TWA turned to Douglas, in Long Beach, California, to build a competitor. From this came the famous “DC” series of commercial transports, which would continue through the jumbo jets of today. The original Douglas design, the DC-1, was a significant improvement over the 247D, with better speed, range, and passenger room. Then, in 1935, Douglas came up with the classic piston-engined transport airlift aircraft of all time: the DC-3. DC-3s would be built in larger numbers than any other transport aircraft in history, quickly becoming the backbone of the growing airline industry. By 1938, over eighty percent of American airline traffic was being carried by DC-3s. Additionally, DC-3s were license-built all over the world, even in the Soviet Union (as the Lisunov LI-2) and Imperial Japan (as the L2D Tabby).
Thus, when World War II came, the DC-3 naturally donned war paint and became the C-47 Dakota.[2] The Dakota served in the air forces of dozens of nations, with some 9,123 being built in the U.S. In fact, the large Army Air Force/Royal Air Force fleet of C-47s was one of the major factors that made the invasion of Europe possible. By being able to move large numbers of personnel, equipment, and supplies efficiently and safely by air, the Allied forces in 1944 had a level of operational mobility and agility that remains a model even today. All because of a simple, basic transport aircraft with two good engines, a highly stable flying design, and a structure that was practically indestructible. By way of example, the DC-3 hanging in the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C., has more than 56,700 flying hours, and was retired in 1952! Other DC- 3/C-47 airframes have served even longer. Some updated versions, equipped with everything from turboprop engines to GPS satellite navigation systems, are still going strong today, more than sixty years after coming off the production line.
What made aircraft like the 247D and DC-3 so revolutionary in their day was the integration of a number of new and emerging technologies. Technologically they had more in common with today’s jumbo jets than they do with the wood-and-canvas contraptions that had come before them. Their technical innovations included flush riveting, monocoque construction, turbo-supercharged radial engines, pressurized cabins, radios, and the first generation of modern aerial navigation instruments. These aircraft represented a technical Rubicon which, once crossed, could make commercial air transportation as viable and profitable a business as any railroad or trucking company.
Now, don’t let me mislead you into thinking that transport aircraft alone won the Second World War and made victory easy. It needs to be said that the thousands of C-47s and other transport aircraft that the Allies produced were just barely adequate for the rudimentary (by current standards) tasks that they were assigned, and had many shortcomings. The C-47 was only capable of carrying about two dozen paratroops out to a range of several hundred miles from their home bases. Older designs, like the Ju-52s (affectionately known as “Iron Annies” by their crews) used by the Germans, were lucky to carry half that many. Also, World War II-era transport aircraft were terribly vulnerable to enemy action. Lacking armor and self-sealing fuel tanks, they were death traps if they encountered antiaircraft fire (AAA) or enemy fighters. Finally, they were poorly configured for the job of dropping any cargo bigger than a large equipment “bundle.” Their side-opening cargo doors made carrying anything larger than a jeep difficult at best, and dropping that same jeep by parachute simply was not possible.
This shortcoming in heavy equipment delivery led to the development of specially designed gliders, which could be towed behind a transport or bomber aircraft, then released to land gently (it was hoped!).
By the end of the Second World War, the technical problems of building improved transport aircraft to support airdrop operations were clearly understood. The drawdown of U.S. forces following the war restricted new military developments to just a few key programs, and it was some time before these new airlifters could come into service. Commercial development of airliners flourished, creating designs like the Douglas DC-6 and Lockheed Super Constellation (known by their military designations as the C- 54 and C-121 respectively). These, though, were primarily passenger aircraft, and did not have any real improvements in cargo handling or stowage. Until the coming of the new generation of postwar military transports, older aircraft like the C-47 would continue to soldier on, flying the Berlin Airlift and fighting their second major war in Korea.
When the first of the new-generation transport aircraft finally arrived in the late 1940s, they were known as “Flying Boxcars.” The primary builder of these unique aircraft was Fairchild Republic, which designed them to be modular haulers of almost any kind of cargo or load. The Flying Boxcars were composed of a cockpit section with a high wing and two engines in tandem booms, with rudders and elevators running between them. Between the booms the cargo was carried in large pods equipped with powered rear doors and ramps. This meant that the cargo section could have a large rear door to load, unload, and drop cargo, vehicles, artillery pieces, and paratroops. Several variants of the Flying Boxcar were produced, the ultimate version being the Fairchild C-119.
Flying Boxcars were the backbone of the aerial transport fleets of the U.S. and its allies for over a decade. They dropped French paratroops into Dien Bien Phu and Algeria, acted as flying gunships, and even snagged early reconnaissance satellite film containers from midair. Still, the Flying Boxcars suffered from the inherent weaknesses of all piston-engined aircraft: limited speed and lifting power, as well as relatively high fuel consumption. This meant that for airdrop operations, they could only work within a relatively small theater of operations, albeit a larger one than the C-47. The dreams of U.S. Army leaders for projecting combat power directly across the oceans from American soil would have to wait for a major development of some sort. They did not have long to wait.
Down at Lockheed in Marietta, Georgia, there was a dedicated group of engineers who saw the early potential of jet-powered transport aircraft. Developers of the classic Super Constellation-series airliners, they were now dabbling with an interesting hybrid powerplant: the turboprop. Turboprop engines coupled the new jet turbines with the well-proven technology of high-efficiency propellers. The result was an aircraft powerplant with great power and superb fuel efficiency. When combined with the new generation of airframes coming off the Marietta line, the result was the classic medium transport aircraft of our generation: the C-130 Hercules. While this is a tall claim, it is sufficient to say that over four decades after it first entered production, new C-130 variants are being brought into service.
Good as the Hercules was, though, it only whetted the appetite of Army and Air Force leaders to expand the capabilities that they wanted from their fleet of transport aircraft. The coming of the Cold War had shown them that they needed airlifters with high subsonic speed (Mach.7 or better), intercontinental range, and a cargo/payload capacity which would make the movement of whole ground units with all their equipment possible. While the Hercules lacked the high speed and long range that Air Force and Army leaders craved, the C-130 was a giant step forward in combining the desirable characteristics of the new jet/turbine engines with advanced airframe designs. When the Air Force bought the Boeing KC-135[3] in the 1950s as its first real jet transport (an airborne refueling tanker), it had almost none of the cargo-carrying capacity desired by Army leaders, who were interested in moving forces rapidly and efficiently to a crisis zone.
It took another ten years before a true heavy transport with high subsonic speed and intercontinental range would become a reality. By the mid- 1960s, though, the wishes of everyone in the U.S. armed forces were finally fulfilled in the form of the Lockheed C-141 Starlifter. The Lockheed Marietta engineers took an ambitious requirement for large payload, long range, and high cruising speed, and then combined those features with the ability to be able to slow down to speeds (around 130 kn/241 kph) that would allow paratroops to be safely deployed over a drop zone. The Starlifter did all of this, and still continues to do so today, with seven-league boots and a cargo capacity that can accommodate much of the basic equipment of the U.S. Army’s various units.
Good as the C-141 was, the leadership of the Army and Air Force wanted even more. A lot more.
