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Post by mrbones on Mar 3, 2010 23:42:09 GMT 9
Well there I was sitting in the jump seat behind the pilot of a C-119 holding on for dear life! Well when was a MA-1 flightline tech. at Dover AFB Del. I always got volunteered to go on the supply plane (C-119) when the 95th went every spring to Tyndall. It does not help when the pilot would make you wear a parachute and tells you if the RED light comes on start pushing the war boxes out of the aircraft and you go on the GREEN light. He said she wont fly on one engine with all this weight! On this hot May afternoon we were to takeoff from Tyndall and fly back to Dover after our Six qualifications. Sitting behind the pilot I was plugged into the intercom with my headset. We taxied out lined up and he started his takeoff run. About halfway down the runway he says abort, not enough power to get her off. Well we taxied back and the flight engineer does some adjustments and we try again. About halfway down again he aborts again! Now it looks like we not going to get out today. Then the pilot says we are going to get out of here this time! Well down the runway we go, past halfway and then here comes the end of the runway and the grass , finally we come up slowly. I know we were in the grass before getting airborne! White Knuckles! By the way the C-119 was from the West Virginia Air National Guard and the sign on the side of the plane said Dog Patch Airlines! :   |
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Jim Scanlon (deceased)
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Post by Jim Scanlon (deceased) on Mar 4, 2010 3:03:00 GMT 9
It was early Spring 1957.
The 13th FIS was headed from The SCAB to Yuma for our Saber Dogs to fire plaster tipped rockets.
The base had a squadron of C119s. They were the later version, with the 3350 Compound engine. Much better than the 4360 on the early models.
We had a going away squadron party the night before, that lasted until time to load up the Boxcars.
Off we went in to the Wild Blue Yonder.
All of us strapped in to the standard folding Jump Seats, and ready to go.
Tool boxes, B4 bags and some equipment tied down in the middle.
Non-stop flight from The SCAB to Vincent Air Force Base at Yuma, Arizona.
We got airborne and things were going well.
Until.
We began to get in to some wintry type weather over Northern New Mexico and had to make a course change. Seeing the Boxcar is not pressurized and there is oxygen only for the flight crew, we had to stay fairly low.
That meant we started to pick up ice.
No sweat. The de-icer boots were working just fine. The ice was breaking off and the props were also de-icing and throwing the ice against the fuselage.
Then the pilots started a holding pattern over Saint Johns, Arizona, just West of New Mexico and south of Route 66.
We held in that continual large circle flight for about an hour, it seemed like days.
The ice was bouncing off the fuselage, the wings were bouncing up and down, the booms were shaking and some of the troops were looking for the brown bags.
We were probably at about 12,000 feet, as there are mountains in the area over 10,000, and the pilots didn't want to have an abrupt meeting with one of them. That meant we were not breathing to easily.
We had to stay strapped in, as we were all over the sky.
As it got dark, we all tried to rest. Except for the ones taking turns at the dumper, to get rid of whatever they ate and drank at the squadron party.
Finally we felt the Boxcar begin to go in a straight line and we were once again headed for Vincent.
Good landing and for most of us, off to our barracks and then the chow hall. Some were not up to eating, only sleeping.
Thus began our gunnery trip in Spring of 1957.
Jim Too
:god_bless_usa
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burt49
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Post by burt49 on Mar 17, 2010 11:46:15 GMT 9
The white knuckle ride on a C-119 starts before the engines are even cranked up, it just does not seem to be a place you want to be. As you fly from Tyndall to Griffiss you have to ask yourself, "why do I see the forest and trees below this aircraft when I not even looking out a window"? The other question is "just how much oil can leak out those engines before we really do need these chutes"? I guess it was asking to much to fly us in a jet.
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Post by jimpadgett on Mar 17, 2010 20:06:45 GMT 9
ADC had a fleet of really scary iron, i.e. C-119, C-123. All I can remember them being called was Dog Patch Airlines. A flight from McChord to Tyndall was a 2 day adventure (RON in OK city). Had to find a low place in the mountains to fly through. Many visited the "comfort pallet" to talk to Ralph. To cap it off, you exited the AC and stood under the boom(s) and oil dripped on your head. Not a thing that would encourage you to get back aboard the next morning. Especially when you saw an oil truck pull up to service the AC. By the end of each day I had, in my anxiety, pulled the crotch straps of my chute up so tight I could not stand erect. Ahhh the good old days.
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Post by Bullhunter on Mar 18, 2010 0:55:39 GMT 9
I've only seen a C-119 in flight once. Two flew over our farm in NE Pennsylvania heading south. They were low and slow and just cleared the ridge to the north of our farmhouse. That had to be in the early to mid 1960's. Guess I was about 11 or 12 then. The old picture below is looking toward the ridge. They passed over it just to the right of the tall evergreen trees. This is great, as members tell old stories it triggers memories in other members and they may share their story.  |
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Post by lugnuts55 on Mar 18, 2010 1:28:25 GMT 9
The 5th FIS went to Tyndall in April '71. We flew down on a C-118. It had recip engines and was noisy but we had seats. The equipment went on a C-119. On the way back, a few of us went on the Boxcar. I think we could have gotten back faster by walking. I don't remember any white knuckle moments but it was the noisiest, shakiest, teeth rattling airplane I've ever been on. I was 21 and everything was an adventure so I took in every moment of it. I have flown on C-130's many times. Compared to a Boxcar, it is a 747.
When we went TDY to Aviano AB, Italy or Zaragoza AB, Spain from the UK, we flew on C-130's with our equipment and all other personnel. We were packed hip to hip and knee to knee. We wore ear muffs and ear plugs and usually slept. We couldn't fall out of out seats because of how we were packed in. There was no sleeping on a C-119
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Post by Jim on Mar 18, 2010 2:24:49 GMT 9
In '56, I was flying (as a crew member) back from Lybia (gunnery) on a C-119 and we were about halfway to Chambley AB when all hell broke loose on #2- oil all over the bottom of the nacelle and boom. Engineer finally got the prop feathered and we began to loose altitude.... Part of our cargo were the ftr pilots footlockers and flyaway parts kits for the F-86.
Back in those days, we maintained flyaway parts kits for all of our a/c that were kept under lock and key when at home base..The order came to get rid of every thing we could- funny how footlockers will tumble and finally the lids pop open....... The flyaway kits were too wide to fit thru the back doors, so we stood them on end to get them out - they too tumbled and burst open.. The last one, when we tipped it on end, water ran out of it and it rattled. Out the door it went, when it popped open you could see cans and boxes flying out of it. We later found out that it was the beer left over from a sqdns beer tent........... Yes we lived in tents.... we made a straight in approach to the airport at Marsaille (?) Scarey when you watch the altimeter slowly unwind and land is still not in sight. I think that when we crossed over the shore of France we had about 500 ft......... When we got parked there were three big holes in the coweling where the heads had actually blown off... Some bolts missing and some where the heads had popped off.... No evidence one way or the other as to whether they had been safety wired............ I flew back to Chambley in the plane that brought the replacement engine in, and like Jim P says, those crotch straps were pretty snug...........Use to play a lot of pinnochle on C-119s.............. The Old Sarge
Will have another story to tell about the C-119 and corrosion
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Jim Scanlon (deceased)
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Post by Jim Scanlon (deceased) on Mar 18, 2010 8:16:39 GMT 9
The Flying Boxcar was a good bird.
Sure it leaked oil from it's big reciprocating, piston driven, propeller propulsion engines. They were meant to leak.There was never a recip that didn't leak oil.
The 119 shook. A lot.
You would too if you had some 3500 horsepower turning a big four bladed engine cooler.
You had to find a pass in the mountains, because they only had oxygen for the flight crew and were not pressurized. Yep, you could see through some of the panels, that were purposely made that way.
You could also open the parachute doors and take some wonderful pictures.
Oh, yes, it was best if you had your chute on and were secured to the plane with a cargo tie down strap.
Some were so venturous as to hang out the door and feel the breeze.
The cockpit was mammoth and even had a bench across the back that two could take a nap on.
From the cockpit there is a "laundry chute" that goes to the belly of the fuselage.
If you can't guess what it is for; well, it is big enough for a pretty good sized man, wearing a chute to drop through to exit the plane from the cockpit.
The benjo, unfortunately, is at the front of the cargo deck and not the easiest to get to in a hurry if you are on the flight deck. Still have to climb down the ladder.
There were two basic versions of the 119.
The earlier, and most common, had a R-4360, "Corn Cob" engine.
Just like the ones on the C-124, B-50, C-121, B-36 and others. It was loud, vibrated a lot and really dumped the oil. It was prone to problems that caused you to check the feather button, while in flight.
The later, and better, in my estimation, is the R-3350 Compound. The 3350 is the engine used on the B-29 and lots of other birds, including an experimental Corsair.
Both engines were close in horsepower, and both leaked. The 3350, was no less prone to the feather button airborne activation, but was a bit less prone to problems. It was also a smoother engine.
So. don't' dis the Boxcar. It was a pretty good old girl.
The C-82, on the other hand. Well, let's just leave well enough alone for now.
Jim Too
:god_bless_usa
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Post by jimpadgett on Mar 18, 2010 9:47:55 GMT 9
Then there was the C-123. Had the displeasure of flying? in one from "dickie goober" to Duluth with a 7200 pound power unit straining at the tie-down chains about a foot from my knees. We were assured we would get home sooner than the rest of the guys who were returning commercial. Right!!! We were in a climb attitude the entire trip. You could distinguish people's arms and legs on the ground and seedaylight through the seams in the skin. Understand the thing was originally designed as a glider and later powered (the K added two jets). They shoulda left well enough alone. My second most miserable ride. For having the class aircraft we did with the six, we sure traveled in some shabby stuff. Got there though. Believe a lot of "dogpatch" aircraft were stationed at Hamilton. Oh, the commercial guys met us when we landed at Duluth. They had been there for 2 hours.
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Post by Gene on Mar 18, 2010 11:18:28 GMT 9
hey there...iv loaded a lot of rolling stock on 130's... 10000chains and devices... 4 for forward and two for aft restraint is more than enough to keep that thing in place( the formula is for 3 X the weight for forward and 1.5 X for aft restraint)...flown on a lot of 130's and sometimes it gets "interesting" on final...
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Post by Lee Nellist on Mar 18, 2010 12:07:53 GMT 9
Mention of the C-119 brings back a memory for me. Somewhere along about 1958 the 456th (Of which I was a member) went to Willie Tell with our deuces. It was a long ride from Castle to Tyndall but our bird made it with a couple of refueling stops.
At the end of Willie Tell we worked all night getting the birds fixed and launched them back to Castle shortly after sunrise. Tired, dirty, we loaded our gear on a C-119 and headed west. (Of course the parachute was on) Along about Sheppard AFB, Texas we lost an engine and landed. For those of you who remember Sheppard it was a finish basic/tech school base.
There we set with all our gear packed up on the airplane and no spare engine. About this time we were all hungry so we found the mess hall. Do you remember dirty and tired? The TI's went absolutely nuts with all these grubby looking airmen on their base. L/C William (Red) Miller was our commander at the time and he had to intercede to get them off our backs. That afternoon an engine was flown in and they couldn't get us off their base fast enough. Except for chow we couldn't leave the flight line. Parachute on and we made it home to Castle.
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Post by Jim on Mar 27, 2010 2:04:59 GMT 9
Another C-119 white knuckle moment, not mine, but the aircrew.......
Dec 1956 at the Griff, was weekend Alert NCOIC and we were standing outside the crew lounge smoking and watching the snow blowers doing their thing when we heard a receip making an apprpoach. It was making a hell of a racket and as it came into sight, we could see stuff falling off the boom- skin and those bumps on the bottom of the booms.... As it went by we saw the elevator drop off at the same time as the main gear touched down.... When they reversed the props, part of a boom drooped down about 2 feet........... The Flight engineer wanted to know if the BX was open as they all needed clean shorts.... Examination and the AI team said that stress corrosion had caused skin/rivet failure and the vibration caused failure of one of the elevator attach points........ Not an encouraging sight to the guys that were going to Moody for gunnery and flying on the 119. the next day.................
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Post by lindel on Mar 27, 2010 3:58:09 GMT 9
I can remember a few flights down to Tyndall from the Griff sitting in the jump seats with my feet on the engine cradle. The cradle would move a couple of inches in all directions during the flight.
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Post by Gene on Mar 30, 2010 14:19:02 GMT 9
need to spin down those tie-down devices...
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Post by burt49 on Mar 31, 2010 11:15:48 GMT 9
I guess even ugly women eventually find a husband, but a C-119 will always be a bridesmaid to me. They might have supposed to let you see the ground and supposed to leak the entire trip, but I would rather wave at them than fly in them. About the only thing worse was a C-124 where you could watch it take off, go inside to s**t, shower and shave, and come back outside and still see it on the horizon.
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Post by lauren044 on Mar 31, 2010 20:03:04 GMT 9
A yes, the exclusive riding conditions of the C-119 Flying Box Car. It was about 20 below or so when we loaded up the beast at Griffiss AFB with Age and tool boxes and personal gear on our way to Tyndall AFB in sunny Florida. Twas the year 1971 and my first William Tell and ever to Florida, land of liquid sun shine and on a C-119. We had a few enterprising individuals leave by car no less at the same time as we too to the air (09:00) which almost took the entire runway at the Griff. The noise was defining and cold back in the cargo bay. It seems that the heat system for the cargo bay system was wasn't working that bright and sunny day. So we took turns up on the flight deck drinking coffee and looking out the cockpit windows. We were about 7,000 feet or so and with earplugs, ear defenders on and we could still hear the sound of over a million rivets flying in loose formation. The farther South we flew we eventually lost the snow and ice and began to see green trees etc. When looking at the ground we were never far from a major highway either, LOL. About 17:30 they informed us that we were on approach to Tyndall AFB and to strap in for landing. It seemed like to me at the time the nose was exceptionally high when the main wheels touched down and then heard the chirp of the tires grabbing the runway and the unreadable shake inside the cargo bay. We taxied to the designated unload area and to our surprise the guy's that left by car that morning were awaiting our arrival. Well we left Griff at 20 below and arrived at Tyndall at rounded off to about 50 above. It wasn't long before the parka and heavy ski-pants came off and the fatigue shirt and the long underwear top as we unloaded the equipment. We all got razzed about wearing Bunny Boots (Mickey Mouse Boots) in Florida of all places. Wished I had some of those pictures today to look back at and laugh and remember.........And who could ever forget the increadable aroma from the paper factory located North West (I think) of the base as the gentle breezes brought it across the parking ramp, LOL.   |
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Post by Bullhunter on Apr 1, 2010 2:07:31 GMT 9
White Knuckle Moments (WKM),,,it does not state that it is restricted to C-119 tales even though that seems to be what is getting posted. C-119's were before my time. I'd say that I've expereanced at least three of what I could call (WKM). One on the ground, and Two in the air. One late evening close to midnight we were called out to run-up the engines of a B-52G at Griffiss AFB, NY. It was a pre-check before airborne alert. I believe it was called "Cromedome Alert". I could never figure out why we had to run the engines several hours prior to its take off. I did my walk around and the bombay doors were open. Inside the bombay were to racks of SRAM's. These were Short Range Attack Missles with nuke warheads. It was snowing and the snow flakes were lit up by the ramps flood lights. Everything was white as we had a few inches on the ground also. With walk around checks done I climbed aboard and went up and sat in the pilots seat and completed the pre-engine-run checklist. The crewchief sat in the co-pilots seat to ride brakes. A fellow jet engine technician stood ground observer and fire guard. The tower cleared us to start engines and provided us with the current weather conditions. its was cold! The tempature and dewpoint were within 7 degrees of eachother so we surely had icing conditions so anti-icing system was turned on. Engine start was normal and because of the snow and slick conditions I declined to take all 8 engines to full power at the same time. I'd take the two out board engines up on each wing first then the inboard engines for safety. Didn't want a B-52 with nukes sliding across the snow. Engines 1 & 2 along with 7 & 8 advanced to power and we checked the gauges. All were normal and we put them back at idle. We then advanced power on engines 3 & 4 along with 5 & 6. As we sat there looking at the gauges for any defects our ground observer/fire guard started screaming in the head set. "FIRE, FIRE, YOUR ON FIRE!" As I started to retard the throttles and asked which engine I looked up from the gauges and out the window glass. All the snow flakes and snow had took on an orange glow along with the hangers across from us. The crewchief was already out of the co-pilots seat telling me, "I'm out of here!" Our ground observer/fireguard yelled he couldn't pull the fire cart throught the snow. As I was chopping the throttles into cutoff position I ask again, "Which engine is on fire?" He replied, "Five, number Five!" At that point I had all the engines in shutdown and reached up and pulled the emergancy T-handle for #5 & #6 engines as they were on the same engine pylon. The T-Handles isolated the engines from the rest of the aircraft. I had also contacted the tower and advised them that were had an engine fire and we had nukes onbaord. AS I looked out of the cockpit again the outside was once again white and the ground observer advised that the fire went out. I exited the B-52 and went over to # 5 engine and asked, "Where was the fire?" I was informed that sparks were coming out the exhaust and hitting the blast fence and being blown up into the air. A B-52G with 8 engines running loaded with a dozen SRAM's with nuke warheads is a very scary thing when your ground observer screams ("FIRE, FIRE!").  |
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