This week in AFLCMC history - February 7- 11, 2022

  • Published
  • By Air Force Life Cycle Management Center History Office
In this edition of Heritage Hangar, you'll learn about old and new airplanes and tidbits of what happened this week many years ago. 

07 Feb 1942 (ISR & SOF Dir.—Big Safari) 

The US Army Air Forces leased the new municipal airport in Greenville, TX, dubbing it Majors Field, as a pilot training facility, including for the WASPs. The base closed after the war and was acquired by the Texas Engineering and Manufacturing Company (TEMCO) in 1951. TEMCO was largely a subcontractor to other aviation companies, but diversified into avionics, missile systems, and aircraft modifications. In 1957, the Big Safari program opened a Greenville liaison office as Detachment 2. Its first official program there was SUN VALLEY, the modification of early C-130As for Airborne Communication Reconnaissance Programs. Many programs, primarily C-135 variants like Rivet Joint, followed.  

 08 Feb 1963 (ISR & SOF Dir.) 
 
The Air Force ordered 22 Sikorsky S-61R helicopters, designated the CH-3C. This was an improvement on an earlier helicopter developed for the Navy that Sikorsky used to compete unsuccessfully for a Marine Corps contract. The Air Force intended to use it for transporting troops, casualties, or cargo. These original ones were upgraded to the CH-3E configuration in 1966. Increasingly involved in Vietnam, the Air Force selected 50 of those for conversion to HH-3Es, famously known as the “Jolly Green Giant,” for combat search and rescue missions. These added self-sealing fuel tanks, armor, a retractable in-flight refueling probe, two M-60 machine guns, and a rescue hoist.  

09 Feb 1972 (Tinker AFB) 
  
The Oklahoma City Air Materiel Area (OCAMA) at Tinker began “Project Bullet Shot,” a massive expansion of support to B-52s and KC-135s heading to Vietnam. President Nixon had ordered an increased operational tempo for bombing missions in what turned out to be the final months of the Vietnam War. Tinker provided technical and logistics support, including: manufacturing patches for KC-135 engine exhaust nozzles, alternation of missile-launching pylons for conventional bombs, overhaul of hydraulic pumps for both plane types, and the replacement of fiberglass radome linings with sheet metal. Tinker was also aerial port of embarkation for these and other spare part, shipping out twice its usual amount of cargo per month. 
 
10 Feb 1964 (Hill AFB) 
 
The first launch of an Athena RTV missile from Green River, UT. The Ogden Air Materiel Area (OOAMA), headquartered at Hill AFB, supported this facility and these tests as part of its intercontinental ballistic missile responsibilities. The Athena was a 4-stage solid rocket designed as an inexpensive way of testing subscale ICBM reentry vehicles (RVs). The Athena pushed the RVs to proper speeds and altitudes, with an impact point at the White Sands 
Missile Range, NM. On this first flight, multiple failures led it to go off course, crashing outside of Durango, CO. Over 100 subsequent launches occurred, with one famous failure in 1970 resulting in the missile landing in Mexico. 

11 Feb 1952 (Fighters & Adv. Aircraft Dir.) 

The Air Force contracted with North American Aviation for 23 production F- 100A Super Sabre supersonic fighters, beginning full-scale development. The plane was the result of NAA’s unsolicited proposal for a derivative of its F-86 Sabre that was earning fame in the Korean War as the preeminent US air-to-air fighter. The Air Force dubbed it the F-100, the first “Century Series” fighter. But like its brethren, the F-100 suffered from numerous design and production issues that caused accidents and required rectification. Nevertheless, it served extensively in the Vietnam War as a fighter-bomber before being phased out in the early 1970s.

12 Feb 1953 (Bombers Dir.) 

The Air Force contracted with Convair for detailed Phase I development of the B-58 Hustler. In the late 1940s, the Air Force was interested in supersonic, high-altitude strategic bombers and let several design studies and contracts. In late 1952, Convair’s design that drew heavily from supersonic interceptors, including the delta-wing design and area rule, along with its unique external pod for a nuclear weapon and fuel, beat out Boeing. While its utility was limited by Soviet surface-to-air missile development, the Mach 2 Hustler earned numerous speed records and aviation awards. 

13 Feb 1969 (Propulsion Dir.) 

Pratt & Whitney and GE received competitive contracts to furnish engine-airframe compatibility data for the F-X (F-15) designs. Having recently faced significant inlet-engine issues on the F-111, the Air Force started both research programs and requiring this data. The F-15 was the first to use a new generation of high-thrust engines and to subsume the engine management under the System Program Office. While Pratt won the F-15 engine contract in part based on this data, this was the opening salvo in what became known as the “Great Engine War” of the early 1980s. 

50 Years Ago This Week in AFLCMC History: 09 February 1972 

In the early 1960s both Air Defense Command and Tactical Air Command had a need for improved radar detection and tracking of multiple airborne targets. ADC was interested in spotting low-flying enemy bombers, while TAC wanted tactical command and control for its fighters. Though ground-based radars were blind to airplanes flying “under the radar,” airborne radar could “look down” to detect those aircraft. However, they had difficulty distinguishing between actual targets and “ground clutter” - the reflections of radar waves off surface objects. By 1963, recent advances in computer technology and pulsed Doppler radar made a “look down” radar feasible enough for the Air Force to issue Specific Operational Requirement 206 to study an “Airborne Warning and Control System.” 

The Aeronautical Systems Division at WPAFB set up an AWACS Program Office to manage the study and concluded that significant tech development still needed to be done on the ground clutter problem. Multiple contractors, as well as the Air Force labs, spent the remainder of the 1960s improving the radar systems, the processing equipment, and identifying how an AWACS airplane might be configured. In May 1967, the Program Office transferred to the Electronic Systems Division (ESD) at Hanscom AFB, which was better suited for managing radar development and acquisition. 

In 1970, ESD selected Boeing as the AWACS prime contractor for the overall system, the airplane, and choosing the radar subcontractor. Boeing proposed its civilian 707-320B airliner for the airframe, initially with eight TF-33 engines, like the B-52, but cut back to four, as on the C-141 and civilian 707s. To house the large radar, Boeing studied the aerodynamic, structural, and electromagnetic performance issues and settled on the now-iconic “pancake” rotating dome (rotodome) mounted on two struts near the aft of the fuselage. 

Phase I of the development program was the Brass-board Radar Demonstration, which meant a literal fly-off of the two radar concepts on a pair of AWACS prototypes Boeing provided, which the Air Force dubbed the EC-137D. The first step was the airworthiness flight test of the prototypes to evaluate their flying qualities. The first plane, tail number 71-1407, rolled out of the Boeing plant in Renton, Washington, on 1 February 1972. It lacked all of the electronics, so ballast provided the appropriate weight and center of gravity. The first flight occurred on 9 February 1972 at Boeing’s facility, with six more flights through Feb 17. The radar flights occurred from March-October, with Westinghouse winning the competition over Hughes. 

The AWACS became operational in 1977 as the E-3 Sentry. Both prototype EC-137Ds were converted into the standard operational configuration and continue to serve with the 552 Air Control Wing at Tinker AFB.