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DC-3, American Airlines NC18141
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The Douglas DC-3 was one of the most noteworthy aircraft ever built. An outgrowth of the DC-2, it was designed at the request of American Airlines for an aircraft to service its longer routes and which would provide passengers room to stretch out and sleep. America Airlines had been using the Curtiss Condor which was large enough for sleeping berths, but it was slow. While the DC-2 was faster, it was too narrow for sleeping berths. During the summer of 1934, American decided that it needed a plane that could fly non-stop between New York and Chicago with both the roominess of the Condor and also the DC-2's performance and approached Douglas about providing a plane to meet those requirements. Construction on an order of 10 aircraft began in December 1934. The first Douglas Sleeper Transport - or DST - debuted on December 17th, 1935 - exactly 32 years after the first flight of the Wright brothers. The new aircraft began scheduled service with American on June 25th, 1936. The first order was followed by another 10 aircraft configured for 28 seated passengers - that aircraft being the DC-3. United Airlines became the second DC-3 customer in November 1936, and KLM (Netherlands) was the first overseas DC-3 user. By the end of 1938, 95% of all US commercial airline traffic flew on DC-3s... and by the following year, 90% of the world's airline traffic was being carried by DC-3s! Douglas built a total of 10,655 DC-3 series aircraft and another 2,500 planes were built under license in Japan and the Soviet Union. When WWII began, many commercial DSTs and DC-3s were pressed into Allied military service as the C-47 Skytrain. Attractive because of their large load-carrying capacity, the DC-3's normal range of 1,500 miles could be extended 500 miles by adding fuel tanks. Both the Army Air Forces and the US Navy used large numbers of C-47s and other military DC-3 derivatives in a variety of support roles - including dropping paratroopers and pulling gliders filled with commandos on D-Day. Those used by Britain and other Commonwealth Air Forces were known as "Dakotas." Because of its awkward appearance, the C-47 Skytrain was nicknamed "Gooney Bird", but the aircraft could travel reliably over water and in areas with few or no navigation aids while surviving every environment from the heat of Africa to the cold of Alaska; and it flew reliably in all kinds of weather. The Skytrains, the Skytroopers, and the Dakotas served the Allies in every theater of World War II. After the war, a large number of C-47s became surplus and joined the commercial air fleet, seeing use by almost every airline and many militaries around the world - including the US military that retained some variants. In 1948, both US and British C-47s participated in the Berlin Airlift; and - in the 1950s - they flew in the Korean War. When the Vietnam war came along, Gooney Birds continued to be flown as conventional transport airplanes but were also modified for electronic reconnaissance, psychological warfare, and as the AC-47 gunship for night attack roles. The DC-3 has proven to be the workhorse of the aviation world. Today - more than six decades after it was introduced - hundreds of DC-3s are still flying world-wide. Aircraft NC18141 (featured) was one of American Airlines Flagships (May 20th, 1939) and was named "Tulsa". Afterwards it served with Trans Texas (1949), Texas International (1968), Tradewinds 1969, Air New England (1971) and, finally, with Naplees/Prov Boston as N38PB. Length: 63
ft 10 in
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