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Aviation History
1955
1955 - 1414.PDF
•-•m 526 FLIGHT The Douglas Nike ground-to-air missile, as seen on the left, is already operational in the Philadelphia district and in other parts of America. On the right is the Hughes Falcon air-to-air missile. OFF TO PHILADELPHIA . . . "s and loudest, American tradition. A Grumman Super Widgeonand a Royal Gull (the last being our old friend the Piaggio P.136L, licensed in America) appeared on the Lycoming demonstrationlist, though I did not see the Widgeon myself. The Gull was certainly there and looking so attractive that it was boarded by aparty of enterprising teenagers, who flipped all the switches and succeeded in retracting the undercarriage. The flying demonstrations of Sunday culminated with agalvanizing exposition by the Navy's Blue Angels, on F9F-8 Cougars. Like the F-84Fs of their rivals the Thunderbirds, theseare specially furbished for demonstration flying, gun ports, for instance, being riveted over. Two "maximum-performance" men first took the stage, flatout and from opposite directions, trailing red and blue smoke and whipping into rolls. Thereupon, in a tight diamond, came theteam of four on their "feel-out pass," wherein they check for turbulence and generally take note of conditions and cloud. Havingsatisfied themselves, the big show gets on the road. The forma- tion evolutions—some with smoke—included a change from rightechelon to diamond and reverse echelon rolls, such manoeuvres being interspersed with individual performances. Especiallyremarkable were "knife-edge runs," with the Cougars skating on their sides at something near top speed. One man reversed fromone edge to the other. The team of four pulled round in turns at between 4 and Sg, and looped at a constant 4g. In every waytheir show was a marvel of precision and beauty—especially the high-explosive break-up, the sequence of which I have to confessutterly baffled me. (I was comforted to learn that there has been so much argument as to what really happens in this newly per-fected manoeuvre that a film has been made to settle the matter). Leader of the Blue Angels is Lt-Col. Zeke Cormier, and the other The Martin TM-61 Matador, with booster, on its launching trailer. members are Lt. (J.G.) B. Gureck, Lt. N. Pierozzi, and Lt. Q.G.)K. Wallace. After the flying show was over the announcer gave notice thatthe Bendix Trophy trans-continental speed dash was developing into a horse race. Two of the six F-100C Super Sabres were out,having blown tyres at refuelling stops, and the remaining four had been bucking headwinds. Certainly the times were disappoint-ing. The winner, who was the first to land, although he had taken off second from George A.F.B., Victorville, California, wasColonel Carlos M. Talbott, and his speed for the 2325-mile flight was 610.726 m.p.h. Colonel Talbott had stopped for five minutesto refuel at McConnell A.F.B., Wichita, and I noticed that his F-100 was the only one of the four to land with under-wingtanks in place. None of the machines carried guns; in fact the armament bays appeared to contain personal effects. Headwinds ranging from 40-75 m.p.h. had, I gathered, beenencountered all the way to Indianapolis, whereafter the wind was of some assistance. The pilots who landed after Colonel Talbottconsidered that they had been "short-changed" at their refuel-ling stops and Capt. Mooreman told me that he had coasted infrom Harrisburg, so dire was his fuel situation. I saw him landdownwind at what I supposed to be 180 m.pJi. The F-lOOCs werefrom the 479th Fighter-Day Wing, George A.F.B., Cal., andthe 450th Fighter-Day Wing, Foster A.F.B., Texas. On the following day (when Iwas on my way home) the announcement was made atPhiladelphia that an F-100C had given a more realistic demon-stration of its performance by setting up the new world speedrecord of 822.135 m.p.h. over an 18-km course (this, of course,with reheat, the use of which was denied the Bendix racers). Thepilot was Colonel Horace A. Hanes, and for his achievementhe was presented with the Thompson Trophy at thePhiladelphia show on Septem- ber 5th. Below is what is beliered to be the tint picture published of a squadron-service fighter equipped to carry guided missiles. It is a Chance V'ought F7U-3M Cutlass and the missile carriers are seen on the outboard under-wing pylons. They are toed in at quite a sharp angle. At upper right is a model revealing—again for the first time-—the fuselage configuration of the Cutlass's successor, the XF8U-1 Crusader. At lower right is a model of the Convair F-102A single-seat all-weather intercepter showing the peculiar wing-tip form.
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