Beyond The Sprues
Current and Finished Projects => Stories => Topic started by: upnorth on September 11, 2021, 02:20:31 AM
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January 31, 1961. Trois Rivieres, Quebec, Canada
A pillar of black smoke rose from the south bank of the St.Lawrence river, just south-west of Trois Rivieres. A single parachute drifted downward into the farmland north-east of Nicolet. A test pilot survived, a prototype jet trainer did not.
"I'd been set to fly a routine trip from the Canadair factory in Cartierville to Quebec City and back, following the river for navigation. Nothing should have gone wrong, but the program had been full of unexpected delays and obstacles. If ever there was an aircraft full of gremlins, the CL-41 was it."
So went part of the post crash interview with Canadair test pilot Ian MacTavish.
From the maiden flight, on January 13 of 1960, the Canadair CL-41 jet trainer program had been plagued with inexplicable problems. In spite of losing three prototypes due to sudden loss of control during flight, all wind tunnel tests showed a stable aircraft design. All mechanical inspections showed no problems and all test pilots were healthy as horses.
Investigations into the loss of the three CL-41 prototype airframes were inconclusive. What was not inconclusive was that the program had fallen through the thin ice it was already on.
No lives had been lost, but with three prototypes lost in a year of flying and no conclusive explanation for it, the Royal Canadian Air Force had lost interest in the CL-41 as its new jet trainer aircraft.
The RCAF's next generation jet trainer would not be of domestic design.
A former Canadair employee:
"The CL-41 had been a private venture by Canadair to create an indigenous advanced jet training aircraft. As there was no tender put out, we really had to sell it to the RCAF. We failed.
We had piqued the RCAF's interest in an advanced jet trainer, but they had lost their interest in the CL-41 after the accidents.
They put out a tender not long after the CL-41 program was cancelled and we hoped that we could get a second chance at the trainer, even if it might be license built.
We got lucky."
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Good stuff! And colour me intrigued ... very interested to see what replaces the CL-41. :D
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Indeed
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The Competition Gathers
While the RCAF brass decided they had seen enough of the CL-41's bad luck, the logic of looking for a new generation jet trainer to supplement and possibly replace the Canadair license built T-33s was sound. The RCAF announced a competition for the new jet trainer in late summer of 1961.
The trouble was that the only truly new generation jet trainer flying at the time, other than the CL-41, in western Cold War skies was the Aermacchi MB-326 from Italy.
Other available trainers, like the Cessna T-37, Fouga Magister and BAC Jet Provost were well proven and capable but all more than half a decade older in basic design than the CL-41.
Additionally, the RCAF had specified that the new trainer be of single engine design. This effectively removed the Cessna and Fouga aircraft from contention.
The final line up of competing designs were the the Aermacchi MB-326, BAC Jet Provost and the Folland Gnat.
A former RCAF pilot who was involved in the competition:
"While the Italian jet was still in prototype and pre-production stages, several of us who had been stationed in France or West Germany in the late 1950s had seen the MB-326 demonstrator jets perform. We were impressed to say the least.
The Jet Provost variant in the competition would be the very new T.4 version that was a just a few months away from entering RAF service when the competition was announced. RCAF pilots who had flown the previous Jet Provost version, the T.3, generally spoke well of it, so we were interested to get a look at the new version.
As for the Gnat, we weren't sure what to make of it. It was fast, but the small size concerned us a bit and we knew that the aircraft was initially intended to meet a light strike fighter role that the RAF lost interest in and Folland had reworked the aircraft into a trainer in order to sell the RAF on it. The idea of a reworked and repurposed fighter rather than a from-the-ground-up trainer didn't sit well with all of us."
October 9, 1961: RCAF Station Marville, France
As all three competing trainer designs were European in origin, it was decided to host the preliminary stage of the competition at one of the RCAF's European bases. As it was likely the new trainer would see some deployment to Europe, it had to be seen how it would perform over the congested airspace of Continental Europe.
With September spent preparing Marville for the competition, the first week of October was given for the competing parties and their aircraft to arrive and give briefings on their machines. The flying started in earnest the second week of October.
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Oh this is very cool! I'm already anticipating Macchis in Maple Leafs :)
Are you doing images to accompany the story?
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Oh this is very cool! I'm already anticipating Macchis in Maple Leafs :)
Are you doing images to accompany the story?
I'm thinking about some images. Gotta get out the drawing pens and ink and get the rust out. :smiley:
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Ooh! Another Upnorth tale! Chair pulled up and coffee cup filled.
Chris
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Ooh! Another Upnorth tale! Chair pulled up and coffee cup filled.
I can't promise this will be the long, drawn out tale that previous ones were. This year has been crazy on many fronts and the idea of losing the CL-41 has been bouncing around in my mind since I was still rewriting the post WWII history of Austria.
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Operazione Coniglio
The initial stage of the competition at Marville had gone without a hitch for all three companies involved. While the RCAF were busy with closer assessment of the preformances of the aircraft, the three companies were making their way to Canada for the second stage.
A retired Aermacchi engineer recalls the time:
"The second stage of the competition focused primarily on cold weather performance and range. The Jet Provost had a bit less range than our 326, but it could still compete with us there. Of the Gnat, we were confident we had it roundly beaten as far as range was concerned.
Fitting the 326 out for cold weather operations proved to a be a straightforward task. We could imagine that the Jet Provost team wouldn't have too much trouble with that, but we were very sceptical that the Gnat would survive the cold weather operation aspect. The Finnish air force had experienced all sorts of problems with the Gnat almost as soon as they took in into service in 1958, part of those problems were due to the harsh operating environment in Finland.
Our 326 was doing well for itself so far and we were very optimistic. Our marketing team had created "Operazione Coniglio" to market the aircraft specifically to Canada. In English, that translated into "Operation Rabbit". The name was chosen after our marketing team did some research and saw that the RCAF had some aircraft named after wild animals like the Chipmunk, Beaver, Otter and Caribou; they felt giving the 326 a name that fit in that pattern could only help in the competition.
To push the point home a bit further, the two aircraft we took to Canada were appropriately registered as I-JUMP and I-LEAP and had the silhouette of a leaping rabbit painted on the fuselage just below the cockpits."
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:smiley:
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I was wondering where the 'Jackrabbit' subject line came from! Okay, 'Operation Bunny', it is ;D
Watching with interest 8)
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November 20, 1961: RCAF Station Namao, Alberta, Canada
The chill of a Canadian prairie winter cut sharply through the cold weather clothing of the ground crews of all three teams in the competition as they prepared their respective aircraft in the pre-dawn hours for the range testing their aircraft would endure over the course of the day.
A retired BAC team pilot recalls:
"I had flown in the RAF in World War Two and had done the bulk of my flight training on the Canadian prairies, some of it during the winter, so I had some idea what to expect going out there at this time of year. Still, it was something of a shock to the system after having been away from it for several years.
The RCAF evaluation team had set a triangular course for the teams to fly and we were briefed on it while our ground crews readied the planes.
The first leg would be from Namao to Cold Lake. We would then go from Cold Lake to Moose Jaw and spend a few hours there so that representatives from RCAF Training Command could get a good look at the aircraft and ask questions. We would then head back to Namao in the early evening.
It was a good route for the test as the second on final legs, about 555 km and 658 km respectively, were a fair test of the range of all three aircraft and the final leg would see us return to Namao at night, so there was some latitude to show some night flying abilities of the aircraft.
The only real concern about our Jet Provost at the time was the lack of cockpit pressurization. Both the MB-326 and the Gnat had pressurized cockpits while the Jet Provost Mk.4 variant we were demonstrating did not. This meant we could not fly as high as they could and make the most efficient use of our engine."
November 20, 1961: RCAF Station Cold Lake, Alberta, Canada
After a flight of approximately 225 km, all three aircraft reached Cold Lake without incident.
Cold Lake was designed to be a quick stop for technicians from the three teams who had been sent to the station ahead of the aircraft to top up fuel and do a quick visual inspection for their respective aircraft before the second leg. The aircraft were all back in the air and headed to Moose Jaw less than an hour after landing at Cold Lake.
November 20, 1961: RCAF Station Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, Canada
After a flight of over 550 kilometres, the MB-326 and Gnat arrived at Moose Jaw in quick succession with the Jet Provost arriving about 20 minutes later. The three aircraft were taxiied to a shared hangar where technicians unstrapped the pilots and set to work readying the aircraft for the final leg later in the day.
The pilot of the Gnat team recalls:
"I loved the Gnat tremendously as a flying machine, but I don't think I've ever been as happy to get out of one as I was after the Cold Lake to Moose Jaw flight or the final leg of the range competition that followed it. Happily, Moose Jaw would give us a good chance to relax between second and third legs.
All of the pilots expected they would need to do some interviews with the press and answer questions from RCAF Training Command brass, but that was all being taken care of by the various company representatives and other test pilots. All three teams had sent spare aircraft to Moose Jaw ahead of time and all three teams were set up in an adjacent hangar attentding to the public relations and marketing end of things.
I was quite glad I didn't have to face the press that day. My flight so far had been great and the aircraft performed flawlessly. However, watching the vast Canadian prairie under me left me with some serious concerns about how appropriate the Gnat might be for a country like Canada. It was the smallest of the competitiors and had the least space for survival gear if it went down in the middle of nowhere.
As it turned out, the pilot of the other Gnat developed similar concerns while flying it from Namao to Moose Jaw for the press conference."
The flying crews were escorted to a private dining area for lunch and then were taken to mingle with instructor pilots from the base for an informal question and answer session with them.
A retired RCAF instructor pilot:
"We were all very excited at Moose Jaw about the new trainer. Our excitiment was only diminished a small amount by the fact it wouldn't be domestic. A good plane is a good plane, wherever it comes from and we were looking at three good planes.
All three aircraft had things in their favour. The Jet Provost, with its side by side seating, definitely felt like a trainer first and foremost while both the MB-326 and Gnat gave more of a fighter feel.
My personal preference was for the MB-326. Sitting in the cockpit felt like getting into a newer version of the T-33 we were already flying. It felt comfortable right from the start."
November 20, 1961: RCAF Station Namao, Alberta, Canada
The three aircraft returned to their starting point as twilight was giving way to the full blackness of night. The teams would have the next 48 hours to relax and discuss the day's flying and aircraft performance. The teams that had done the press conference in Moose Jaw were due back at Namao the next morning.
Those aircraft that had been used at the press conference were to be the subjects of the icing trials later in the week.
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December 4, 1961: Hawker Siddeley headquarters, Kingston upon Thames, United Kingdom
Following the range and icing tests in Canada, the three competing teams returned to Europe to break for Christmas and prepare for the final fly off scheduled for early in 1962.
The reports of the Gnat pilots had reached the executive levels of Hawker Siddeley, which had taken over Folland in 1959, and the first two weeks of December 1961 were taken up by many meetings and heated debates in the company boardrooms.
A former company executive recalls:
"The Gnat pilots who had demonstrated the aircraft in Canada had both recommended that we pull the aircraft out of the competition as they both had serious misgivings on the adequacy of the aircraft for Canada as far as range was concerned.
I could empathize with their position as I had some experience flying over the Canadian prairies myself, those could be some very big distances to cover and the Gnat had a range of just a bit over 800 kilometers. The final leg of the range test was around 660 kilometers, so the math was not difficult to see that there wouldn't be a lot of options for an aircraft with a range of less than 1,000 kilometers if things started going badly.
They also had concerns over the Gnat's small size in regards to how much survival gear might be able to be packed into it. If a Gnat went down in a remote enough area, would the aircraft be able to carry enough supplies to keep the crew alive until rescue teams could get to them?
I didn't have any problems taking the side of the pilots and the company had plenty of other irons in the fire at the time, so it wouldn't hurt us much to pull out.
Not everyone at the company felt as I did, though.
There were those who saw the Gnat as way for the company to keep a hand in aircraft production in Canada. Avro Canada was a full subsidiary to Hawker Siddeley at the time and the cancellation of the Avro Arrow interceptor in 1959 had left the factory at Malton without a project or staff. Their idea was that, if we won the competition, we'd open up a Gnat production line there rather than close the aircraft arm of the company as some others wanted to do."
January 5, 1962: Hawker Siddeley headquarters, Kingston upon Thames, United Kingdom
Following a return to work after the Christmas and New Year break, Hawker Siddeley executives voted by a narrow margin to withdraw the Gnat from the competition.
Later that same year, Hawker Siddeley disolved Avro Canada and restructured it as Hawker Siddeley Canada. The aircraft arm of the company was closed and de Havilland Canada eventually took ownership of the former Avro Canada factory at Malton.
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February 5, 1962: RCAF Station Marville, France
BAC and Aermacchi teams converged for the final fly-off at the same location as the competiton began, the RCAF Station At Marville in France.
It was an anti-climactic event, as the decision had largely made itself by that point in time. A retired BAC representative recalls:
"We knew the Jet Provost, with its lack of cockpit pressurisation, really didn't have a chance.
The T.4 version that had entered RAF service in late 1961, and was the version Canada would get, was a sound aircraft. However, the need for trainer jets that could operate at higher altitudes was being voiced by many air arms around the world and the Jet Provost would need a serious redesign to accomodate the cockpit pressurisation required for that.
What the MB-326 could deliver 'now', we could only promise for later.
What really put the MB-326 over the top, was that Aermacchi promissed a license building deal to Canada for their aircraft if it won.
All we could do was sit and watch, then shake hands with the victors."
As it was, Aermacchi was working on more than a license building deal. At the time, Canadair was a subsidiary to General Dynamics through that company's Convair division.
At the same time Aermacchi was selling the MB-326 to Canada, they were also in negotiations to purchase Canadair and make it their own subsidiary.
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A former Aermacchi executive:
"There was, understandably, a great deal of concern at Canadair and General Dynamics about Aermacchi's bid to purchase Canadair. Lockheed was showing even more concern as Canadair had not only license built a version of their T-33 trainer, but they had the license to produce Lockheed's F-104 Starfighter as well.
In truth, they needn't have worried. We were prepared to respect any license building deals that were already in place at Canadair.
We knew we had a winner on our hands with the MB-326 and that there would need to be multiple assembly lines to meed the global demand we envisioned for it.
We could simply have granted a production license to Canadair, but purchasing them would give us a real foothold in the North American market for potential future aircraft construction and marketing."
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I was just about to ask you if there were any updates...
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I was just about to ask you if there were any updates...
Yeah, I finally had a chance to get more written. Lot's of other stuff going on in "real life" got in the way for a bit.
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August 6, 1962: Cartierville Airport, Quebec, Canada
The roar of a newly built CF-104 Starfighter filled the air as the heat from its engine exhaust disipated the morning mist around it. The pilot manipulated the throttle and the aircraft started taxiing to the end of the runway in preparation for its shakedown flight and acceptance by the RCAF.
While the world at large was gossiping about the death of Marilyn Monroe over the weekend, the buzz in the Canadair hangars was solidly on the changes that Aermacchi might bring to operations now that Canadair was officially the Italian company's subsidiary.
A former Canadair executive:
"The CF-104 line was safe, as Aermacchi had promised it would be, and we were on a hiring surge to get the personnel in place to tool up for and start building the MB-326.
In spite of Aermacchi assurances, there were some people working for us that were difficult to convince that they could carry on with their jobs as if nothing happened. I suppose some people are just that way.
The change of Ownership to Aermacchi had been finalised and we were in the process of tooling up for MB-326 production. The area of the plant that had been intended for CL-41 production would now be home to the MB-326 line.
Aermacchi had made it clear that they wanted us to produce the aircraft for a long term and for export customers as well as the RCAF. With that, we could give some assurance to anyone we hired for the MB-326, that they would have steady work for a decent period of time."
The first five MB-326 to be built by Canadair were assembled from kits provided by Aermacchi. The first of these aircraft took to the air in early November of 1962 with the other four taking their respective first flights within November and December of that year.
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Hmmm...I wonder what this development could mean in the longer term?
Would the CF-5 program go ahead? If yes, would this also provide a reverse flow opportunity for CF-5s to be proposed by Aermacchi for the Aeronautica Militare in Italy? If not, what might replace it? Something akin to the MB.326K perhaps?
Eventually would we also see a development of the AMX offered in Canada? Perhaps the MB-339?
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Good questions. On the future of the CF-5 purchase, links between Northrop and Canada seemed to have had to do with the personal relationship between Paul Hellyer (MND 1963-1967) and T.V. Jones (Northrop CEO/Chairman/President). If Hellyer remains in place in this AltHist, so too does the CF-5.
Unless ... Hellyer had briefly supported the call to license-build Spey-power F-4 Phantoms in Canada (for the CF and RN/RAF). Had that gone ahead, one can image the CAF Phantoms needing an upgrade by the mid- to late-'80s. Let's say that the old RB.168 Mk.202s are replaced by a reheated version of the RB.168 Mk.807. That, and Canadair still being owned by Aermacchi, would leave AMX International pushing at an open door in Canada :smiley:
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I'm working out the details of how to handle the CF-5 at the moment.
Some of Hellyer's other legacies with regards to the Canadian military may come in for some revision as well.
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Another Iron in the Fire
By Late February of 1963, fully Canadian built MB-326s were leaving the Cartierville factory for delivery to the RCAF station at Moose Jaw and were proving very popular there among the instructor pilots who were getting trained on the type.
Not long after Aermacchi took over Canadair, they became aware of an intriguing design on their new subsidiary's drafting boards: the CL-204.
The CL-204 was a purpose designed, amphibious water bomber that was intended to be able to refill its water tanks by skimming over a body of water and using a pair of retractable scoops to take up a new load of water.
A former Aermacchi engineer:
"The moment we set eyes on the CL-204 design, we knew it would be something very useful back in Italy and other areas of the Mediterranean that were prone to fires due to prolonged hot and dry conditions. It didn't take much to convince our executives in Italy that the CL-204 should be supported as a priority project.
The design was solid and well thought out as it was. However, the design incorporated World War Two era radial engines and that did not sit well with us. We adjusted the specification to make it a turpoprop driven aircraft.
We ordered a series of prototypes, some with the proven Rolls Royce Dart engine and some with the newer, General Electric T64.
If successful, the idea was to have Canadair produce the aircraft for markets in the Americas while Aermacchi would have a production line in Italy to supply European demand."
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:smiley:
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Plot thickens ... :D
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Jackrabbit Affirmed
A mid-March 1963 morning had dawned on the RCAF Station at Moose Jaw and a quartet of MB-326s took to the air in quick succession and formed up in a diamond formation.
The aircraft moved seamlessly from diamond formation, to finger four, to echelon....
Opposing solos did mirror passes and a solo machine engaged in Lomcovak manouvers.
To those on the ground, both instructors and students, the MB-326 was the material you could make an aerobatics team from.
A former instructor pilot:
"By the time the MB-326 had been accepted into RCAF service, the powers that were had given it the CT-114 designation that the Canadair CL-41 would have received. They also tried to give it the "Tutor" name, but the "Jackrabbit" name that Aermacchi had come up with during the competition had really taken hold in the minds on many and that's the name the MB-326 would be known by in Canadain service.
The Jackrabbits
On April 1 of 1963, the RCAF's 39th birthday, the "Jackrabbits" aerobatics team was born at Moose Jaw. Initially a four aircraft team, it was quickly expanded to six aircraft.
The Jackrabbits team initially started out as a team that could represent the RCAF at shows where the Current team, the Golden Hawks, weren't scheduled to appear. However, in a very short period, shows featuring the new team were recording higher attendance numbers than those which featured the Golden Hawks.
A former Jackrabbits pilot:
"I had significant time flying the Sabre, and enjoyed every moment of it. However, by the late 1950s, the writing was clearly on the wall for the Sabre.
It felt strange to say that you could run rings around a fighter with a trainer, but that was exactly the case with the Macchi. It may have been a trainer, but it was a full generation ahead of the Sabre and acted that way. We could do things with the Macchi in a Jackrabbits show that the Golden Hawks just couldn't."
By February of 1964, the Golden Hawks were disbanded and the Jackrabbits would be the RCAF's official aerobatics team until 1967. In Canada's Centennial year, the team was renamed the Golden Centennaires.
The team was disbanded at the end of 1967.
The Canadian military would not have another aerobatics team until 1971, when the Snowbirds were established. Like the Jackrabbits and Golden Centennaires before them, the Snowbirds used the MB-326 as their mount.
Mind the Minister
April of 1963 saw the appointment of Paul Hellyer as Canada's new Minister of National Defense. Hellyer had many new ideas for the Canadian military, not all of them popular.
Hellyer was noted to be very critical of the MB-326 in spite of the aircraft's popularity with both air and ground crews. It was well known that he received his education in aeronatical engineering in America and had good ties to Thomas V. Jones of Northrop.
It was rumored that if Hellyer had his way, the RCAF would have a fleet of Cessna T-37s and Northrop T-38s for training.
A former RCAF instructor pilot:
"When Hellyer went on the attack against the MB-326, absolutely nothing could disuade him from his disdain for the aircraft.
We offered him familiarization rides in the Macchi, all of which he flatly refused. He likely would have had the Jackrabbits team disbanded if it weren't for their popularity with airshow crowds.
He was pitching the idea of a light combat type for the RCAF. We knew we had a performer in the Macchi and it couldn't be that hard to make a weapons delivery platform out of it that could satisfy that light combat type specification.
We approached the Aermacchi and Canadair executives on the matter and they agreed that an armed version of the Macchi should be a priority."
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July 15, 1963: Cartierville Airport, Quebec, Canada
Four MB-326s, two company demonstrators and two RCAF examples lifted off from the Cartierville runway on their way to Central and South America. Shortly after take off, they were joined by a support aircraft in the form of an RCAF C-130 Hercules.
In response to Paul Hellyer's overt dislike of the MB-326 from the start, a sales tour was deemed essential by both Canadair and Aermacchi. Securing export customers for the Canadair built version of the aircraft would make it more difficult for the minister to undermine the aircraft in the face of foreign revenue generated by it.
A former Canadair marketing executive:
"It wasn't enough that we were building the MB-326 for the RCAF, we needed export customers for it. It was the plan from the start that Canadair would be the primary provider of the aircraft to the Americas, but it took on a new level of urgency with Paul Hellyer in place as the Defense Minister. Export orders would be some level of insurance against him simply trying to cancel it.
Our target market was anyone using the Lockheed T-33, as the MB-326 could act as a more modern replacement; something the aircraft was already in the process of doing in the RCAF.
The tour lasted about a month and the aircraft generated a good amount of interest. Both Brazil and Argentina were very interested, but both wanted to license build the aircraft as both countries had domestic aircraft producers.
In the end, we had Confirmed orders from Uruguay, Paraguay, Nicaragua and Guatemala."
"Project Viper"
Even before the MB-326 sales tour of Central and South America took place, the planning of an armed variant of the aircraft had been taking place in earnest as a private venture.
Tentatively named "Viper" the aircraft had a redesigned forward fuselage to accomodate a pair of 30mm DEFA cannons. The two seat cockpit dimensions were retained, but the rear cockpit was redesigned to house an equipment module with gear specific to the light strike mission.
To maintain parts commonality with the trainer variant, the cockpit canopy was not changed. This also allowed some rearward vision for the pilot to be retained.
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:smiley:
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Nice! And I sense some interesting marking options coming down the pike :smiley:
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Well Paraguay flew the type int he real world but I don't believe the others did:
(http://aviadejavu.ru/Images6/AN/AN85-2/12-3.jpg)
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Well Paraguay flew the type int he real world but I don't believe the others did:
Right! And RW Paraguay got its EMB-326GBs from Embraer, of course. So, how does Brazil respond to Canadair pushing into 'its' South American market?
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Well Paraguay flew the type int he real world but I don't believe the others did:
Right! And RW Paraguay got its EMB-326GBs from Embraer, of course. So, how does Brazil respond to Canadair pushing into 'its' South American market?
Working on the details of that right now. :-)
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Working on the details of that right now. :-)
Excellent! No pressure ;)
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September 17, 1963: Varese, Lombardy, Italy
Even before Canadair had begun pushing "Project Viper" and securing sales in South America, it had been decided that the first four prototypes of the CL-215 would be built and tested by Aermacchi at their facilities in Varese, Italy.
Priority had been put on getting one prototype each of the Rolls Royce Dart powered version and General Electric T64 powered version. The Dart powered version had been completed and taxi runs done with it by early September.
September 17 saw the first taxi runs of the T64 version completed and a small naming ceremony held for the two aircraft.
The Dart powered prototype was given the name "Dorothea" and the T64 prototype would be known as "Teresa".
A former Aermacchi executive:
"We surprised ourselves in getting the first two CL-215 prototypes finished less than a year after deciding to go ahead with the project. Mind you, Canadair had already done a lot of the design work. Mostly, we just had finer details to work out in the design by this point.
Given the situation with the MB-326 in Canada and what a priority it was to secure customers for it, we decided to take the pressure off Cartierville by starting the CL-215 prototyping and testing in Varese. We had the space available to do it and we had Lake Varese available when it was time to test the aircraft in the water.
Canadair sent their CL-215 design team to Italy to help form the Aermacchi part of the team and lead the team. The design was Canadian, so it was only fair that Canadians should be leading it."
By the end of September, both CL-215 prototypes had taken their first flights and were seen favourably by the test pilots.
A former Canadair test pilot:
"Testing the first CL-215 prototypes in Italy went quite smoothly for the most part; they both handled well and didn't hit us with any nasty little surprises.
I'd flown Dart powered aircraft before. It was a good engine and I knew what to expect from it, but aero engine technology was going ahead by leaps and bounds at the time and the Dart was an older engine as turpoprops went.
The T64 was also a good engine, nicely responsive and no particular bad habits.
The real advantage of the T64 was how much lighter it was than the Dart. The version of Dart we used was of higher horsepower than the T64 in order to offset the weight difference.
The difference in engines made "Teresa" a lighter aircraft on the controls and more fuel efficient than "Dorothea". I had a feeling "Dorothea" would be the only prototype fitted with the Dart, and I was right."
November 10, 1963: Lake Varese, Italy
Early in the morning, "Teresa" and "Dorothea" taxied into the waters of Lake Varese for the first time. Their landing gears were retracted and neither aircraft had any water leakage through the hull. The morning was occupied with taxi testing on the water and further tests for leakage. Both aircraft did very well in those tests.
After lunch, the crews returned to the aircraft and it was time to test their ability to take off and land on water.
The former Canadair test pilot continues:
"The advantages of the T64 over the Dart were made very clear when taking off from water. Even without taking on a load of water, "Dorothea" took longer to get airborne and used more fuel to do so than "Teresa". None of the test pilots were keen to try scooping water with "Dorothea" after taking off with her empty and we let the design team know that in our reports.
They still made us do water scooping tests, but it was all very academic by that point. Both aircraft could scoop and get back in the air, but "Dorothea" took a bit longer to get back up in the air and the fuel guages made clear to us that she wouldn't be able to stay in the fight as long as "Teresa" without going home for fuel.
Immediately after the scooping trials, all further testing with the Dart was cancelled and the T64 was settled on as the engine for the CL-215 from that point on.
It wasn't the end for "Dorothea" though. She was inspected and it was decided that it was worth keeping her and refitting her with T64s. In spring of 1964, she was back in the air with new engines and seemed much happier for the change."
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Very cool!
Moving CL-215 development to Italy took me off guard as did your early move to turboprops for the waterbomber. Nice!
Especially like your use of GE T64s! Commonality with DHC-5s/CC-115s and Aeritalia G.222s :smiley:
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Very cool!
Moving CL-215 development to Italy took me off guard as did your early move to turboprops for the waterbomber. Nice!
Especially like your use of GE T64s! Commonality with DHC-5s/CC-115s and Aeritalia G.222s :smiley:
Thanks!
The T64 commonality with the DHC-5 and G.222 was a big part of my decision to bring the engine into play.
Moving CL-215 development to Italy made sense for keeping space free at Cartierville at a critical time for the MB.326. It was also a bit of a nod to Aermacchi's heritage with seaplanes and using Lake Varese to test them.
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... Moving CL-215 development to Italy made sense for keeping space free at Cartierville at a critical time for the MB.326. It was also a bit of a nod to Aermacchi's heritage with seaplanes and using Lake Varese to test them.
And, of course, the Vigili del Fuoco becoming a major user of CL-215s in OTL.
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This thread needs some images... ;)
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This thread needs some images... ;)
I know, but I've been lazy to get the drawing pens out and real life tends to get in the way too. :(
Apophenia can feel free to step up and make images if he'd like. :smiley:
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November 12, 1963: Cartierville, Quebec, Canada
Things were going well for Canadair on both sides of the Atlantic. The MB-326 line in Cartierville was busy making aircraft for the new customers in South and Central America while the "Project Viper" team were busy refining what would be the armed variant of the aircraft.
The success of the MB-326 sales tour put Paul Hellyer on his back foot, for a while at least, and he concerned himself with other defense related matters for the time being.
The success of the CL-215 prototypes in Italy only served to embolden the team at Cartierville further.
A former Canadair employee:
"Those were really good days to be working for Canadair, everything was coming together so well. Motivation was high in all departments and seeing the defense minister with egg on his face made everything that much better!
I was working on the MB-326 line at the time, specifically building the aircraft to fill the Nicaraguan order; not that they were any different from the other MB-326s we were making. There was a true sense of pride in building those aircraft even the ones that weren't destined for the RCAF.
As it was, I didn't stay on the MB-326 line for long after that. Shortly after the CL-215 prototypes first flew and showed their potential, I was moved over to that project due partly to my seniority and the fact that I was of Italian ancestry and could speak the language fluently. While there would eventually be a Canadian production line for the aircraft, the first production batch at least would come from Italy. The company decided to send me there to help supervise production.
There was so much to be optimistic about at the company at the time, we were on a real high."
November 15, 1963: RCAF Station Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, Canada
The ramp at RCAF Moose Jaw was full, one end to the other, with MB-326s reflecting the winter morning sun in their silver laquer paint. Among the many RCAF student and instructor pilots at the base were pilots from the first four export customers for the Canadair built version of the aircraft.
A former Guatemalan air force pilot:
"We had been in Moose Jaw since August of 1963 to learn how to fly the MB-326. I enjoyed it emensely, with the exception of the cold prairie winter, and everyone on the base and in the local community were very kind to us.
We were being trained ultimately to be instructors on the aircraft so we could go home with the knowledge to teach pilots back home how to fly them. This meant none of us were novice pilots, we all had many hours in T-33s already.
Climbing into the MB-326 felt good from the start; not too different from the T-33, but certainly newer. It was that 'The same, but different' feel.
The aircraft felt right in just about everyway and I can't think of anything I really disliked about it. I have many great memories of flying it.
Getting in to an MB-326 after flying more advanced fighter types for a while was like getting into a sports car on the weekend and hitting the highway. There was just something smooth and carefree about it."
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Early January, 1964: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
A former Bristol executive:
"It was a shock to say the least when we received the order directly from the Minister of Defense to immediately cease production of the Viper engine for the Canadiar built MB-326 fleet. It was an outrageous overreach by the minister if I'm to be perfectly blunt.
It didn't take long for us, Canadair and the RCAF brass to fire back at the minister for an explanation; the Prime Minister got directly involved not long after.
Initially, Hellyer was evasive about his reasons. However, his decision had raised the ire of the Prime Minister and he had no choice but to answer.
As it turned out, he wanted Bristol to stop producing the Viper as he had it in mind to order the Canadian MB-326s refitted with the General Electric J85 engines that were intended for the CL-41 and have the construction carried out by Orenda. In this way, he could create jobs closer to his own constituency in Ontario.
He was showing us he could still meddle with the Canadian end of the MB-326 even if he could not quash it outright.
Happily, before January of 1964 was out, Paul Hellyer was no longer a problem for us and we merrily continued Viper production in Winnipeg."
Hellyer paid dearly for his meddling. The RCAF brass, very happy with the MB-326, demanded Hellyer be relieved of his ministerial portfolio. Top executives of Canadair and Aermacchi as well as the Trade Ministers of Canada and Italy put additional pressure on the Prime Minister to take corrective action.
The beginning of February 1964 saw a reshuffled cabinet with the defense portfolio safely out of Hellyer's hands.
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Hey! I somehow missed this installment ???
... The beginning of February 1964 saw a reshuffled cabinet with the defense portfolio safely out of Hellyer's hands.
A scenario : A now-elderly George Pearkes declines to extend his tenure as BC's Lieutenant Governor. Jack Nicholson accepts the position of 21st LG of BC and resigns his Vancouver Centre seat. To cover some of Nicholson's ministerial positions, Paul Hellyer is assigned the roles Postmaster-General and Minister for CMHC. [1]
As Lester Pearson expected of his erstwhile rival, Hellyer resigns these new positions and crosses the floor to sit as an independent. Hellyer then runs as an independent in the November 1965 general election. However, Hellyer only splits the local vote with the Liberal drop-in candidate, Charles Templeton. The inevitable result was the loss of the Trinity seat to Progressive Conservative candidate, John Brazill.
So, who does become the next MND? Léo Cadieux? :D
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[1] An alternative concept (assuming that Pearson wants to keep Hellyer close and under his control) would be to transfer him from MND to Transport (as happened RW in September 1967).
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Prairie Rattlers
March 2, 1964: RCAF Station Cold Lake, Alberta, Canada
The newly installed Minister of Defense, Lucien Cardin, made a visit to RCAF Station Cold Lake one of his priorities after being moved up from the Associate Defense Minister position to replace Paul Hellyer. Hellyer was left without a portfolio after the reshuffling.
Primarily, Cardin came to see how the testing of the armed version of the MB-326 was progressing. He was well aware of Hellyer's disdain for the MB-326 and was eager to make his own assessment of it. He knew the trainer version was very popular with the crews at Moose Jaw; he would be going to Moose Jaw after his visit to Cold Lake and would be getting a ride in one.
A former RCAF test pilot:
"We were excited, but also a bit apprehensive, about the new Defense Minister. Anybody had to be better than Hellyer, at least where the MB-326 was concerned, and it was heartening for us to see the new guy paying us a visit and seeing the aircraft for himself.
We were definitely out to make the best impression on him that we could. Part of that was to give the test aircraft some nose art that played off the "Project Viper" name.
We had two aircraft for testing and we decided to name them "Prairie Rattler I" and "Prairie Rattler II" and give them slightly different nose art based on rattlesnakes. It made sense as the prairie rattlesnake is a type of viper and you can find them in some parts of the Canadian prairies.
The minister was with us for a couple of days at Cold Lake, so we got a really good chance to show him around the aircraft as well as give him a chance to see it in action over the weapons range.
Just as important as showing off the aircraft, was showing the minister our pride in the aircraft and our general esprit de corps. In showing that, naming the aircraft had been a good move as the minister rather liked the nose art.
As the minister left for Moose Jaw, we were more relaxed than we had been in some time. He seemed to like what he saw during his visit to us. We got confirmation of that after his visit to Moose Jaw and his ride in a trainer there."
As long as Lucien Cardin was Minister of Defense, the MB-326 was safe in Canada.
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May 1, 1964: ILA airshow, Langenhagen airport, near Hanover, West Germany
A pair of Aermacchi built CL-215 water bombers, Dorothea and Teresa, finished their display with a spectacular dump of water in front of the crowd at the 1964 edition of the ILA airshow.
As the two water bombers touched down on the runway, the pilot of Prairie Rattler II positioned his aircraft for take off. Receiving clearance, he pushed the throttles to full and took the aircraft skyward for what would become one of the most talked about performances of the 1964 ILA show.
During the performance of Prairie Rattler II, a crowd was building at the joint Aermacchi - Canadair ground display to get a closer look at Prairie Rattler I and the selection of weapons it was displayed with.
A former Aermacchi marketing executive recalls:
"We were increadibly lucky with ILA 1964. We had no idea if we would have an armed version of the MB-326 to show or not until Canada got a new Minister of Defense.
Once the new minister showed his approval for the MB-326 in Canada, everything moved along swiftly and we were able to get both of the armed MB-326 prototypes to the show.
The basic MB-326 trainer had already been in service for a couple of years, so we had nothing to prove with that. However, it was a different story with the armed version of the MB-326 and the CL-215.
Happily the armed MB-326 and the CL-215 both generated a great deal of interest and orders for both types would follow soon after."
A former Canadair marketing official:
"ILA 1964 was something special. Since the reshuffling of the cabinet, everyone involved with the MB-326 in Canada had been breathing much easier.
The pilot of Prairie Rattler II was putting the aircraft through its paces like there was no tomorrow and the crowd was loving it.
I fielded a ton of questions about the armed MB-326 at the ground display. It was quite something to see the array of weapons laid out in front of Prairie Rattler I. As it turned out, many of the weapons on display would never be carried by the MB-362 in service.
The CL-215 generated just as much interest and we had firm orders from Greece and Spain for the water bombers before the ILA 1964 show was over."
Soon to be commander of the Luftwaffe, Johannes Steinhoff, was in attendance for the the MB-326 display:
"At the time, the Luftwaffe had fleets of both the Lockheed T-33 and Fouga Magister trainers. Both were fine aircraft and well liked, but they were first generation jet trainers and something would be needed to replace them before the 1960s were out.
As I watched the flying demonstration of the armed MB-326 and got a closer look at the one in the ground displays, I already knew this aircraft would be part of the future of the Luftwaffe.
Between the ILA 1964 show and when I was made commander of the Luftwaffe in 1966, I learned everything I could about the MB-326. I made trips to both Italy and Canada to get closer looks at it and learned to fly it.
I liked it, and I made sure the Luftwaffe got it."
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Is the armed version here a single or twin seater?
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Armed version is a single seater, as per the description in an earlier post. Standard MB-326 canopy kept for parts commonality, but rear cockpit stripped out and replaced with electronics and gear for armed missions.
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Any chance of joint co-production with Australia? The RAAF was quite pleased with the MB326...
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Any chance of joint co-production with Australia? The RAAF was quite pleased with the MB326...
I'm mulling that over at the moment. I have a couple of ideas for the Australian angle bouncing about in my head at the moment.
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Almost as soon as Lucien Cardin had completed his assessment of the MB-326 after taking the Minister of Defense portfolio, he gave the go ahead for full production of the armed MB-326 variant for the RCAF and for an operational training unit for the type to be formed within the year.
A former Canadair employee recalls:
"When the order came to put the armed version into full production for the RCAF, everyone at the company felt fresh wind in their sails. Happily we had enough basic MB-326 aircraft in one state or another of completion and some in for overhaul at the factory that could be diverted on the assembly line to be completed as armed versions, or converted during overhaul to armed versions.
We could give the RCAF their training unit worth of aircraft within the year."
September 1, 1964: RCAF Station Cold Lake, Alberta, Canada
A crowd of people, both civilians and military, filled a small grandstand behind a platform with a dias on top of it. Praire Rattlers I and II stood to either side of the platform and were impecably clean.
Flags of both Canada and Italy had been hoisted up flagpoles.
The ground crews, both Canadian and Italian, of the about to be formed operational training unit were standing at ease facing the grandstand in their full dress uniforms.
The aircrews were enroute with the unit's fleet of 15 new aircraft, they were flying in from a fuel stop at RCAF Namao.
The ceremony progressed through speeches, band music and a march past before the standard of 403 "City of Calgary" Squadron was handed over to the commanding officer of the new unit.
The culmination of the ceremony was three formations of five MB-365 overflying the proceedings.
A former RCAF instructor pilot:
"It was a great day, beautifully clear flying weather and the honour of carrying the number of a squadron with a fighter pedigree.
403 had flown Tomahawks and Spitfires in World War II and then flown Mustangs and Silver Stars as an Auxiliary squadron through part of the 1950s.
They shifted to transport duties and flew Otters and Expeditors until the unit was disbanded at the end of March in 1964.
Some said 403 was an odd choice to use as it had not been disbanded for long and was not expected to be activated again so soon. There was word that someone senior in the setting up of the training unit was a former 403 man and was able to pull the strings to make it happen.
Whatever the case, we were proud to carry the number."
A former Italian air force instructor pilot:
"The decision had been made quite early that Itallian pilots of the armed version of the MB-326 would take their initial training on the type at Cold Lake. To that end, we made sure that all Italian pilots destined for that version got their basic jet flight training at Moose Jaw.
We had our own fleet of MB-326 trainers back in Italy to handle pilots going to other types. We were also planning squadrons of the armed variant and pilots going to those units from Cold Lake could get any training specific to Italian air force needs after getting home.
As we would be in Canada for a while, we felt it right that the Italian part of the training unit should have a number of its own. It wasn't difficult to decide which; 403 Squadron had a wolf in their badge, the Italian air force had a "Wolf" squadron too: 98 Gruppo.
The trouble was that 98 Gruppo was an active squadron at the time, flying C-119 transports.
We wondered how we might be able to have the transport unit renumbered so we could have 98 Gruppo for ourselves."
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I'm really enjoying this, but a few points;
- Aermacchi has a factory at Lake Varese, before WW II, it produced flying boats, afterwards they used it for their licensed production of Harley-Davidsons. I have no problem seeing a part of the plant being repurposed for the CL-215 effort.
- Considering that both Canada and Italy operate the F-104, I could see the MB.326C radar trainer generating more interest than in OTL.
- On OTL, the single-seat MB.326 has the cannon ammunition where the second seatis located in the two-seater. How is this handled on the Prarie Rattler or are the guns a bit farther back?
- Also note that the main factory, at that time was in Varese, but all aircraft have to be partially disassembled and trucked to the test airfield at Venegono for reassemly, final checkout, and flight testing. Aer Macchi has since built a new plant at Venegono. Considering that the plant in Varese is completely surrrounded by Varese, this is perhaps understandable.
How do I know this? Fifty years ago, summer of 1972, I was there, working for Aer macchi, on an exchange program between my Junior and Senior years of college.
One more thought for your scenario, ALitalia bought four MB.326Ds to use in trasitioning their pikots from props to jets. With Canadian MB.326 production, I could see the various Canadian and perhaps some of the US airlines using a similar training method. Since the MB.326Dx were finished in Alitalia's then current paint scheme, I could see some colorful possibilities with other airlines.
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I'm really enjoying this, but a few points;
- Aermacchi has a factory at Lake Varese, before WW II, it produced flying boats, afterwards they used it for their licensed production of Harley-Davidsons. I have no problem seeing a part of the plant being repurposed for the CL-215 effort.
- Considering that both Canada and Italy operate the F-104, I could see the MB.326C radar trainer generating more interest than in OTL.
- On OTL, the single-seat MB.326 has the cannon ammunition where the second seatis located in the two-seater. How is this handled on the Prarie Rattler or are the guns a bit farther back?
- Also note that the main factory, at that time was in Varese, but all aircraft have to be partially disassembled and trucked to the test airfield at Venegono for reassemly, final checkout, and flight testing. Aer Macchi has since built a new plant at Venegono. Considering that the plant in Varese is completely surrrounded by Varese, this is perhaps understandable.
How do I know this? Fifty years ago, summer of 1972, I was there, working for Aer macchi, on an exchange program between my Junior and Senior years of college.
One more thought for your scenario, ALitalia bought four MB.326Ds to use in trasitioning their pikots from props to jets. With Canadian MB.326 production, I could see the various Canadian and perhaps some of the US airlines using a similar training method. Since the MB.326Dx were finished in Alitalia's then current paint scheme, I could see some colorful possibilities with other airlines.
I'm glad you're enjoying this.
Thanks for the details from your experience. I'll keep them in mind and maybe work them in somehow.
The Prairie Rattler is pretty much the armed MB.326 as known from real life; Cannons where the back seat would be.
The F-104 nosed MB.326 would certainly be interesting, though I'm not sure how far down the F-104 road I'll go in this story.
IN this story, the armed MB.326 runs on the idea that perhaps the Fiat G.91 never came to be, but interest remained in a light attack platform.
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FWIWm the MB.326Km with the single-seat canopy has the ammunition for the cannons where the second seat was, that's one reason it's faired over. I'm not certain how this layout affects your concept of the Prarie Rattler.
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FWIWm the MB.326Km with the single-seat canopy has the ammunition for the cannons where the second seat was, that's one reason it's faired over. I'm not certain how this layout affects your concept of the Prarie Rattler.
My idea with the Prairie Rattler, and other early armed MB.326 variants is to have the guns and ammunition in their real world position, but maintain the standard trainer style canopy over it all.
Partly, this would be for parts commonality between the attack and trainer versions where possible. It would also be to maintain some degree of rearward vision for the pilot.
From what I've seen of cutaways of the MB.326K, the gun package doesn't extend up past the point of the cockpit sill and the upper part is taken up by some avionics boxes.
I figure if those avionics boxes can be arranged behind the pilot so that the pilot can see to at least the four and eight positions, if not five and seven, then keeping the trainer canopy and the better field of view it could give might be prudent.
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Reasonable enough assumption on the Prarie Rattler, now that I understand the set up. It's going to be interesting to see where you take this story and where Canadian production ends up serving.
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If someone wants to model the Prarie Rattler, it's easy in 1/72 as pavla has the cannon bulges that can be applied to a standard MB.326 kit. In 1/48, you'd almost have to combine a MB.326 and MB.326K to get everything.
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If someone wants to model the Prarie Rattler, it's easy in 1/72 as pavla has the cannon bulges that can be applied to a standard MB.326 kit. In 1/48, you'd almost have to combine a MB.326 and MB.326K to get everything.
These days, you're pretty much in the same boat in either scale.
Pavla folded in 2021 or so. So unless you are lucky enough to get your hands on the 1/72 cannon bulges, or someone else makes a set, you're kitbashing in 1/72 as well.
The current Pavla website looks like it's just a website builder template:
https://www.pavlamodels.cz/ (https://www.pavlamodels.cz/)
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With all of this going on, are any of the Canadian airlines going to order canadian equivalents of the MB.326D to transition their pilots from piston engines to jets? You could whif some colorful MB326's that way.
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If someone wants to model the Prarie Rattler, it's easy in 1/72 as pavla has the cannon bulges that can be applied to a standard MB.326 kit. In 1/48, you'd almost have to combine a MB.326 and MB.326K to get everything.
These days, you're pretty much in the same boat in either scale.
Pavla folded in 2021 or so. So unless you are lucky enough to get your hands on the 1/72 cannon bulges, or someone else makes a set, you're kitbashing in 1/72 as well.
The current Pavla website looks like it's just a website builder template:
https://www.pavlamodels.cz/ (https://www.pavlamodels.cz/)
i did manage to acquire some of their 1/72 MB.326K cannon bulges. Originally bought with the idea of converting a G-4 Super Galeb into a J-4 Super Jasyreb in Yugoslavian markings. Never got around to that conversion, but I have the parts and may do your "Prarie Rattler" instead.
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With all of this going on, are any of the Canadian airlines going to order canadian equivalents of the MB.326D to transition their pilots from piston engines to jets? You could whif some colorful MB326's that way.
That had not crossed my mind.
However, I'll have to work it in somehow. The idea of MB.326s in Canadian Pacific or Pacific Western livery is just too tempting to pass up. :-*
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Strategy for Supply
As the result of predicted interest in the MB-326 and better than predicted interest in the CL-215 at the 1964 ILA Airshow, a strategy had to be developed to supply the demands. Canadair and Aermacchi could not fill all the orders on their own.
A former Aermacchi executive:
"In 1964 it was only ourselves and Canadair producing the MB-326. In Italy, we had been testing the CL-215 extensively and had refined it to the point of building some pre-production models that would be ready for the Paris Airshow in June of 1965. We were also developing a utility version of the aircraft that did away with the water bomber capacity in favour of a multi-use cabin. We hoped the prototype for that would also be ready for Paris in 1965.
In 1964, the only other company with a license to produce the MB-326 was Atlas Aircraft of South Africa. They had not yet started production, but it didn't really matter. With the Apartheid government that was in place there at the time, very few places indeed would buy from them and their variant of the aircraft would be very specialised to their own needs.
At the ILA 1964 show, Commonwealth Aircraft of Australia, along with Embraer of Brazil and FMA of Argentina all showed interest in obtaining licences to produce the MB-326. Additionally, all three companies showed greater or lesser degrees of interest in obtaining licenses to produce the CL-215.
Before 1964 was out, we had granted a license for the MB-326 to Commonwealth Aircraft and a team was sent from Canadair to the Commonwealth facilities to oversee the tooling up process.
Supplying the license for the MB-326 to Embraer and FMA was more problematic as we felt we didn't need two full production lines for the aircraft in South America. We suggested that one could hold the license and be the main production/assembly line while the other could be subcontracted by them for production of certain components.
We could tell they weren't happy with our suggestion, but nobody had any better ideas for how both companies could get themselves involved in the production of the aircraft.
Ultimately, we gave the license to Embraer in early 1965 and they subcontracted FMA to produce the landing gear and wingtip fuel tanks along with the rear fuselage and empanage.
What really tipped the scales in Embraer's favour was their higher interest in the CL-215 than FMA seemed to have. Shortly after granting the license, Aermacchi sent teams to both Embraer and FMA facilities to supervise tooling up for the MB-326."
A former Canadair executive:
"It was a tremendous relief to us in Cartierville when we heard there would be another production line for the MB-326 in the Americas. We were stretched to fill the Central American orders, we had no idea how we could stretch to South America as well.
The challenge was determining where the line would be for us and Embraer. We were already delivering the MB-326 fleet to Guatemala, but had made no deliveries south of there yet.
After some bargaining, we agreed that Embraer would have the markets from the Honduras-Nicaragua border southward. We agreed on this as the first batch of Honduran aircraft was nearing completion at Cartierville. Any commitments Canadair had made for the MB-326 further south were transfered to Embraer.
We were really very eager to get the CL-215 production started in Canada now that the bulk of development had been taken care of in Italy. At the time, we were also deciding whether to expand the Cartiervile facilities or open another facility elsewhere to handle CL-215 production when the time came.
A former Commonwealth Aircraft executive:
"The ink was barely dry on our production license for the MB-326 when we were told by Aermacchi to actively pursue customers across Asia and Oceania.
Their idea was that Embraer would have South America, Canadair would cover North America and a good section of Western Europe, Aermacchi would focus on Mediterranean markets as well as any other potential customers in Africa or the Middle East. We would have what was left.
We already knew New Zealand was committed to the MB-326. Australia also had good relations with Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore; so we hoped we might find a customer for the aircraft among them as well.
As for the rest of Asia, we knew india was unlikely as they already had the domestically designed HAL Kiran trainer underway. As for the rest of the continent, we had no idea what to expect."
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He's back ...
Great stuff! Keep 'er coming :D
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He's back ...
Great stuff! Keep 'er coming :D
Yep, it feels good to get more of this story out.
A bit of writer's block here and there and some real life advantures got in the way a bit. Hopefully it won't be so long to the next installment.
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A bit of writer's block here and there and some real life advantures got in the way a bit.
Oh I know how that goes...
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Sharing Europe
A former Aermacchi marketing executive:
"With Embraer set to produce the MB-326 for South American markets, we decided to redirect Canadair's marketing responsibility for the aircraft to the more northern regions of Europe. This would allow us at Aermacchi to focus more on southern Europe and African markets.
The sale to West Germany was already done and it was easy because Johannes Steinhoff personally approved of the aircraft and did a great job of selling it to the West German defense ministry.
Another thing that made the West German sale easy was that the Sabre jets the Luftwaffe, and several other European NATO nations, flew had come from Canadair and so the Canadair name carried some weight in Europe. We were counting on that weight to generate sales.
Aside of West Germany, we put Belgium, Denmark, The Netherlands and Norway under Canadair's pervue for the MB-326.
France, Great Britain and Spain all had domestically developed jet trainers that also had some scope for ground attack. As such, we had no plans to market the MB-326 to them.
Yugoslavia was a similar situation. They were a user of the Canadair Sabre, but they also were taking a stance of non-alignment and decided to develop their own jet trainer, the SOKO G-2 Galeb.
Portugal had already recieved a fleet of Cessna T-37 trainers from America via the Mutual Defense Aid Program (MDAP) in the early 1960s, so they had no immediate need of the MB-326. Greece and Turkey were in a similar situation as they had also recieved T-37 fleets the same way Portugal had.
Our primary strategy for marketing the MB-326 to Europe was to focus on any user nation of the Lockheed T-33, or the Canadair built variation of it. The general idea was to have the T-33 largely gone from European skies by the late 1960s or early 1970s.
We were also going to put a special focus on user nations of the F-104 Starfighter. The team at Canadair was working on a new variant of the MB-326 that involved marrying the nose of an F-104 to it so the MB-326 could be used as a training aid for F-104 crews to learn the radar and navigation aspects of the Starfighter.
With as steep a learning curve as the F-104 had, we were optimistic that such a variant of the MB-326 would be welcome if it worked. "
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Any chance of the MB,328, MB,329, or MB330 business aircraft coming about in this scenario? MB.330 business jet would be the most likely as it mated the wings and horizontal tail of the MB.326 with a new fuselage and vertical tail and two aft-mounted Cj610 engines (same as fitted to the 20-series Learjets).
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Any chance of the MB,328, MB,329, or MB330 business aircraft coming about in this scenario? MB.330 business jet would be the most likely as it mated the wings and horizontal tail of the MB.326 with a new fuselage and vertical tail and two aft-mounted Cj610 engines (same as fitted to the 20-series Learjets).
I hadn't thought about that. I'll maybe see if I can make some space for it.
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See here: https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/aermacchi-projects.629/ (https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/aermacchi-projects.629/)
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See here: https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/aermacchi-projects.629/ (https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/aermacchi-projects.629/)
Very interesting, I didn't know about that. I'll keep it in mind as the story progresses. :smiley:
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Angry in Argentina
A former FMA factory supervisor:
"It was a very tense time around the FMA offices and factory in Cordoba for a while after the MB.326 License went to Embraer in 1965.
While work went ahead in the factory for our part of the aircraft under sub-contract, many in the corporate offices were fuming.
As a supervisor, I was happy that there was work to keep people employed. At the time FMA didn't really have anything happening in the way of major projects, so any work was good work even if it was as a sub-contractor.
I could see how our exective types would feel rather slighted, though. FMA had a history going back to 1927, while Embraer was a newly founded company. There was also the fact that in 1959 we got the license to produce the Morane Saulnier MS.760 Paris trainer jet for the Argentine air force.
With the history FMA had and recent experience building an aircraft of the same category as the MB.326, it really was a puzzle to many of us why we didn't get the production license.
Could the fact that we weren't really that interested in the CL-215 and Embraer were, the reason Aermacchi gave for their decision, really have made so much of a difference?
Whatever the case, an unavoidable reality was that we would need a replacement for the Paris trainers and had to put some priority on it. Morane Saulnier was bought out by Potez in 1962. Potez inherited the very popular Magister trainer jet when they purchase Fouga in 1958.
As long as the Magister was selling for them, we weren't counting on Potez to give us any support for the Paris if we needed it.
Regardless of how some of our executives felt, FMA factory staff were kept employed and able to support their families while the Argentine air force and navy both got a training and light attack jet that they were very pleased with for many years."
A former FMA executive:
"We could go some distance on sub-contracted part work, but we wanted a license for a whole plane. We NEEDED a whole plane!
We had a couple of projects of our own at the time. There was the IA 46 Ranquel light utility aircraft that we had currently in production and the IA 50 Guarani II twin turboprop utility aircraft in testing.
Neither aircraft was set for large production, nor were they the sort of aircraft that would keep the FMA name on people's lips. Embraer was a fresh upstart with no reputation, we could only hope Aermacchi had not made a mistake in giving the production license to someone unproven who was possibly biting off more than they could chew.
As time would prove, Aermacchi did not make a mistake. Embraer handled the project admirably.
Also, as it turned out, we would not have to wait very much longer for that whole aircraft that we needed."
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On the Nose
Cartierville, Quebec, Canada
January 11, 1965
A former Canadair engineer:
We had spent a good part of the Autumn of 1964 working on grafting an F-104 radome and navigational gear into the MB.326.
After some adjustments to our proposed grafting design, based on wind tunnel tests, we got two full sized aircraft converted just before Christmas of 1964.
On January 11 of 1965, the aircraft rolled out of the plant and was prepared for their first flights. One was piloted by a company test pilot and the other by a pair of F-104 instructor pilots from the RCAF.
Many people around the company had taken to calling the aircraft "Woodpecker". While completely informal and in fun, the name ended up sticking with the aircraft into its service life.
The first flights could not have gone better. All of the pilots were very optimistic about the aircraft.
The next step was to send the aircraft to the Central Experimental and Proving Establishment at the RCAF station at Rockliffe to let the RCAF test it more deeply.
A Former Aermacchi engineer:
"I and some company executives had gone to Cartierville specifically to see the new variation on the MB.326 and watch the first flight.
We shared the enthusiasm everyone seemed to have for it. We headed back to Italy with a copy of the design adjustments needed and got directly on the job of modifying a couple of our own aircraft almost as soon as we got back home.
We got our first aircraft converted in a remarkably short length of time.
At some point between its completion and its first flight, the Italian word for woodpecker, "Picchio" had been stenciled onto one side of the nose just ahead of the cockpit. To my, knowledge, the culprit was never found.
Not everyone saw the humour in the stunt, but the name stayed on the plane all the way to Paris.
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Nice! The Real World MB.326C become an 'MB.326CA' ;D
-- https://digilander.libero.it/air10/f104/curiosita_dc3spillone.htm
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Nice! The Real World MB.326C become an 'MB.326CA' ;D
-- https://digilander.libero.it/air10/f104/curiosita_dc3spillone.htm
:smiley:
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Canadair West
Even before 1964 was out, Canadair executives had reached the conclusion that it would be best to set up a separate facility for the construction of the CL-215 in Canada.
A decision made early on was that the facility should be in the west of the country. Both Alberta and British Columbia had vast forested regions and were known for forest fires. Setting up a facility in either province would put the CL-215 line close to the aircraft's intended area of use and, hopefully, potential customers.
A former Canadair executive:
"We looked at a number of airports across British Columbia and Alberta as potential places to set up the CL-215 production line. Eventually, we shortlisted to Abbotsford in British Columbia and the Edmonton International Airport in Alberta.
The advantage of Edmonton was that the international airport there was still relatively new, having been extablished in 1960. This meant that it had a good amount of available land and we could build our facility from the ground up and have it just as we wanted.
Edmonton's international airport also wasn't too busy at the time, so we wouldn't be competing with too much traffic on the runways.
Like Abbotsford, Edmonton would put us in a part of the country where aerial firefighting was in demand on a regular basis and many potential customers for the aircraft were nearby.
The advantage of Abbotsford was that it had a well established aerial fire fighting culture in place. It would not be difficult to find veteran waterbmber pilots willing to fly the CL-215 and give honest feedback to us about it.
Abbotsford also came with the advantage of the airshow that had been inagurated there in 1962. Having the facility at an airport that had its own airshow would present a regular opportunity to show of both the aircraft and the production line to both potential customers and the general public.
While both locations were perfectly suitable, Abbotsford ultimately won out.
Aside of the existing aerial fire fighting culture and airshow, Abbotsford had an available hangar that was large enough for us to start some small scale production while building a larger purpose built production facility on a nearby piece of land that the airport offered to let us purchase."
At the end of February of 1965, the deal for Canadair to move into the available hangar at Abbotsford and begin construction of a dedicated production building had been finalized.
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I love the way the ancillary details are developing as much as the main story.
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I love the way the ancillary details are developing as much as the main story.
Thanks1 I'm glad you're stil enjoying and following along.
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Paris Airshow, Le Borguet airport, France - June, 1965
As the crowds moved through the static park of the show and the various displays there, the rumble of six turboprop engines caught the attention of many.
A trio of CL-215 waterbombers approached low from one side of the field and made a spectacular dump of water in the colours of the Italian flag at the mid point of the showline. The formation did a few more passes before two of the aircraft broke off to land and leave the lead aircraft to do the solo part of the demonstration.
The solo pilot recalled the day some years later:
"There wasn't really a well fitting adjective to describe how good it felt to be demonstrating the CL-215 at a show as prestigious as Paris. Not only did I have the honour to fly the formation lead and the solo, but the other two aircraft in the formation were the first two CL-215s we had built for the Vigili del Fuoco. We had officially handed them over a week before the Paris show.
I was using 'Teresa' to lead the formation and do the solo. She deserved to lead, she had served us well as a prototype in testing and was continuing to do great work for us as a company demonstrator aircraft. We had put a ton of hours on her and she wasn't complaining one bit, it was a great example of how tough and reliable the CL-215 was.
Once the water tanks were empty, the CL-215 was a remarkably agile and responsive aircraft given its size and what it was designed for. Sure, it was no fighter or aerobatics plane, but it had some moves in it that surprized the crowd.
As I finished up the solo and got ready to land, I could see 'Dorothea' at the company display in the statics. The crowd was gravitating toward her and I imagined things were about to get quite busy for our people down there.
We were the first of the company's flying demonstrations at the show and we definitely made a good impression all around.
As I taxied back to my parking spot, I could see our ground crews getting the aircraft of our MB.326 demo prepared for their performance later in the day."
A former Canadair public relations officer:
"I wasn't yet on my shift at the company stand when the CL-215 demo took place. I watched it from on top of the hangar that our company display was placed in front of.
The demo was an amazing thing to see. Some people asked me if it bothered me to see the aircraft drop Italian national colours in spite of the fact that the aircraft was of Canadian design, I must say that it didn't bother me. The aircraft benefited from the Italian involvement and flew much sooner that it would have otherwise.
Were it not for Italian involvement, the CL-215 would probably have been fitted with radial piston engines rather than turboprops and would likely not have the performance that was seen at the show that day.
The first CL-215s were built and flown in Italy and the first customer was Italian. It was only fair that they should show some national pride through it as well.
After the CL-215 solo was done, I looked down at our company display. I saw the crowds build around 'Dorothea' and the first shift of our PR people talking with people and handing out brochures and so forth.
In that moment, it also hit me that we had the biggest display in the static park.
Our display was a combined effort of Aermacchi, Canadair, Embraer and FMA. Pride of place in the display was given to 'Dorothea' and she turned out to be very popular indeed. We had one of her engines exposed; this worked well as the General Electric display was adjacent to ours and they gave the T64 engine, which we selected to power the CL-215, a place of prominence among their products at the show.
At the Canadair end of the display, we had a CF-104 Starfighter in the highly polished bare metal finsh that was standard in the RCAF at the time. We also had one of our F-104 training versions of the MB.326 on display. We also had a large model of the Prairie Rattler, with an example of the real thing set to be part of the flying display.
The Aermacchi display included a standard trainer version of the MB.326 and an example of their AL.60 light civil aircraft. They also had models and information about a business jet design they had designated as the MB.330.
Embraer had brought one of their MB.362 company demonstrator aircraft for the company display. They also had a model of a very handsome looking turboprop airliner that they had named the EMB-110 Bandeirante. The model generated a good amount of interest not only for its looks, but also that it had been designed by the Frenchman, Max Holste.
FMA brought the prototype of their IA 50 Guarani II turboprop utility aircraft for their part of the company display. The Guarani II generated some interest, but mostly because it was the first aircraft of Latin American design to be flown across the Atlantic. It was definitely dated in many aspects of its design.
FMA was the weak end of our combined company display at the show. It was clear they would need some help to become a stronger link in the chain.
By the time the 1965 Paris airshow was over, we would make sure FMA had something good to sink their teeth into."
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By the time the 1965 Paris airshow was over, we would make sure FMA had something good to sink their teeth into."
We await the news...
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Paris Airshow, Le Borguet airport, France - June, 1965
An hour after the CL-215s had done their show, four MB.326s made their way to the runway and took of in two pairs.
The first pair were and MB.326C, with the F-104 nose, and a Prairie Rattler. The MB.326C was an Aermacchi company demonstrator while the Prairie Rattler was from 443 Squadron, based at RCAF Station Zweibrucken in West Germany. 443 had recently been reactivated and was the first Prairie Rattler squadron in Europe.
The second pair were a basic MB.326 of the Italian air force and an MB.326D that the Alitialia airline used for training.
Once aloft, the aircraft assembled in a diamond formation to make their opening flypast.
The Prairie Rattler was the lead aircraft, with the Italian air force and Alitalia aircraft at the #2 and #3 positions and the MB.326C in the slot.
After a couple of flypasts, the formation broke. The Prairie Rattler and MB.326C flew out of sight of the crowd and left the other two aircraft to carry out a very well received aerobatics performance.
As the first pair landed, the Prairie Rattler roared back into the show area and demonstrated a series of tactical strike manouvers that were equally appreciated by the crowd.
The sound of the Prairie Rattler landing was fully drowned out by the MB.326C coming back into view of the crowd in the company of a pair of F-104 Starfighters, one each from the Italian air force and the RCAF.
After a pair of low and slow passes, the MB.326C broke away to land and the Starfighters were let loose for their own display.
A former Aermacchi executive recalls:
"Another wave of people made their way to our display on the heels of the MB.326 demonstration. We also saw a notable increase of people moving towards the MB.326D at the Alitalia display nearby.
The model of the Prairie Rattler at the Canadair end of our display was also getting a lot of attention.
Our model of the MB.330 and Embraer's EMB-110 model were drawing steady, if not so intensive, attention through the duration of the show. People were clearly going to be watching for more on those two aircraft.
The FMA guys knew they were the quiet end of the display. Despite that, they kept up brave faces and hid their discouragement behind full professionalism when people took even a passing interest in their aircraft.
Even before the show was over, multiple orders for the MB.326 and CL-215 had been confirmed by Aermacchi, Canadair and Embraer agents. We were all going to be very busy soon.
I knew we'd have a lot on our plates between the MB.326 and CL-215.
I looked at how few MB.330 brochures we had left from what we had brought with us and made a call to our headquarters in Italy for approval of an idea I had.
After the show concluded and we had dismantled our display, we had a small after party to celebrate our success. With blessings given from my higher-ups in Italy, I handed the model of the MB.330 to the FMA guys and announced the project was theirs. They would have full authority to develop it as they saw fit and put their name on it.
It was not right to let them go home empty handed."
A former FMA public relations officer:
"Holding the MB.330 model at the after party of the 1965 Paris Airshow was like coming up for air. I called my superiors in Cordoba before the party was over to let them know. I could hear the excitement in their voices.
I was to go directly to Aermacchi headquarters from Paris to collect the existing research and development documents and bring them home with the model."
A former FMA executive:
"Getting that call about the MB.330 was the silver lining we needed. We needed a whole aircraft, and now we had one.
There were lots of happy people around the Cordoba offices and the gesture went a long way to easing any remaining feelings FMA people may have had about only being made a sub-contractor to the MB.326."
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Okay, you've got me intrigued now. What aircraft is "Dorothea"? A CL-215 variant without water-bombing capability but with an adaptable cabin or some other aircraft?
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Okay, you've got me intrigued now. What aircraft is "Dorothea"? A CL-215 variant without water-bombing capability but with an adaptable cabin or some other aircraft?
"Dorothea" is the sister aircraft to "Teresa", and both are water bombers.
The pair were the engine testing prototypes I mentioned on the second page of the story. "Dorothea" was originally powered by RR Dart engines while "Teresa" had the T64 engines.
The T64 won out and "Dorothea" was converted to T64 engines and kept flying.
They changed her engines, but kept her name.
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Aermacchi facilities, Venegono airport, Italy - July, 1965
A pair of freshly assembled MB-326 trainers took off into the morning sun for their respective shakedown flights. Both aircraft were destined for the Tunisian air force, the first African nation to have the aircraft in service. South Africa had held a production license since 1964, but it would not be until 1966 that their version would enter service.
A former Aermacchi marketing executive:
"We walked away from the 1965 Paris airshow with a healthy interest in the MB-326 shown by a number of African nations. It was a simple enough aircraft that less developed nations could service and operate it themselves, yet still modern enough to be of interest to more developed nations in Africa.
It seemed Africa was set to play a bigger part than Europe or the Middle East in keeping the Italian MB-326 lines busy.
However, we were planning to market the aircraft aggressively to both Switzerland and Austria in the near future. Both nations had fleets of old DeHavilland Vampires as trainers. Austria also had Fouga Magisters, but they would most likely need replacing before the 1960s were out.
Canadair had helped set up assembly lines for the MB-326 at MBB in West Germany and at Fokker in the Netherlands. That companies capable of building the aircraft in those two countries existed, took a lot of pressure off the people in Cartierville."
If there was a downside in this period of time, it was that one of the CL-215 demonstrators, Dorothea, had been damaged when her nose landing gear collapsed on landing at Venegono shortly after returning from the Paris air show.
A former Aermacchi assembly line supervisor:
"Dorothea wasn't so badly damaged that she couldn't be fixed, it was a question of it being worthwhile to fix her. We had already learned a lot from her and her sister ship, Tereza, and put a lot of hours on both airframes.
Ultimately, it was decided to retire Dorothea from flying. She had served well, so we decided to carry out the cosmetic repairs needed to make her fit for display near the company offices at the airport.
A very impressive plinth was created to place her on. It was modelled after water being dumped from the aircraft. Once Dorothea was placed on the plinth, she was an amazing sight to behold."
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RAAF Station East Sale, Victoria, Australia - September 1965
A six ship formation of MB.326 trainers resplendent in RAAF training colours flew low over the main parade square, the crews were a mix of RAAF and RNZAF pilots.
The formation was part of a welcoming salute to a delegation made up of defense ministers and high military brass from Malaysia and Thailand. Both nations had committed to buying MB.326 fleets.
The first MB.326 pilots of the two nations were to be trained by the RAAF.
A former Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation executive:
"It was an exciting and tense time all at once. Australia was the big power in the region and we were also combatants in the war in Vietnam at the time. It was in our interests to help smaller militaries in allied Southeast Asian countries modernize, as many of them very much needed to.
We were lucky to get our first batch of MB.326 aircraft to the RAAF as soon as we did. This was partly because all but the last few aircraft in that batch were kits from Canadair that we just had to assemble. The second batch was already underway with the first ones due to be delivered to RAAF Pearce, on the west coast, in the very near future.
Malaysia committed to MB.326 purchase at Paris and their pilots would be the first of the two nations' crews to start training. While most of the training would happen at RAAF Pearce once a full complement of MB.326 aircraft were in place there, this first group of Malysian pilots would start their training at East Sale."
A former Malaysian air force pilot:
"It was great to know we would get something modern. The smaller nations in the region were quite behind in military technology. With the war in Vietnam nearby, the Malayan Crisis not so far in the past and Indonesia something of a powder keg waiting to explode; running on second hand World War Two gear and 1950s technology would not be useful to us.
Malaysia ordered the armed version of the MB.326 and entered a training agreement with Australia for our pilots.
It felt like a bright time to me, in spite of the conflicts in the region."
A former RAAF instructor pilot:
"I think everyone was cautiously optimistic about the training agreement. We were certainly happy about providing those smaller countries with something modern for their arsenals."
A former Thai air force pilot:
"We had Cessna T-37 trainers from America and some older T-33 trainers, but these were 1950s aircraft and we needed something newer.
We wanted the A-37 development of the T-37, but were told we wouldn't get it anytime soon because of how much it was needed in Vietnam.
In the armed version of the MB.326, we saw the light strike aircraft we wanted and that we could have now."
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Commonwealth Aircraft, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia - October 1, 1965
A former CAC executive:
"We arrived at work that morning to news of the coup against the Communist government in Indonesia. Australia and other nations that were neighbours to Indonesia had been watching the building tension in that country for a while.
The coup led to a rather drawn out and, as we learned sometime after the fact, quite brutal internal campaign to rid Indonesia of anyone who was pro-Communist.
It would be a while before that country was stable enough to consider selling military gear to it.
We were more optimistic about Singapore. They had declared their independence from Malaysia on August 9th and Australia had good relations with the country. We also had military advisors in Singapore, actively helping to plan the modernization of the newly self-governing country's military.
Our sales and marketing division was putting in overtime to ensure that our presentation of the MB-326 to Singapore, which was scheduled for early December, would go completely without a hitch.
Outside of the MB-326, we were getting ready to hand over our first six CL-215 aircraft.
Four of the aircraft would be going to the Forests Department of Western Australia to use as waterbombers. Crews had returned recently from training in Canada and were due on Monday, October 4, to accept the aircraft.
The other two aircraft would also be going to Western Australia, but they were part of a test program to see the suitability of the non-waterbomber version of the aircraft for the Royal Flying Doctor Service. Crews from that organization were also due the next week to accept their aircraft.
As it was with the Forests Department, RFDS crews had also been up to Canada to qualify on the aircraft."
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Amahai Airport, Seram, Indonesia - October 6, 1965
An Indonesian air force Ilyushin Il-28 bomber lifted off from the Amahai airport runway at 09:00 local time on a southward course with Kupang as the planned destination.
In accordance with the filed flight plan, the aircraft headed directly south towards the Leti Islands. The flight plan and the actions of the crew deviated sharply from there.
The former Il-28 navigator:
"We were flying a reconnaissance version of the aircraft, so the long and straight flight plan didn't arouse any suspicion of our true intention.
The pilot, myself and our gunner were very much in a similar situation in that most of our families had already left Indonesia some time ago and we were not close to the ones who remained. We were all fairly young ourselves and none of us had families of our own.
Things were getting brutal in Indonesia and it seemed nobody was above suspicion of being in favour of the Communists. It was a delicate time and we really had nothing to stay for.
Our aircraft could get us to Darwin, in Australia, as long as we were able to keep going straight once we cleared the Leti Islands and were over the Timor Sea.
We were counting on the presence on the new Mirage fighters that the RAAF had in the region to deter any Indonesian fighters from intercepting us once we diverted from our filed flight plan that would have seen us turn toward Kupang once we were over the islands."
A former RAAF Mirage pilot:
"My wingman and I were vectored onto an unknown aircraft coming over the Timor Sea on a straight line for Darwin. We were in visual range soon enough and could see it was an Il-28.
We made a couple of passes and they remained unprovacative. We pulled up alongside the aircraft and the tail gunner held up a sign that said: 'Going to Darwin!'. That sign, accompanied by a friendly wave told us what we needed to know about their intentions and we relaxed a bit.
I kept station on the aircraft while my wingman broke formation to keep an eye out for possible Indonesian interceptors. As it was, we were left unaccosted all the way home."
No sooner had the three aircraft touched down at RAAF Darwin, than a security detail surrounded the Ilyushin and took it to a secured hangar.
The crew were interogated and satisfactorily made clear that they were no threat and would happily share everything they could about the aircraft in exchange for safe haven in Australia.
RAAF Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia - October 7, 1965
The next morning, the Il-28 was fuelled and the crew were briefed on a flight plan that would see them take their aircraft to the Woomera Ranges in South Australia. There, the aircraft would be taken under the authority of the Aircraft Research and Development Unit (ARDU) and examined thoroughly.
The former Il-28 tail gunner:
"Understandably, they did not include me on the crew for the trip to Woomera. The gunner station was still armed and the security teams had sealed it for the trip to Woomera.
I left in a RAAF transport, about an hour ahead of of our aircraft and its Mirage escort. I was happy to be going in comfort, it gave me a chance to relax and think about where life could go from here."
The former Il-28 pilot:
"Thankfully, I never had to make another flight quite like that again. We had to make a fuel stop in a place that truly seemed the middle of nowhere. At least the Mirage had long range fuel tanks attached, he could stay up and wait for us.
Opening the cockpit canopy brought no relief from the heat. I was happy we didn't need a full refuel, just a topping up to get us to Woomera.
We were back underway soon enough and rejoined the Mirage for an uneventful remainder of the flight.
I always thought flying over the open ocean was scary enough. The flight to Woomera taught me that flying over open desert was every bit as daunting a prospect."
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Great stuff! Somehow, I had missed two previous installments. Taking in three posts at a time made for a fantastic read! :smiley: :smiley:
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Great stuff! Somehow, I had missed two previous installments. Taking in three posts at a time made for a fantastic read! :smiley: :smiley:
Thanks! It's all new output over the past week or so.
I'm on holidays just now, so my brain got out of work writing mode and into creative writing mode long enough to come up with some new stuff.
I'm glad folks are still following.
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Didn't expect the latest twist
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Didn't expect the latest twist
Nor I! Very intrigued to see where this is going ... beside Woomera, obviously ;)
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... beside Woomera, obviously ;)
And having spent quite a bit of time there in the past there is not much there... ;)
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RAAF Woomera, South Australia, Australia - October 7, 1965
A Former ARDU test pilot:
"As soon as we got word in Woomera that the Il-28 that landed at Darwin was headed our way, there was quite a bit of excitement.
The Il-28 was not a new aircraft, it was similar vintage to the Canberra that we were using, but this would be the first time that most of us would get close up to one on the ground.
The gunner arrived a bit ahead of the Il-28. It was felt he wasn't needed on the bomber for the trip from Darwin to Woomera, so he arrived on a RAAF Dakota transport. No sooner had the aircraft parked and the passenger door opened, than he was whisked into a security car and taken elsewhere on the base.
A security detail was already waiting for the Il-28 to arrive.
We could see the Il-28 coming from a good distance out as the sun was reflecting strongly off its silver laquer coating.
Following a textbook landing, the pilot parked the aircraft where directed and the security team surrounded it. As with the gunner, the pilot and navigator were taken away in security cars.
Shortly after, the aircraft was towed into a hangar. In the hangar, the aircraft was condoned off and "Armed" signs were placed at nose, tail and wingtip positions.
We had been told ahead of time that the aircraft's cannons were all still armed."
The former Il-28 Gunner:
"The really important, and stressful, secuity interviews had already been taken care of while we were at Darwin. I had shared the flight to Woomera with a security officer who had transcripts of the interviews to transfer to his counterpart at Woomera, so I was hopeful that whatever interviews were forthcoming there would not be repeats of the ones at Darwin.
Thankfully, we satisfied them that we weren't threats and we could get down to the business of showing them the Il-28 the day after we arrived."
The former Il-28 pilot:
"The biggest surprize for me at Woomera was how well we were treated.
The Malaysia-Indonesia Confrontation was taking place and Australia had taken side with Malaysia. We knew there was a big and well established population of Indonesian people in Australia, but we had no idea how well three Indonesian military guys in a Soviet made jet bomber would be received.
The day after we arrived at Woomera was full of briefings and the three of us answered many questions about our roles on the aircraft.
After the gunner had walked RAAF armourers through technical manuals for the 23mm cannons, they were safely able to disarm the aircraft and take the ammunition away for further examination.
Once the aircraft was safe in all ways, we had made our ejection seats safe when we arrived, the three of us were very busy giving detailed "tours" of our respective stations on the aircraft.
Our biggest worry was that we really couldn't tell them much about the cameras that made up the reconnaissance pack. Not so much because of anything secretive, but simply because it wasn't our specialization. We knew how to activate it to take photos, but that was really all.
As we would find out, the RAAF already had some connections that could help them with areas of the aircraft that we couldn't.
As the day finished, I watched a pair of MB-326 aircraft fly around overhead and then land and taxi past our hangar. I knew about the type, but had never seen one. they looked like a lot of fun to fly, perhaps one day I would get my chance to get some stick time on them."
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RAAF Woomera, South Australia, Australia - October 11, 1965
For the men of the Indonesian Il-28, it had been a restful weekend, the former navigator recalls:
"They decided to put us in lodgings at the RAAF base at Edinburgh, near Adelaide, for the weekend. It was a welcome change from Woomera and we got a great guided tour of Adelaide. We were able to get some clean civilian clothes and beds were certainly more comfortable than the ones we slept on at Darwin and Woomera the week before.
On Monday morning, we had breakfast at the RAAF Edinburgh mess. After breakfast, we were taken to a hangar with a RAAF Dakota transport prepared for flight sitting outside.
In the hangar, we were briefly introduced to a "Mr. Nowak" and told he would be going with us on the flight back to Woomera that morning.
During the flight, we got a chance to get better acquainted with Mr. Nowak. He quickly let us know that we were free to call him by his first name, Stan. As it turned out, he had fled to Australia from his native Poland a few years before.
Stan had been a technician on the Il-28 in the Polish air force and was familiar with a number of systems on the aircraft, including the reconnaissance pack.
Clearly, he was there to fill in some gaps about the Il-28 that were best left to groundcrew to explain."
The Dakota landed at Woomera just prior to the noon hour. After lunch, the Il-28 crew and Stan Nowak were escorted to the hangar where the Il-28 was being kept.
Stan Nowak recalls:
"I left Poland in 1962. I had nothing to hold me to the country and took the opportunity to defect while my squadron was in Bulgaria on joint excercises with the air force there. Our squadron was hosted at Ravnets air base, near Burgas, on the Black Sea coast.
The only border crossing from Bulgaria into Turkey was on the highway that ran through Burgas and eventually into Turkey. I decided to take the risk of trying to get to Turkey from Burgas. I had heard stories of other people defecting that way so I had some idea of what to expect.
Fortunately, but with difficulty, I made it into Turkey. I made my way to Greece and got on a ship headed for Australia.
Due to my service in a Warsaw Pact military, the Australian military took an interest in me while my naturalization papers were still in process.
Military intelligence interviewed me as much as the immigration authorities did. The trade off was that my Australian citizenship application was expedited."
"Bold Beagle"
Stan Nowak, the Il-28 crew and a number of ARDU and other RAAF personnel gathered in a medium sized briefing room to one side of the main hangar area.
The various people took seats facing a blackboard that had only the phrase "Bold Beagle" written on it.
Once everyone was in their seats, the commanding officer of ARDU addressed the room and announced that "Bold Beagle" was to be the project name for anything the unit did connected to the Il-28 sitting in the hangar.
The RAAF officer appointed as commander of "Bold Beagle" took the place of the ARDU commander at the front of the room and introduced himself before pulling down a projection screen and beginning a presentation of overhead projector slides that outlined "Bold Beagle" and the scope of its initial stages.
The former "Bold Beagle" commander:
"Our Indonesian guests might have had a relaxing weekend, but I can assure you that many ARDU people put in many long hours from the day the IL-28 arrived at Woomera in order to makes sure we had the start of a testing program on Monday morning.
The information from the interviews with the Indonesian crew, any technical documents they had aboard the aircraft, as well as from transcripts of interviews we did with Mr. Nowak about the Il-28 shortly after he arrived in Australia, were used to create the official documentation for "Bold Beagle".
The briefing lasted for around two hours, after which the group made their way to the Il-28.
Stan Nowak:
"I must say, it was good to see an Il-28 again. Most of my time in the Polish air force was spent working on the type and I enjoyed working on them. In spite of defecting from Poland, I did miss the Il-28 a bit.
It was great to be able to talk to the crew about the aircraft, it's certainly different to discuss a particular aircraft with people who have first hand knowledge of working with it. The navigator's name was Chandra, the pilot was Edi and the gunner's name was Tim.
The ARDU had contacted me primarily for my knowledge of the aircraft's reconnaissance pack. Before I could tell them anything, the aircraft systems needed to be powered up enough for the bomb bay doors to be opened and the camera position that was halfway between the bomb bay and the tail gunner station opened.
All of those things were controlled from a panel in the navigator's position. Chandra and Edi took their respective stations in the aircraft to monitor the powering up process.
As soon as the needed power was reached, Chandra opened the bomb bay doors and rear fuselage camera station.
Once I got a look at the setup, I was happy to tell the ADRU people that it was a standard daytime camera fit that was described in the technical information they had on hand.
Removing it wouldn't be difficult, it was just a matter of removing some bolts and disconnecting a few cables, but they would certainly need some sort of supporting frames to take the weight of the cameras before the bolts could be undone.
Happily, the technical manuals provided accurate weights for the cameras and the ARDU crews were able to find something that worked.
By the early evening, the cameras had been removed and were on their way by road to RAAF Edinburgh.
Myself, Chandra, Edi, Tim and some ARDU people got onto a Dakota transport for the flight back to Edinburgh."
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RAAF Edinburgh, South Australia, Australia - November 1, 1965
October of 1965 had been very eventful between RAAF Woomera and RAAF Edinburgh for the people of ARDU.
The unexpected arrival of the Indonesian Ilyushin Il-28 and the opportunities it presented for learning about the type were fully exploited.
After the cameras were removed from the aircraft and delivered to the ARDU branch at RAAF Edingurgh, Stan Nowak spent the bulk of his time there guiding the ARDU people through the workings of the four AFA-33 cameras that made up the Il-28's daytime reconnaissance package.
"There were no surprizes for me with the cameras, the AFA-33 was the same type I worked with on the Il-28 before I left Poland. The film was the same type. It was all a very textbook setup that I could easily guide the ARDU people through."
While the cameras were in Edinburgh, Chandra and Edi were at Woomera to familiarize ARDU aircrews with the Il-28 and oversee the first flight of the aircraft by an australian crew in the last week of October.
Chandra recalls:
"I was quite surprized that the first flight of the Il-28 by an Australian crew happened as quickly as it did.
I suppose my view was coloured by my role as the navigator/bombardier. The Australian crew came from the Canberra, an aircraft where the navigator and bombardier are two separate people in different parts of the aircraft. It was decided that It would be eaasier to teach a navigator to be a bombardier than the other way around, so I found myself teaching a couple of Canberra navigators not only how to navigate the Il-28, but how to operate the bomb aiming system.
An added challenge was that we had a reconnaissance variant to work with, so we were aiming to take pictures rather than drop bombs.
Edi had the easier task of teaching the pilots, as they weren't taking on extra tasks."
Edi recalls:
"The Il-28 was a quite straightforward aircraft to fly, so it was not a problem training the very experienced Canberra pilots on cockpit procedures.
On their first flight I was a bit concerned as the Il-28 could be a bit touchy on the centre of gravity when fuel was being transfered between the various tanks, but there was no sign of any problems that way as I watched from the ground as they flew it.
I was also a bit concerned about weight distribution without the cameras installed, but the ARDU engineering crews had done a great job of putting weights in the bomb bay that mimicked the camera load precisely so the aircraft flew just like it had when we flew it in from Indonesia."
A former ARDU test pilot:
"I quite enjoyed my time flying the IL-28. It handled well and had no nasty idiosyncrasies to speak of.
The cockpit was a bit cramped compared the Canberra I was used to, but the view out was much better. It was like sitting in a fighter compared to the Canberra.
As much as I loved the Canberra, the seat was low in the cockpit and you couldn't see anything behind you. As you sat on the left side of the cockpit to fly, you couldn't see much of anything to the right either. As the navigator was buried in the fuselage behind the cockpit, he wasn't a lot of help as an extra set of eyes.
With the Il-28, you sat higher in the cockpit and were right on the aircraft's centre line when flying it. Rearward visibility was a bit limited, but forward and side field of vision were much better than the Canberra.
The Canberra was certainly the more refined of the two in design. The two aircraft were roughly comparable in speed and range, while the Canberra certainly had the edge in climb rate and ceiling."
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RAAF Woomera, South Australia, Australia - November 5, 1965
09:00, local time
An MB-362, resplendent in ARDU markings, sat on the tarmac at Woomera. The ground crew was tending to the last details before the aircrew made their way to the aircraft from the briefing room in the hangar.
An ARDU test pilot, accompanied by Edi, walked to the aircraft in full flight suits and helmets in hand.
Edi recalls:
"I was finally going to go up in an MB-326!
Ever since I saw the aircraft up close for the first time after arriving at Woomera, I wanted to fly in it. Watching the ARDU use them as chase aircraft for the Il-28 in the "Brave Beagle" program only increased my desire for that.
I could hardly contain my excitement that morning.
As we got strapped into the aircraft by the ground crew and went through the preflight check, I noticed how everything was right where I expected it to be. I suppose all training aircraft are similar in these regards, there is a certain way you present things to students.
I had my advanced flying training in a two seat MiG-15, so a jet trainer cockpit was not at all an alien place to me.
The canopy closed and locked and we made our way to the runway and got airborne into a beautifully clear sky."
The former ARDU test pilot:
"Edi and I had got to know each other quite well and I was pleased to give him his first flight in the MB-326. He'd more than earned it with all the work he had done to get us familiar enough with the Il-28 to fly it competently.
It had been relayed to me, though not yet to Edi, that the RAAF had a plan for him and his crewmates beyond "Bold Beagle".
Indonesia was still unstable at the time, but there was enough optimism in some influential quarters that peace would come soon enough for us to justify flight training for our three Indonesian guests in anticipation that they could be Indonesia's first MB-326 pilots.
I was a qualified instructor pilot as well as test pilot, and had already spent several hours on the ground with Edi going over the basics of the MB-326.
Several of us had seen his logbook, he had a respectable number of flight hours for the youngish fellow that he was. There was also the fact that he had made the flight from Indonesia to Australia, no mean feat in itself.
He had the existing flight experience that I and a number of others at RAAF Woomera had every confidence that he could handle the MB-326 if the stick was given to him.
Edi did not yet know he was going to fly the aircraft himself on this flight."
Edi at the Stick
"When I heard the words in my helmet: 'The plane is yours'. I was stunned, but my training and experience kept me from freezing in fear.
We had been in the air for about 45 minutes when the pilot gave control to me, so I had taken the time to observe how the aircraft behaved in flight and so forth.
I really wanted to wring the aircraft out, but I felt there was an underlying reason to why I was getting control. I decided to keep my flying disciplined and by the book.
I stuck to standard aerobatics like rolls and loops. I threw in a Cuban eight or two and a tail slide for good measure.
After about half an hour, I gave the controls back to the ARDU pilot."
The former ARDU test pilot:
"Edi was the real deal as pilots go, there could be no doubting that.
I knew he was very excited even before we got into the aircraft, so I didn't know what to expect when I handed the aircraft to him to fly. Needless to say, I was very impressed with how he handled himself and the aircraft. He was young, but there was nothing cocky or ladish in how he flew.
The aerobatics he performed were not perfect, but competently done nonetheless.
Within and hour of landing the aircraft and debriefing, we were putting the gears in motion on Edi's paperwork so he could be moved to the Central Flying School at RAAF East Sale for a fuller evaluation of his flying skills and a formal familiarization with the MB-326.
Normally, as he wasn't a citizen of Australia, such doors wouldn't be opened to him. But strings were being pulled from influential places for Edi and his crewmates."
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I'm curious to see if any of the CL-215s find their way down under...perhaps in response to the 1967 Tasmanian/Black Tuesday fires
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I'm curious to see if any of the CL-215s find their way down under...perhaps in response to the 1967 Tasmanian/Black Tuesday fires
Six are already there, all of them in Western Australia. Four ine waterbomber configuration with the Western Australian government and two in air ambulance configuration on a trial period with the Royal Flying Doctor Service.
I should be getting to them in the next post or two.
If you go scroll back up toward the top of this page, you'll find a post I made on July 18 or so that mentions the first six CAC built CL-215s.
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Doh!!
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RAAF East Sale, Victoria, Australia - March 11, 1966
15:00, local time
Edi, the Indonesian Il-28 pilot, had been sent to RAAF East Sale in early February of 1966 for training on the MB-326. After some initial academic testing and review of his flying logs, which he had brought with him from Indonesia, he was placed in a training flight alongside RAAF and RAN trainee pilots.
Edi recalls when he heard news of the shift in power back home:
"Flying was done for the week, classroom activities as well. I was in the pub with some mates from my training flight when the news came on the television that Sukarno had given his presidential powers over to Suharto. I tried to take it as a sign of hope, but I knew Indonesia was not out of the woods yet. Sukarno was still the president in the nominal sense while Suharto was an acting president.
Some of my mates in the flight asked me what that meant, but I was hesitant to speculate much. Indonesia might see relatively more stability for a while, but it would take a lot of time to undo the damage Sukarno did. The national economy was a mess and poverty was everywhere. If the change was truly positive, we wouldn't know for a while.
Later that evening I got a call from my old navigator, Chandra, a rather more politically minded man than myself. He was more positive about the change than me and I let him talk about it until he had exhausted himself of the subject.
We then got talking about Tim, as neither of us had heard from him since we were all moved on from RAAF Edinburgh. I was here at East Sale getting my MB-326 training, while Chandra was at RAAF Point Cook getting basic flying training on the Winjeel trainers there.
As it was, we didn't need to wait long to find out Tim's whereabouts. He called me on the following day to talk about the change in government back home, we also took the opportunity to get caught up generally.
Tim had been sent to RAAF Wagga to the RAAF's technical school and was learning all about the Viper engine and its associated systems, He was quite excited about it and was happy to make the change from the gunner position."
Tim's own memories of the time:
"It was a very exciting time for me personally and professionally. It felt like my life was moving in a clear direction for the first time since I got to Australia. When we arrived here, and even through our part in the Bold Beagle program, nothing felt certain as the future was concerned.
I knew they saw future MB-326 pilots in Edi and Chandra, but what were they going to see in a tail gunner? The RAAF had no aircraft with tail guns and I didn't have another trade going in my favour. I had just been that kid who joined the military to keep himself off the streets.
When I got to RAAF Wagga, they tested my academic and logical thinking abilities as well as my English skills. I passed all the tests and they gave me the option of training to work the Viper engine, or the 30mm DEFA cannon.
I chose to go with engines, as I felt I'd spent enough time with guns while sitting in the back of the Il-28. It was time for something new. I ended up with a long career in aero engines because of that choice, so I have no regrets about it.
On the personal side, I made contact with some family who came to Australia before I did, so it was great to reunite with them.
A word from Chandra:
"The changes back home were very exciting to me and filled me with hope. However, flight training was quite stressful.
Ground school wasn't to much of a challenge and the Winjeel was a nice enough aircraft to fly. The real point of stress was that Australia was fully involved as a combatant in Vietnam and were trying to push as many new pilots through training as they could. I was not a special case as trainee pilots went, I was drinking from the fire hose with the rest of them.
It was very much sink or swim at Point Cook in those days. The pattern was often full and could get quite conflicted, so you needed to keep your wits about you.
One day, myself and another pilot were coming back from solo flights and almost collided trying to enter the landing circuit. There were enough other aircraft around that there was some confusion over who the tower was talking to. Myself and the other pilot both decided to put some distance between each other and get away from the circuit until we could establish clear contact with tower.
I successfully completed basic flight training and moved to the MB-326 at East Sale for the advanced stuff. East Sale felt like a holiday after Point Cook; it was busy, but certainly not the chaos Point Cook could be.
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Commonwealth Aircraft, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia - May, 1966
A pair of CL-215s sat in a dimly lit hangar — their Royal Flying Doctor Service livery stripped from them. After the six month trial period, the RFDS determined that the CL-215 was too expensive to operate to offset the benefits that it brought.
However, all was not lost and they would fly once more.
A former CAC executive:
"It was a pity that the RFDS decided against continuing with the CL-215, but their reasons were understandable.
Happily, the government of Western Australia was very happy with theirs and had ordered four more. Other state gevernments were showing interest in the type based on Western Australia's experience of using the type to make short work of a couple of small brush fires that had flared up in the state earlier in the year. Without the aircraft, those fires could have gotten out of control quite quickly.
At the same time the RFDS had handed their aircraft back to us, two aircraft from the Western Australia fleet had been dispatched to Indonesia to help fight forest fires that were raging there and up the Malay peninsula. They and their crews were getting a real workout.
We would find out later that they were not only doing a good job of fighting fires, they were also doing a good job of generating interest in the aircraft in the region.
We had delivered the aditional four aircraft to Western Australia by the end of June, 1966, and were already at work converting the former RFDS aircraft to firefighting configuration; they would be part of an order for the New South Wales government.
After we delivered the second set of four aircraft to Western Australia, they quickly sent two more aircraft up to Indonesia to help with the fires."
A former CL-215 pilot from Western Australia
"I was with the second pair of aircraft that went to Indonesia. We joined the first pair at their base at Kupang airport on Timor and discussed how we would deploy next. In the time they were at Kupang, they had brought the fires there under control.
The fires were still worst on Borneo, so we went there and based the aircraft at Kuching.
It was really an amazing feeling to just be able to skim the ocean and have the aircraft back in the fight in moments, rather than have to go all the way back to base.
What was equally great was the amount of interest the aircraft generated at the airport, all kinds of people wanted to have a look at them. Unfortunately, the aircraft were kept far too busy to let anyone but the most official of VIP types have a close look at them.
I remember one day particularly, we arrived for our usual end of day debrief and were surprised to see our top boss from home and a senior salesman from CAC. Our boss had a grin ear to ear and the CAC guy informed us that the Malaysian government had just placed an order for ten CL-215s and the provisional government in Indonesia were showing tremendous interest in the aircraft.
It was very gratifying that our work there was a major factor in those events coming about."
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Good to see you writing again
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Good to see you writing again
Thanks, I had a couple of false starts so decided to step away from the story a for a while.
I also did up a drawing of the CL-215, I'll maybe use it to do some profiles. I've also been working on a drawing of a Prairie Rattler, but I'm not happy with it yet.
(https://i.imgur.com/yko1CuP.jpg)
I wanted the CL-215 to look somewhere between the 215 and 415 of the real world. Instead of the big wingtip plates on the 415, I made the 215's wing fences bigger. I also made the extra fins on the horizontal stabilizer smaller and a bit less refined than on the 415.
As for the engine pods, I decided to put the aair intake up top to give it more clearance from the water.
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Southern Reshuffle
1966 brought changes to MB-326 operations in Australia.
RAAF East Sale was running at full capacity, but some of the pressure was taken away when more of the training load was shifted to RAAF Pearce.
The entirety of Malaysian and Singaporean MB-326 training was shifted to RAAF Pearce between late 1965 and early 1966. This left RAAF East Sale responsible for RAAF, RAN, and RNZAF MB-326 training.
It was also determined that the user nations of the MB-326 would be responsible for their own basic flying training. Advisors from Australia or New Zealand were placed on-site in those countries to help ensure that any trainees destined for the MB-326 would be ready for it before being sent to Australia to train on it.
The first group of MB-326 trainees from Thailand were scheduled to arrive at East Sale in September of 1966 and work was being done to make sure they could be accommodated.
Indonesia was still a question mark politically, but had voiced strong interest in the MB-326.
Taipan and Kahu
Up until 1966, only the trainer versions of the MB-326 had been active in Australia. 1966 saw CAC start construction of the armed versions of the aircraft, which would be known as Taipan in RAAF service and Kahu in the RNZAF.
Through most of 1965, experienced RAAF and RNZAF instructor pilots had been learning the ins and outs of the Prairie Rattler in Canada at RCAF Cold Lake.
In anticipation of the new version of the aircraft, upgrades were being made to the RAAF air weapons ranges at Evans Head, Salt Ash, and Learmonth.
An RNZAF instructor pilot recalls:
"Cold Lake was a great experience as we were working with a very international group of people. There were the Canadian and Italians running the training unit, along with guys from other NATO countries and some others. It was busy, but incredibly well organized.
Aside of the Canadians and Italians, there were also trainee instructor pilots from Germany and Mexico at the time were were there.
We were there for the full treatment. Not just to learn how to use the plane, but how to teach others to use it as well. Knowing the trainer version of the MB-326 was just the start for us, the Prairie Rattler had its own learning curve.
We arrived just as a group of Dutch pilots, both air force and navy, were graduating the course and getting ready to go home. For most of the time we were there, we shared the ramp with a training group made up mostly of Pilots from Germany and Austria.
Germany was already a user of the trainer version of the MB-326, and were working up on the armed version. Austria had committed to purchasing both trainer and armed versions in autumn of 1965 and were getting their first group of pilots ready for the armed version.
The Prairie Rattler was an eye-opener to us, it was surpizing that a refitted trainer could pack the sort of punch it did. Before we left for Canada, we were told that it was a "light attack" version. Once we got to know the aircraft, we could say that was a definite understatement. It was swift, responsive and accurate; it was the kind of aircraft you could confidently ruin someone else's day with.
The prairie Rattler had a more powerful version of the Viper engine and a substantially strengthened wing to carry a good weapons load. It also had larger wingtip tanks for a bit better range than the trainer.
The first time I put the throttle to full on a Prarie Rattler, I could feel the thrust difference from the trainer model immediately.
The trainer version was like a sports car, the Prairie Rattler was Formula One by comparison!"
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Abbotsford Airport, British Columbia, Canada - August 14, 1966
The 1966 edition of the Abbotsford International Airshow was underway. The weather was warm and clear, and a good sized crowd was filling the airport to take in the spectacle.
A highlight of the show was three MB-326s painted in an eye-catching gold, blue and red livery. They were were the beginnings of the Golden Centenaires, a team that began forming in March of 1966 at CFB Portage la Prairie in Manitoba with the intent of growing to a nine aircraft team that would tour Canadian airshows during Canada's Centenial year in 1967. They had received clearance to appear at selected shows in 1966 as a smaller team.
The nucleus of the Golden Centenaires was the last iteration of the Jackrabbits team.
In the opening flypast, the team flew a six aircraft formation with a pair of Prairie Rattlers from Cold Lake and a Jackrabbit trainer version from Moose Jaw.
The Golden Centenaires went up at about the mid-point of the show to do their routine and were met by enthusiastic applause from the crowd as they taxied back to their parking spots afterward.
Later in the afternoon, the Jackrabbit and Prairie Rattlers went up for their display. The plan was that they would do a couple of formation passes together and then the Prairie Rattlers would return for a role demo display after the Jackrabbit did a solo routine.
As the group lined up to do their second pass, the Jackrabbit collided with one of the Prairie Rattlers. Both aircraft and their pilots plunged into the ground in a fireball.
The pilot of the surviving Prairie Rattler recalls:
"We had finished the first pass and were forming up to do a second from the opposite direction. The Jackrabbit was leading the formation.
We were about to enter the show area when I saw the Jackrabbit shudder and suddenly lurch over and collide with the other Prairie Rattler. I hit the throttle and flew my plane up and away from the crowd and quickly landed.
Eyewitness accounts from the ground as well as news footage supported my own account of the incident in the investigation.
The only positive thing was that the aircraft crashed on open ground, away from any people or other equipment.
I only knew the guy in the Jackrabbit from our airshow demo, but I knew the guy in the other Prairie Rattler very well; he was an instructor pilot in training in from Germany. He was a real nice fellow and showed a ton of potential as an instructor.
Later in the evening, I spent a bit of time talking to the Golden Centenaires. We all had more on our minds than just this day's crash; in early July, one of our Zweibrucken based Prairie Rattlers crashed. The investigation for that was still underway, the aircraft went down in open farmland and the pilot didn't survive. It seemed there were no witnesses to that crash.
Additionally, all the MB-326 fleets in countries using the Embraer built aircraft had been grounded since June. Between March and May, there had been five incidences of MB-326 aircraft from South American air forces mysteriously breaking up in flight.
We hoped that this crash and the one in Zweibrucken wouldn't give cause to ground our fleet as well."
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RCAF Zweibrucken, Rhineland-Palatinate, West Germany - August 16, 1966
The wreckage of the Prairie Rattler that had crashed the previous month was laid out on a hangar floor. The crash investigators redoubled their efforts after hearing the news of the crash in Abbotsford on August 14.
The aircraft had gone down in open farmland between Contwig and Battweiler, north-east of the base, just after take-off.
An investigator recalls:
"It was a particularly difficult investigation, and not just because the pilot was lost.
The aircraft took off in the late afternoon, bound for the Luftwaffe base at Pferdsfeld. The weather was clear and, being summer, there was still plenty of light. We couldn't believe no witnesses were coming forth! It was farm country and there was still light to work by, the fields should have had plenty of people out working in them.
The flight itself was a routine one that our aircraft made once or twice a week to do training with the Prairie Rattler wing there, Jagdbombergeschwader 42.
Our investigation was under tighter scrutiny than usual. Not only did we have local authorities and people from 1 Air Division HQ present, we also had people from Aermacchi and Canadair present and looking for answers.
Aermacchi was taking the grounding of the Embraer built aircraft very seriously and were trying to determine what the problem was and how far spread it might be in the global fleet. Needless to say, three Canadian built aircraft crashing in less than two months got their attention.
A former Canadair executive:
"The Aermacchi guys were leaving no stone unturned looking for answers to the South American problem. Not that you could blame them, the aircraft was getting a lot of attention for good qualities so bad press was not welcomed at all.
Every construction facility for the aircraft had Aermacchi people investigating every aspect of their operations. With the Abbotsford crash and this one, we at Canadair were feeling the heat increase on us.
We weren't buying that there were no witnesses to the crash here. Myself and another from the Canadair team had grown up on farms on the Canadian prairies, we knew the way farm people think and we knew they'd be out in the fields using every bit of daylight available to them.
Someone had to have seen something. The RCAF, Aermacchi, and ourselves put as much pressure as we could on local authorities to go back out and try to find witnesses."
A former Aermacchi executive:
"It was an infuriating and utterly unacceptable situation. We had struck gold with the MB-326 family and we had to protect it!
At the time, we were negotiating a large order of the aircraft from Egypt. They also wanted the option for license production. We were quite busy at Venegono and welcomed another point of production to take some pressure off.
We were in Germany not just to visit the investigation of the RCAF crash, but also to inspect the still new MB-326 line at MBB near Munich. With the exception of a few Canadair built machines, the Luftwaffe would have a locally built fleet. MBB would also be responsible for the Austrian air force fleet.
We were happy with what we saw at MBB. German precision, just as you'd expect."
In with the Storm
Johannes Steinhoff was due to take office as the commander of the Luftwaffe in early September of 1966.
"I did not imagine taking command on a low note like that.
The Luftwaffe's experience with the new aircraft to that point had been quite good.
There were a few rough landings and other training related mishaps, but we hadn't lost any pilots in it until the Abbotsford crash.
I didn't like that nobody was coming forth as witness to the Zweibrucken crash. I agreed with others who said that someone had to have been out working the fields at that time of day.
I took some solace in the fact that the MBB production line had been satisfactory to the Aermacchi people."
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We Have the "How", but Not the "Why"
Unlike the Zweibrucken crash, the cause of the Abbotsford accident was determined without too much trouble.
The rear section of the Jackrabbit had broken away and survived relatively intact. Examination of the engine showed that there was some damage that was consistant with ingesting a foreign object.
A former investigator explains"
"Dismantling the engine revealed a mangled piece of sheet metal that clearly did not belong there, but it looked very similar to the metal used in the aircraft's intake trunking.
Very little of the forward fuselage had survived the crash, so we focused on comparing the sheet metal fragment to the intake trunking of intact aircraft. Metalurgical analysis confirmed it was a section of intake trunking.
As we found the sheet metal fairly deep in the engine, we suspected that it was not the result of the crash, but a contributing factor to it.
We felt confident in saying that a section of intake trunking had detatched and caused extensive damage to the engine, resulting in a loss of control of the aircraft and subsequent collision.
Why it had happened was still something for us to determine."
Fearful Witness
In early September, a witness to the Zweibrucken crash came forth.
A 14 year old girl from Oberaurbach, a short distance north of Contwig, claimed she had seen the crash as she was riding her bicycle along a minor road that connected Contwig and Oberaurbach.
The former police officer who took her report recalls:
"I remember the day very clearly.
I had been sent to the girl's school based on a call from the headmistress there that one of their students claimed to have seen the crash. I was sceptical and thought it might be a kid thinking they were making a clever prank. My scepticism vanished the moment I saw the girl.
She had clearly been crying, she also looked pale and exhausted. Not at all what you would expect of a kid at the start of the school year.
She had wanted to report the crash as soon as she got back home from visiting a friend in Contwig, but her parents had forbidden her from doing so. As they were very strict disciplinarians with their daughter, she obeyed them unquestioningly.
When the school year started, the headmistress could tell there was something wrong and decided to ask the girl a few questions. The girl broke down in tears and told her headmistress, who then called us.
The poor girl was a mess of guilt and fear. Guilt that she hadn't reported it earlier and fear of what her parents would do now that she had disobeyed them.
She was clearly comfortable in the company of her headmistress, so I took her report of the crash at the school rather than taking them to the police station to do it.
She showed me on a map what road she'd been riding on and approximately where she was along it when the crash happened.
According to her, she stopped when she heard the engine noise of the plane change. She knew the sound of the Prairie Rattler well, so the sudden change in sound caught her attention.
Just after the engine sound changed, she said she saw something fall from the plane. According to her, it looked like it came off the belly of the plane, just a bit behind the wings.
On the map, she pointed to a small area of trees where she thought the falling part landed.
The sheer level of fear the girl had of what her parents might do now that she had reported the crash was very unsettling to me. I decided I had to take the girl to the station for her own protection until we could send officers and someone from the regional child welfare office to talk to her parents and get an idea of her living situation.
Once I was back at the station and made the arrangements to have the girl's home checked, I called the base at Zweibrucken to say I had a witness account for them."
Based on the girl's report, investigators from Zweibrucken went to where she said the part from the aircraft fell. Against their expectations, they were able to recover it.
A former member of the crash investigation team:
"What the girl had seen fall off the aircraft was the access door to the hydraulic and starter panels.
Losing that door would certainly have made the aircraft harder to control due to disruption of airflow in that area. Given that the aircraft would have still been climbing, it would have been a very critical phase of flight and a very bad time to have something come loose from the plane.
Unfortunately, very little of the hydraulics and starter panel survived the crash. We still couldn't say concretely what the cause of the crash was, but we had something new to work with and keep the investigation going."
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Great stuff 'north! This is turning into a real nail-biter :smiley: :smiley:
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Great stuff 'north! This is turning into a real nail-biter :smiley: :smiley:
Thanks, I'm glad you're still following and enjoying.
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A former 443 Squadron pilot recalls the time:
"The pilot who was lost in that crash was relatively new to the squadron, and was still adjusting to our unit's way of doing things. We were also getting him used to life in Germany during our off hours.
He came to us fresh from the "Wolf Den", as we called the Prairie Rattler training unit at Cold Lake, but he was a solid and confident pilot who had made the flight up to Pferdsfeld a couple of times before without issue.
It was something of a relief when the girl came forward and reported that something fell off the plane not long after take off. The investigation really hadn't been going anywhere until then and none of us wanted to think it could be pilot error. The trip the Pferdsfeld was as simple and routine as you could get.
From what I recall, the inspectors found that microfractures had formed around a couple of fastener holes that were adjacent to each other on the front edge of the access door to the bay that held the hydraulics and starter panels. They concluded that the microfractures gave way as the aircraft was ascending and that allowed air to rapidly enter the bay and rip the door off from the pressure. The ensuing disruption to airflow in the area likely resulted in a loss of control of the aircraft.
It was a conclusion that seemed to satisfy the RCAF brass. An order was put out that restricted take off speeds until our fleets of Praire Rattlers and Jackrabbits could be inspected for similar issues.
We were dissapointed, but not surprised, that it took a while to find a witness. Not all local people were happy to have foreign military people around and some wouldn't help us even if they could. As it turned out, the girl's parents were among those who strongly objected to any kind of foreign military presence on German soil and that was part of their rationale in forbiding her to report it.
The local authorities and child welfare office had visited her home and interviewed her parents. They had also interviewed neighbours and staff from the girl's school.
She was ultimately placed with a foster family in Zweibrucken. I don't know how things went for her after that, but I hope she had a better life going forward."
A former child welfare officer:
"As the girl had made her report from her school, we sent officers there to interview the headmistress and the girl's teachers.
The consensus at the school was that her parents were cold and inflexible in demeanour and unpleasant to deal with. School staff tried to avoid dealing with the parents as much as possible. None of them had anything bad to say about the girl herself. She was rather introverted, but not a troublemaker at all and she kept excellent grades.
Interviewing the neighbours underlined the severe nature of her parents. It seems they actively kept everyone at arm's length. Shopkeepers described the mother as a very abrupt and formidable person who spoke only what was needed to do business transactions. Any attempt at small talk with her was met with a look of pure disgust.
Our visit to the girl's family home was not a comfortable one. It was orderly to an extreme degree; we Germans are known for being orderly and precise, but this home was a step above. This home was clean and orderly to the point of being sterile.
The home felt as cold and severe as the couple who owned it. There was no evidence in the open areas of the house that any children lived there. The parents were two of a kind. Both were cold and abrupt and gave minimal answers to our questions. The father had a visible facial tick that got more pronounced as the interview went on.
They didn't speak of their daughter lovingly, they described her as 'satisfactory' and 'acceptable'. Her school marks were excellent, any parent should have been beaming with pride from that alone. When we inspected the girl's bedroom, we saw a very minimalist place. It was as clean as the rest of the house, but contained only the most basic of furnishings that could still be considered fit for use.
A quick look at the parents' finances showed that they were capable of doing much better for their daughter than what we saw.
I made arrangements to visit the parents again in a week with some recommendations for improvements.
The phone rang while I was finishing my report. It was the police. They informed me that the parents had gone to a lawyer a couple of days after my interview and given up all of their parental responsibilites, effectively surrendering their daughter to the state. The parents left the area not long after."
The lawyer recalls:
"That day still stands out very clearly to me. The girl's parents came into my office with no appointment, no pleasantries and were all business. The father said nothing, but the mother said that if the state saw so much value in such a 'mediocre' child, then they could have her.
They demanded I draft up the forms for them to surrender their daughter. I didn't argue, I just wanted them out of my office quickly. I put the forms together and showed them where to sign. They paid in cash and I filed the papers with the local courts later that same day.
The girl was safe, her parents left the area shortly after, and the case was considered closed by the police."
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All Eyes on Embraer
Aermacchi's investigation of the of the problems with South American MB-326 fleets showed that the problem was unique to Embraer built aircraft.
Company executives were satisfied that all other production facilities were maintaining excellent standards, including the FMA lines in Argentina that were responsible for some structures on the Embraer made aircraft.
The aircraft lost were two from the Argentine air force, two from the Chilean air force, and one from the Brazilian navy. There were witnesses to both the Argentine crashes and the Brazilian crash. Both Chilean crashes were in sparsely poulated areas and no witnesses had come forward.
The witness accounts of the Argentine and Brazilian crashes had a key similarity: the disintegration started behind the wings.
One of the Argentine witness accounts came from a crewman on a fishing boat:
"There were a pair of air force jets flying around overhead, it was pretty common for them to do excercises off the coast like that.
I took a short rest and watched them for a bit. While I was watching, one of them broke in half. They were far enough apart that I knew it wasn't a collision and the aircraft was turning away from my boat, so I could clearly see the back half of the aircraft break away. I didn't see any parachutes.
The back half went straight into the water, while the front part cartwheeled when it hit the surface."
A group of schoolchildren and their teacher gave similar reports regarding the other Argentine loss. That aircraft was transiting over La Pampa province when it suddenly broke apart in similar fashion.
The Brazilian navy aircraft had been practicing for an airshow performance when it broke in half descending from a loop.
A former Embraer executive:
"Needless to say, it was a stressful time at our company.
Aermacchi people were all over our factory, asking all kinds of questions and putting everything under the microscope. We were still a new company that they took a chance on, now they had reason to lose faith in us. We cooperated in every way we could with them, they weren't the only ones after us for answers.
The Argentine air force aircraft that went into the ocean was only partially recoverable. We got the aft fuselage and a few bits of the mid section and wings, but most of the forward fuselage disintegrated entirely and went into some very deep water.
The aircraft from La Pampa was only a bit more telling. Again, we got an aft fuselage section somewhat intact, but the rest of the aircraft set off a grass fire over a wide area and it took a while for firefighters to put it out so what little was left of that part of the aircraft could be recovered.
Given the nature of the Brazilian aircraft crash, there was almost nothing left to investigate. Everything went straight into the ground in a fireball.
As for the Chilean losses, both aircraft went down in difficult to access places. Chilean authorities couldn't tell us much about those crashes.
In our own investigation, we took a trip to Guatemala to see their fleet of aircraft. This was at the invitation of a Canadair contingent that was looking for clues into a pair of RCAF losses. The Guatemalan air force was a unique case as they were the first customer of the aircraft in the sales region that Embraer took over from Canadair. As such, they had a mixed fleet of aircraft from both us and Canada.
It was a hunch that didn't really pay off as all the aircraft in the Guatemalan fleet were problem free. There was one minor landing mishap, but that was down to pilot error and the aircraft was repaired and returned to service.
Aermacchi were eventually satisfied with what they saw at Embraer, but that simply meant we still had to look further.
Another similarity between the Argentine and Brazilian crashes was that the aircraft construction numbers showed that they were from adjacent batches. We contacted the Chilean air force for confirmation of the aircraft they lost, those aircraft were also built in the same time frame.
With that information, we were able to narrow things down quite a bit.
Our redirected investigation lead us to one of a couple of local fastener manufacturers that we used as suppliers. This supplier made the fasteners that held the forward and rear fuselage halves together. It looked as if we had received a bad batch from them.
The police and trade authorities moved on the supplier very quickly after we voiced our most recent suspicions.
In the end, our suspicions turned out to be true. The company had produced some sub-standard batches of fasteners a few months before we built the aircraft lots in question, and we ended up with one of those batches. We were not the only company affected by the supplier's lack of quality control. The most damning thing was that they had sent those fasteners out knowing full well they were not up to standards.
It turned into class action lawsuit that saw criminal charges brought against several key people at the supplier and the supplier sued out of business.
We were excused of any wrong doing, but we learned to be a lot more careful about our suppliers and put in a very strict vetting process to keep that sort of thing from happening again."
A former Aermacchi executive:
"They say it's always the small things that will get you, this case proved it.
We were happy to take the pressure off of Embraer and let them get back to business unhindered.
Once the cause was found, the groundings were lifted from all aircraft that didn't come from suspect production batches. Those that did, were ordered to be inspected and have fresh fasteners installed.
It was a drama that we were happy to see the end of."
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I spent the past few days working of this profile:
(https://i.imgur.com/9itjb4a.jpg)
Canadair Prairie Rattler
RCAF 443 Squadron
RCAF Station Zweibrucken, West Germany
1966
This particular aircraft and its pilot were lost in the crash north-east of Contwig in July of 1966.
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:smiley:
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I spent the past few days working of this profile ...
Very nice! But also crying out for shark mouth markings placed ahead of those gun bulges ;D
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Very nice! But also crying out for shark mouth markings placed ahead of those gun bulges ;D
Very tempting idea, I'll have to think about that.
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I managed to scoure three ses of Pavla MB326K cannon fits. I intned to model at least one Prairie Rattler.
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I managed to scoure three ses of Pavla MB326K cannon fits. I intned to model at least one Prairie Rattler.
I look forward to seeing your take on it.