer. The ailerons were placed inboard on the wings and there were no flaps, resulting in a high stall speed in landing configuration. The horizontal stabilizer was moved to the bottom of the fuselage to keep it out of the turbulence created by the wings at high angles of attack. The F-100A had longer wings and a distinctively shorter vertical fin than the YF-100A. The upper segment of the vertical fin was swept 49° 43′.
North American Aviation YF-100A Super Sabre 52-5754 lands on the dry lake at Edwards Air Force Base, California. (North American Aviation, Inc.)
There were two service test prototypes, designated YF-100A, followed by the production F-100A series. The first ten production aircraft (all of the Block 1 variants) were used in the flight testing program.
The F-100A Super Sabre was 47 feet, 1¼ inches (14.357 meters) long with a wingspan of 36 feet, 6 inches (11.125 meters). With the shorter vertical fin than the YF-100A, the initial F-100As had an overall height of 13 feet, 4 inches (4.064 meters), 11 inches (27.9 centimeters) less than the YF-100A.
The F-100A had an empty weight of 18,135 pounds (8,226 kilograms), and gross weight of 28,899 pounds (13,108 kilograms). Maximum takeoff weight was 35,600 pounds (16,148 kilograms). It had an internal fuel capacity of 755 gallons (2,858 liters) and could carry two 275 gallon (1,041 liter) external fuel tanks.
Following North American Aviation test pilot George Welch’s fatal accident, 12 October 1954, NACA designed a new vertical fin for the F-100A. It was taller but also had a longer chord. This resulted in a 10% increase in area. (NASA E-1573)
The early F-100As were powered by a Pratt & Whitney Turbo Wasp J57-P-7 afterburning turbojet engine. It was rated at 9,700 pounds of thrust (43.148 kilonewtons) for takeoff, and 14,800 pounds (65.834 kilonewtons) with afterburner. Later production aircraft used a J57-P-39 engine. The J57 was a two-spool axial flow turbojet which had a 16-stage compressor, and a 3-stage turbine. (Both had high- and low-pressure stages.) The engine was 15 feet, 3.5 inches (4.661 meters) long, 3 feet, 5.0 inches (1.041 meters) in diameter, and weighed 4,390 pounds (1,991 kilograms).
Test Pilot A. Scott Crossfield flew this F-100A-5-NA, 52-5778, in flight testing at the NACA High Speed Flight Station, October–December 1954. (NASA)
The Super Sabre was the first U.S. Air Force fighter capable of supersonic speed in level flight. It could reach 760 miles per hour (1,223 kilometers) at Sea Level. (Mach 1 is 761.1 miles per hour, 1,224.9 kilometers per hour, under standard atmospheric conditions.) Its maximum speed was 852 miles per hour (1,371 kilometers per hour) at 35,000 feet (10,668 meters)—Mach 1.29. The service ceiling was 44,900 feet (13,686 meters). Maximum range with external fuel was 1,489 miles (2,396 kilometers).
The F-100 was armed with four M-39 20 mm autocannons, capable of firing at a rate of 1,500 rounds per minute. The ammunition capacity of the F-100 was 200 rounds per gun.
North American Aviation built 199 F-100A Super Sabres at its Inglewood, California, plant before production shifted to the F-100C fighter bomber variant. Approximately 25% of all F-100As were lost in accidents.
This is the fifth production F-100A-1-NA Super Sabre, 52-5760, in flight southeast of San Bernardino, California. In this photograph, FW-760 has the taller vertical fin that was designed to improve the Super Sabre’s controllability. (U.S. Air Force)
26 December 1948: Test pilot Ivan Evgrafovich Federov (Ива́н Евгра́фович Фёдоров ) became the first pilot in the Soviet Union to exceed Mach 1 when he flew the Lavochkin La-176 in a dive from 9,050 meters (29,692 feet) to 6,000 meters (19,685 feet).
It was first thought that the La-176’s airspeed indicator had malfunctioned, but during subsequent testing conducted the first week of January 1949, Federov repeated the dive and six times reached Mach 1.02.
The La-176 was destroyed when its canopy failed during supersonic flight. Test pilot I.V. Sokolovsky was killed.
Lavochkin La-176
The La-176 was a single-seat, single-engine fighter, derived from the earlier La-168. The leading edge of its wings and tail surfaces were swept at 45°. The fighter was 36 feet (10.973 meters) long with a wingspan of 28 feet, 2 inches (8.585 meters). It had an empty weight of 3,111 kilograms (6,858.6 pounds) and loaded weight of 4,631 kilograms (10,210 pounds).
The La-176 was powered by a Klimov VK-1 centrifugal-flow turbojet, developed from the Rolls-Royce Nene. The British engines were reverse-engineered by Vladimir Yakovlevich Klimov and manufactured at Factory No. 45 in Moscow as the Klimov VK-1. The VK-1 used a single-stage centrifugal-flow compressor, 9 combustion chambers and a single-stage axial-flow turbine. It produced a maximum 26.5 kilonewtons of thrust (5,957 pounds of thrust). The VK-1 was 2.600 meters (8 feet, 6.4 inches) long, 1.300 meters (4 feet, 3.2 inches) in diameter, and weighed 872 kilograms (1,922 pounds).
The swept-wing jet had a maximum speed of 648 miles per hour (1,042.85 kilometers per hour) and a range of 621 miles (999.4 kilometers).
Armament consisted of one Nudelman N-37 30 mm cannon and two Nudelman-Suranov NS-23 23 mm cannon.
Lavochkin La-176
Colonel Ivan Evgrafovich Federov (23 February 1914–12 February 2011) was a Soviet Air Force fighter pilot who fought in the Spanish civil war (where he was known as Diablo Rojo, the Red Devil), the Russo-Finish War, World War II, China and Korea. He may have shot down as many as 135 enemy airplanes. He was personally awarded the Iron Cross by Adolf Hitler, Chancellor of Germany, in 1941. His Soviet Awards include Hero of the Soviet Union, the Order of Lenin, Order of Alexander Nevsky, Order of the Red Banner, Order of the Patriotic War 1st Degree, Order of the Patriotic War 2nd Degree, and Order of the Red Star.
Colonel Ivan Yegrafovich Federov, Soviet Air Force. Hero of the Soviet Union.
Evergreen International Airlines’ Boeing 747-121, N475EV, photographed at Hellinikon International Airport, Athens, Greece, 1 January 1991. The airliner has just been converted to a freighter. (Savvas Garozis)
12 December 1991: A Boeing 747 freighter operated by Evergreen International Airlines was en route from New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) to Tokyo, Japan, with an intermediate stop at Anchorage International Airport (ANC), Alaska, U.S.A. The 747 had a flight crew of six and no passengers.
At about 5:20 a.m., Central Standard Time (11:15 UTC), the 747 was cruising at Flight Level 310 (31,000 feet/9,449 meters) near Nakina, a small village approximately 150 nautical miles (173 statute miles/278 kilometers) northeast of Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada.
The flight crew observed that the airplane’s Inertial Navigation System (INS) FAIL warning lights were on. Checking their instruments, they found that the 747 had entered a 90° right bank and was in a 30°–35° descent. It was rapidly losing altitude and gaining speed.
Before the crew could recover, N475EV had lost over 10,000 feet (3,048 meters) and reportedly reached 0.98 Mach in its dive. After regaining control of the 747, the crew made an emergency landing at Duluth, Minnesota, at 5:43 a.m., Central Standard Time.
On inspection, a large hole, approximately 3 feet × 15 feet (0.9 × 4.5 meters), was found in the leading edge of the right wing, inboard of the Number 3 engine. Three sheet metal panels had torn off, then struck the right horizontal stabilizer, denting its leading edge. On landing, a flap on the left wing fell off.
According to an article in the Seattle Times, an investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board confirmed that the 747 had exceeded its design speed of 0.92 Mach, but as the Flight Data Recorder had not yet been analyzed, “. . . he could not confirm reports that it reached Mach 1.25. . . .”
The Seattle Times reported the incident:
Dive! 747 In Unexplained Incident — Canada Investigating Automatic Pilot Controls After Near-Supersonic Scare
Canadian authorities are scrutinizing the automatic flight controls of a Boeing 747-100 jumbo jet after the plane inexplicably rolled 90 degrees to its right and dove two miles at near-supersonic speed.
The incident occurred last Thursday as the plane, a passenger jetliner converted to a freighter, was cruising at 31,000 feet above Nakina, Ont., on a New York-to-Anchorage flight. The jet is owned and operated by Evergreen International Airlines, based in McMinnville, Ore.
The pilots righted the craft at 22,500 feet, then made a safe emergency landing at Duluth, Minn.
None of the six Evergreen employees on board, including the three-member flight crew, was injured, according to Dave McNair, investigator for the Transporation Safety Board of Canada.
McNair said the jumbo jet’s four turbofan engines functioned properly. He said a broad investigation would take several months and will include an examination of the sophisticated computers designed to fly the plane automatically for most of the flight.
“What we’ll be doing is looking at the entire autopilot logic and any associated logic,” he said.
At some point during the incident, three large panels beneath the leading edge of the right wing tore off, leaving a 3-by-15-foot hole on the forward, inboard section of the right wing.
The panels damaged the right flap (located on the trailing edge of the wing) and dented the right-side forward edge of the horizontal tail section, according to McNair and Boeing spokesman Chris Villiers. Upon landing, part of the left flap came off, as well, Villiers said.
Authorities said it was unclear whether the panels from the right wing came loose first and, thus, precipitated the roll and dive, or if the parts shook loose as the plane careened at a 30- to 35-degree angle of descent – more than three times a normal rate of descent. McNair said age of the 21-year-old aircraft is not believed to be a factor.
The 747-100 is designed to withstand a top speed of Mach 0.92 – nine-tenths the speed of sound, or more than 500 miles per hour at that altitude. McNair said the plane reached speeds faster than that during the dive, but he could not confirm reports that it reached Mach 1.25, because precise information from the flight-data recorder was not immediately available.
Tacoma aviation safety expert John Nance, a former 747 pilot, said it is plausible that the plane would begin to disintegrate once the speed surpassed its so-called “design limit.”
Nance described modern jetliners as “metallic eggshells, very strong when used exactly as they are designed to be used; very weak when not.”
The Evergreen incident occurred on the same day that whistleblower Darrell Smith, a former Boeing 747 computer analyst, made public an internal Boeing audit outlining major flaws in a software program used by a computer that senses the position of key moving parts on the Boeing 747-400, an advanced version of the 747-100.
Boeing officials said the computer Smith reviewed on the 747-400 doesn’t exist on the 747-100. The Evergreen plane was one of the first delivered from Boeing’s Everett plant in July 1970 to Pan Am.
Even so, Smith’s allegations and the Evergreen roll-and-dive add to a string of instances over the past two years in which alleged or apparent flaws in Boeing technology have become part of a heated air-safety debate:
— Last May, an electronically controlled engine-braking device, called a thrust reverser, inexplicably deployed as a Lauda Air 767-300ER jetliner climbed away from Bangkok, instantly flipping the plane into a supersonic crash dive. All 223 on board were killed.
Authorities still do not fully understand how a stray electrical signal, vibration or some other phenomena could have deployed the reverser. Meanwhile, Boeing has steadfastly declined to answer a call by the National Transportation Safety Board to upgrade pilot instructions on what to do if a reverser warning light illuminates in the cockpit during flight. Electronic reversers are used on all Boeing jetliners delivered in the past few years – nearly 1,700 planes all told.
— Last February, Hoot Gibson, a former Trans World Airlines pilot revealed nine complaints from pilots citing major control problems on Boeing 727 jets apparently related to a random, mysterious malfunction of the autopilot computer.
Gibson has waged a 12-year battle with the NTSB and Boeing to clear his name of allegations that he caused a TWA 727 to careen dangerously from a high altitude by attempting to improperly manipulate the controls to enhance the plane’s performance. Gibson, who wrestled back control of the plane at the last minute, maintains that a flaw in the autopilot triggered the dive.
— In April 1990, the NTSB, relying on Boeing technical data and analysis, ruled that the pilots of USAir Flight 5050 made the wrong decision to abort the takeoff of a 737-400 from New York’s LaGuardia airport on Sept. 20, 1989. The pilot decided to abort takeoff when the plane lurched left because the rudder was stuck full left. (The rudder, the upright section of the tail, is supposed to be in neutral for takeoff.)
The NTSB ruled that the pilots should have noticed the stuck rudder and, in any case, should have followed through with the takeoff, even with the stuck rudder. Two passengers were killed as the plane ditched into Bowery Bay.
The ruling upset pilots who felt little credence was given to scores of reports of problems with a new type “rudder trim.” Reports from pilots said it was moving the rudder without being commanded to do so.
—The Seattle Times, 19 December 1991
A year later, the Chicago Tribune reported,
Tom Cole, a spokesman at Boeing Commercial Airplane Co., said original flight tests of 747s conducted in 1969 and 1970 took 747-100 models to speeds of Mach 0.99.
In addition, Boeing knows one case in which a 747 operated by Evergreen International made an emergency descent at speeds that exceeded Mach 1, he said.
—Chicago Tribune, 20 December 1992
Following the December 1991 incident, N475EV was repaired and returned to service.
This was not the first time that 19638 had been damaged:
Boeing 747 19638 (RA003) with a nose boom during flight testing, 1969. (Jeff Ohlston/Boeing)
Boeing 747-121, serial number 19638, line number RA003, had made its first flight on 11 July 1969. Boeing used the aircraft for flight and certification testing. On completion of these tests, it was to be flown to Boeing’s Renton plant to be modified to production standards, refurbished, and then delivered to the new owner, Pan American World Airways.
While landing on Runway 15 at Renton Airport, at 11:11 a.m., 13 December 1969, 19638 struck an embankment about 20 feet (6 meters) short of the runway. None the 11 Boeing employees on board were injured. The Number 3 and 4 engines were damaged and caught fire. The right landing gear was pulled backward, but held to the wing by linkages and actuators. The flaps on the right wing were damaged. The right wing’s lower surface was punctured. The fires were quickly extinguished.
A video clip of the accident is available on YouTube:
N732PA was repaired and finally delivered to Pan American on 13 July 1970. The 747 was christened Clipper Storm King. (It was later renamed Ocean Telegraph.)
Pan Am operated the airliner for nearly 21 years. It was sold to Evergreen International Airlines, 1 July 1991, and converted to an air freighter at Evergreen’s maintenance depot at Marana, Arizona. It was re-registered N475EV.
Evergreen flew N475EV until it was sold to Tower Air, 13 September 1994. Under new ownership, the Boeing 747 was again re-registered, to N615FF.
The FAA registered the 747 to Kalitta Equipment LLC, 3 August 2000. The N-number did not change. The airplane’s registration was canceled 30 June 2017.
