Well, if we don’t get that Bristol Freighter back to UK from Canada, then maybe some enterprising Group can purchase this Carvair and bring it back to the UK in memory of Freddie Laker. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to see her in British United Airways livery? I’m also sure Air Atlantique could put her to good use?? :rolleyes:

Thanks,

the website has just been put up – still being added to – more profiles being added every day or so. Right now strictly aerobatic teams, but soon to expand to include training, combat and UN service specials.

www3.sympatico.ca/animal112

James

As Greece and Turkey keep pace with eachother with military equipment and one doesn’t like being outdone by the other, I can’t understand why the Hellenic Air Force doesn’t form an official aerobatic team in competition with the”Turkish Stars”. Even a team of Raytheon Texans would be better than nothing?

The Whirlwind is my favourite, particularly the longer nosed HAR9 and HAR10 versions,

Let’s see who is the first to tell me what is significant about this Whirlwind?

Is this a Mk.2 Sinclair C5?

But on the positive side, we had 30 mins of aviation on BBC1, which is 30 mins more than usual….. 😀

…not in the ‘Wessex Region’ we didn’t!! 😀

this helicopter has always facinated me… a almost forgotten bird these days… i think they was used in the early part of Vietnam.. i would like to know how many was built. when was they retired…. 🙂

Here you go:

The Sikorsky S-56, called the CH-37 Mojave by the US Army and HR2S-1 by the US Marine Corps, was a large heavy-lift helicopter by the standards of the 1950s. It came into being as an assault transport for the USMC, with a capacity of 26 fully-equipped troops; the order was placed in 1951, the first prototype flew in 1953, and production deliveries began in July 1956 to Marine Corps Squadron HMX-1, sixty aircraft in total being produced.

The US Army evaluated the prototype in 1954 and ordered 94 examples as the CH-37A, the first being delivered also in summer 1956. All Marine and Army examples were delivered by mid-1960. Army examples were all upgraded to CH-37B status in the early 1960s, being given Lear auto-stabilization equipment and the ability to load and unload while hovering. In the 1962 unification of US military aircraft designations, USMC examples became CH-37C.

At the time of delivery, the CH-37 was the largest helicopter in the Western world, and it was Sikorsky’s first twin-engined helicopter. Two Pratt & Whitney Double Wasps were mounted in outboard pods that also contained the retractable landing gear. This left the fuselage free for cargo, which could be loaded and unloaded through large clamshell doors in the nose. The single main rotor was five-bladed, and designed to function with one blade shot away in combat.

The CH-37 was one of the last heavy helicopters to use piston engines, which were larger, heavier and less powerful than the turboshafts subsequently employed. This accounted for the type’s fairly short service life, all being withdrawn from service by the late 1960s, replaced in Army service by the CH-54 Tarhe.

Four CH-37Bs were deployed to Vietnam in 1963 to assist in the recovery of downed US aircraft. They were very successful at this role, recovering over $7.5 million dollars’ worth of equipment, some of which was recovered from behind enemy lines.