The 747 was actually intended for military use. It was beaten by the C-5 Galaxy.

The best loss ever for a plane builder. Lockheed won and went military with their entry and Boeing went commercial with theirs. The world’s commercial market was infinitely bigger.

An incorrect exaggeration often used (falsely) by Euro-fans to claim that Boeing received “illegal subsidies” for the B747.

The Boeing entry in the CX-HLS competition that was won by the Lockheed C-5 was, like the C-5 and the Douglas proposal, a high-wing design!

While the B747 used the experience gained from that competition, it was a clean-sheet design!

Also note that the initial B747 design was for a full-length two-deck layout, the lower being 8-wide 2-aisle and the upper 7-wide 2-aisle – but this was dropped over concerns about evacuation times and because it had limited belly luggage/cargo capacity.

And high speed, low level operations seem to be more fatiguing than upper air ops. High speed low level bending it round the corners of hills and valleys can’t be good for the airframe.

Not to mention the rougher air pounding the wings up & down – leading to the spar issues on Valiants, Vulcans, & Victors once the RAF changed to low-level bomber ops in the late 1950s/early 1960s.

Especially with A-A missile-equipped attack helos with advanced optical sensors (AH-64 with Stingers & AH-1W/Z with Sidewinders).

Many nations carrier designs have either long islands or forward positioned islands….in fact it’s only the US that does the small/aft configuration.

Having the conning position with a view over the bows is a good idea for obvious reasons. Separating ship and air control functions is also sensible for basic resilience and operational efficiency factors. The USN sacrifices ship handling for the clearer deck and optimal aircraft handling. The twin island approach is the compromise between best possible ship and air ops.

In addition, note that both islands have a large exhaust.

This is because under each island, in the supporting sponson, is a MT-30 gas turbine. These are the “high-power” generators of electrical power to drive the electric motors on the shafts for flight operations and other high-speed sailing (the diesel generators in the lower hull are for cruising and to power the rest of the ship’s electrical system).

This allows each gt to have short intake & exhaust runs (saving volume inside the ship and simplifying damage control and chemical warfare compartmentalization), allows easy access to change out the gts (gts are repaired by replacement, not taken apart in the ship, so easy access is important), and separates the gts so that no single anti-ship missile hit, or a fire on one gt, can damage or destroy both.

The double island is an extremely practical set-up.

As for the USN carriers – all of them have cameras at the bow, allowing the navigator/helmsman/OOW to see clearly what is in front of the ship.

There is also a “secondary conn” in the bow, just below the flight deck. When entering or leaving port (as well as when at “general quarters) this is manned – and in case the cameras go down and the bridge crew is unable to see forward or are incapacitated there are portholes in the front of this compartment that can be opened to allow direct viewing of what is in front of the ship.

These can be seen in this photo of CV-61 Ranger in July 1959 (between the catapult “horns”), and on this deck layout of CV-60 Saratoga at her decommissioning in 1994. The photo of CV-67 JFK also shows them. While reduced from 5 to 2, they are still present in all 9 Nimitz class CVNs, just on either side of the centerline, as shown in this May 2000 photo of CVN-75 Truman.

Interestingly, CVN-78 Ford does not have the centerline portholes – but it appears that there is one on each outside corner of the bow, as seen here (unless these are navigation lights).

NOTE: the photos attached in reverse order, so Ford is the first and Ranger is the last.

From May 20, 1926 control of civilian aeronautics in the US was the responsibility of the Aeronautics Branch of the Department of Commerce. In fulfilling its civil aviation responsibilities, the Department of Commerce initially concentrated on such functions as safety regulations and the certification of pilots and aircraft.

The Aeronautics Branch was renamed the Bureau of Air Commerce in 1934 to reflect its enhanced status within the Department.

In 1938, the Civil Aeronautics Act transferred the federal civil aviation responsibilities from the Commerce Department to a new independent agency, the Civil Aeronautics Authority.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt split the authority into two agencies in 1940, the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) and the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB). CAA was responsible for ATC, airman and aircraft certification, safety enforcement, and airway development. CAB was entrusted with safety regulation, accident investigation, and economic regulation of the airlines. The CAA was part of the Department of Commerce. The CAB was an independent federal agency.

The Federal Aviation Act of 1958 gave the CAA’s functions to a new independent body, the Federal Aviation Agency. The act transferred air safety regulation from the CAB to the new FAA.

In 1967, a new U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) combined major federal responsibilities for air and surface transport. The Federal Aviation Agency’s name changed to the Federal Aviation Administration.

So, I’d contact the FAA, as they are the direct successor of the continuously-operating pilot licensing apparatus of the US since 1926.

So for the rest of us, what’s OFMC?

This gives details of the crash and their mission on that day:
http://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=138243

Date: 14-APR-1958
Time:
Type: Douglas RB-66B-DL Destroyer
Owner/operator: 10th TRW, 19th TRS, USAF
Registration: 54-0422
C/n / msn: 44722
Fatalities: Fatalities: 3 / Occupants: 3
Other fatalities: 0
Airplane damage: Written off (damaged beyond repair)
Location: 4 miles from RAF Sculthorpe, Norfolk – United Kingdom
Phase: Approach
Nature: Military
Departure airport:
Destination airport: Sculthorpe, Norfolk (EGUP)
Narrative:
USAF Douglas RB-66B-DL Destroyer, 54-0422, of the 10th Tactical Reconnaissance Wing, 19th TRS, crashed in an open field four miles from RAF Sculthorpe, Norfolk, UK, while making a blind landing as part of a routine training flight.

The aircraft was receiving flight instructions from the radar control tower at Sculthorpe. Although the weather was good, the jet was operating under simulated blackout conditions. All three crew were killed:

1st Lt Robert B. Handcock (navigator)
Captain Roger E. Taylor (pilot)
T/Sgt Bernard M. Valencia (gunner)

The Douglas Destroyer was initially manufactured in two separate versions–a reconnaissance version designated RB-66B (Douglas Model 1329) and a bomber version designated B-66B (Douglas Model 1327A). They were basically similar in overall configuration, differing primarily in the equipment carried. The RB-66B carried flash bombs in its bomb bay for night photography missions and was equipped with a battery of reconnaissance cameras. The RB-66B could be fitted with a removable inflight refuelling probe attached to the right side of the forward fuselage.

The first RB-66Bs were issued to the 9th Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron of the 363rd Tactical Reconnaissance Wing, based at Shaw AFB in South Carolina in January of 1956. They replaced the obsolescent RB-26 Invader. Two more squandrons within the 363rd TRW, the 41st and the 43rd, were equipped with RB-66Bs by the end of the year. The RB-66B very soon became the primary night photographic reconnaissance weapon system of the Tactical Air Command.

The 12th TRS baseed at Itami, Japan, received its first RB-66Bs by the end of 1956. Two RB-66B squadrons were activated within the USAF in Europe.

I have never met the gentleman but did have the please to meet Bob Hoover who I believe was a ‘colleague’ of Yeager when on ops in the UK. Bob Hoover demonstrated a high level of professionalism for more than 50 years that I believe Yeager never came close to. Yeager’s claim to being the first human to fly through the sound barrier was very dubious and had much to do with the politics of the time which required a military officer rather than a civilian to claim the crown.

Not to mention the desire to “keep close” the capabilities of the F-86.