Pound for pound, and specific to its mission, just about the finest airplane ever designed and built.
Pound for pound, and specific to its mission, just about the finest airplane ever designed and built.
Would make a helluva flying camper wouldn’t it! Wonder how much they will go for on the surplus market.
I have more than 1000 hours in the 4-fan trash can from A model to H.
The greatest hauler in history. My beloved Hercules.
Plus, the engines would just lull you to sleep. I flew on the EC-130H Compass Call for three years. It was a blast. Never felt more comfortable on any other type of aircraft. Never felt safer, especially after one particularly bad day ended just fine.
Lost one engine on take-off. Lost a second as we were coming back around to land. As we were in the process of landing, we had one engine feathered, one in the process of being feathered and a third on its way out.
Normally, an empty C-130 could fly and land on one engine, but we had several thousand pounds of fixed equipment in the back. We landed about 1/2 again the normal landing speed. Pilots did great. Went, did the debrief, and headed out for beer at 9 AM.
Note that the C-130’s tail looks alot like the tail of the old Hughes Hercules.
Also, note the similarity of the tails of the A-10 Warthog and the old B-25 Mitchell. It seems like they could even be traded out.
Coincidence? It’s always been interesting to me.