How the Lockheed Hercules Helped Open Alaska to Oil Exploration

The Lockheed L-100 prototype loading in Fairbanks. Note the Alaska titles.

In the spring of 1965, there were seven different oil exploration groups prospecting on Alaska's North Slope and they had run into significant logistical difficulties in bringing in not just the equipment needed but also basic supplies for the personnel. The only way at the time was to bring it in on ocean-going barges that only had access to Alaska's northern coast a few weeks at a time during the summer thanks to the extensive ice pack of the Arctic Ocean. There were no roads or railways that connected the North Slope to the cities of Fairbanks and Anchorage further south. The Yukon River was the first geographic barrier between Fairbanks and where the oil was, but even more significant was the Brooks Range that stretched east to west across Alaska for over 700 miles with peaks as high as 9,000 feet. A straight line distance from Fairbanks to the North Slope is easily 500 miles across the most remote and untouched wilderness in the United States. Engineers for the oil companies involved with North Slope exploration had devised a massive caterpillar land train, but it would cost over $1 million to build just one and it would take a year to transit from Fairbanks to the North Slope, threading its way through the mountain passes in the Brooks Range. During the summer months, no one was quite sure if the tundra could support the weight of the proposed massive land train. That left airlift as the only solution but in 1965 there were no civilian aircraft that had the right combination of load carrying capacity, ability to take in outsize loads, the performance to get into and out of what would be very short gravel airstrips, not to mention an ability to keep working in the extreme Alaskan winters. 

The answer came from Charlie Willis, who had been the head of Alaska Airlines since 1957. The year prior, Lockheed had flown the prototype L-100, a civilian cargo version of the C-130 Hercules. The L-100 was basically a demilitarized version of the C-130E and made its first flight on 20 April 1964. Lockheed was eager for commercial sales of the L-100 and Willis struck a deal with Lockheed to wet-lease the prototype in what became known as the "Thirty Day Miracle"- with only Alaska Airlines titles on the landing gear sponsons, the wet-lease included not just the aircraft but the Lockheed pilots and crew as well. This way there would be no delay in getting an Alaska crew up to speed on the new aircraft. 

During the four-week airlift to the North Slope, the lone L-100 prototype moved over 2 million pounds of out-sized cargo to improvised air strips all along the North Slope. Charlie Willis was thrilled with the lease, exclaiming to the Alaska press covering the airlift "This aircraft can airlift heavy machinery, large earth moving equipment, and prefabricated structures on the same day at less cost by conventional surface means." The first company to benefit from the airlift was Richfield Oil who struck oil at Prudhoe Bay, sparking the Alaska Oil Rush. The Prudhoe Bay oil field is the largest not just in the United States but in North America as well. With over 25 billion barrels of oil, this field is more than double the size of the next biggest oil field in the United States which is in East Texas and extends to the Gulf of Mexico. By the end of 1965, five oil fields and eleven gas fields had been opened up on the North Slope. The challenge then became how to get the oil and gas from the North Slope and the only economically feasible option would be the construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline that would run from Prudhoe Bay to the port of Valdez in the south. 

One of Alaska International's Herks that supported pipeline construction.

Alaska International Airlines had ordered the Lockheed L-100 after seeing it in action during the "Thirty Day Miracle". When construction of the pipeline began in March 1974, AIA devoted six L-100s to airlift missions to support the pipeline contstruction. The six aircraft were moving 1 million pounds of cargo *each* day into improvised gravel air strips along the pipeline construction route. From heavy equipment to fuel to prefabricated housing for the workers, AIA's L-100s averaged 12 hours of flying each day, some aircraft flying as much as 21 hours in a day. The aircraft were indispensable to the construction effort and along with the "Thirty Day Miracle" part of the lore that has surrounded the Lockheed C-130 Hercules. 

Source: Herk: Hero of the Skies by Joseph Earl Dabney. Copple House Books, 1979, pp 231-249. Photos: Lockheed Martin Archives

Credible Sport, the Super STOL Hercules

Following the disastrous failure at the Iranian Desert One rendezvous point of the Operation Eagle Claw hostage rescue mission on 24-25 April 1980, a second plan was drawn up immediately after the failed Delta Force mission to use a specially-modified Lockheed C-130 Hercules to land in the Amjadien Stadium across the street from the US Embassy at which point Special Forces teams would retrieve the hostages and then fly out of the soccer field in the center of the stadium. Under the project name Credible Sport, the crash program would produce a highly modified C-130 Hercules that could land and takeoff from a soccer field with 30-foot high obstacles at each end. Authorized by the Secretary of Defense, the top secret Lockheed project modified three C-130Hs- two would be modified to what was called the XFC-130H configuration within 90 days with the third aircraft to be used for testing the retrorocket packages that were to be installed on the Hercules to give it "super STOL" capability.

The aircraft were modified with fully-powered flight controls along with a 35% increase in the control surface areas. The flaps were modified to be double-slotted to increase their lift and the leading edge roots of the horizontal stabilizer were increased along with a corresponding increase in the leading edge dorsal root fin to provide more stability at low speeds. An extended nose section housed the additional avionics for the mission, the nose section coming from a DC-130 drone controller aircraft. The radar from a Vought A-7 Corsair II attack jet was housed in the extreme nose and an under-nose FLIR package would allow night operations. To provide flight path guidance on the approach into the stadium, a laser altimeter and laser range finder were also fitted. As the mission would be flown directly from the United States, the aircraft were modified with the inflight refueling receptacle from a Lockheed C-141 Starlifter. Five inflight refuelings would be needed to reach Tehran. The inflight refueling system reached back to the wings and was plumbed into the wing tanks. Under the fuselage just forward of the aft cargo ramp was an arresting hook- the plan called for the Credible Sport aircraft to recover on an aircraft carrier in case any hostages or personnel needed medical attention. 

The most extreme modification for the Credible Sport program were the battery of rockets that would give the aircraft its extreme STOL capability. For the landing, eight retrorockets were housed in pairs in sponson fairings on the forward fuselage. Another four rockets on each side of the fuselage were mounted by the main landing gear fairings and were pointed downward. It's believed that the downward rockets were from US Navy ASROC missiles and the retrorockets were from AGM-45 Shrike anti-radar missiles. On approach, speed would be maintained at 85 knots but at 85% engine power to remain at least 5 knots above the stall speed. At height of 50 feet, the downward firing rockets were activated by the navigator for 3 seconds to arrest the descent rate and at touch down, the eight retrorockets deployed out of their fairings and fired with a thrust of 80,000 lbs, bringing the Hercules to a rapid halt. 

For takeoff, four main RATO units that came from the Navy's Standard RIM-66 surface-to-air missile were mounted on each side of the aft fuselage. In addition, six smaller rocket units were installed in three pairs- one pair under each wing mounted on the fuel tank pylon and one pair under the tail unit. The tail unit rockets prevented over-rotation and the wing-mounted units were to provide yaw stabilization should the main RATO units not shut down simultaneously. The ten rocket motors for takeoff provided 180,000 lbs of thrust! This was approximately twenty times the power provided by the C-130's four T56 turboprops.

An amazing series of flight tests proved the concept with the first flight taking place on 18 September 1980, but one problem encountered was hot gas ingestion by the T56 turboprops from the retrorocket packages. Despite this, the modified Hercules could takeoff after a ground roll of only 100 feet and was already 300 feet high just 200 feet after lift off. It was an impressive feat considering that the C-130 itself is about 100 feet long. On 29 October 1980, one of the C-130Hs modified, 74-1683, was conducting a landing test when the downward firing rockets failed to ignite and two of the retrorockets fired prematurely followed by the rest of the retrorockets. This slowed the Hercules prematurely and a high descent rate resulted that caused a hard landing that broke off the right wing by tne number three engine. Quick action by the Eglin AFB fire crews prevented loss of life, but the aircraft was a complete loss. 

With $30 million spent and only two of the three C-130Hs modified, Credible Sport was canceled when the Iranian revolutionary government indicated a desire for a resolution to the crisis with the change in US administration with the November 4th elections that put Ronald Reagan into office. Of the two modified aircraft, 74-1683 and 74-1686, they received the designation YMC-130H. As 74-1683 was a total loss in the 29 October crash, 74-1686 was partially demodified and donated to the Museum of Aviation at Warner-Robbins, Georgia. The third aircraft, 74-2065, was returned to active service. 

This test footage shows how impressive Credible Sport was in action and it also shows in slow motion the crash on 29 October 1980:

Source: Military Aircraft Monthly, Volume 9 Issue 9. "Credible Sport" by Keith Peckover, p46-48.

Big Blue 82: The Commando Vault Bomb

Although the role of the Lockheed C-130 Hercules in Vietnam was primarily that of airlift, one of the most common non-airlift roles it flew was that of a bomber- dropping the large, 15,000-lb BLU-82/B "Big Blue 82" bombs. Following the end of the Second World War the United States did have some bombs in the 10,000-lb class and higher which were dropped by Convair B-36 Peacemaker. They weren't extensively deployed, let alone used, as the B-36's primary mission in the 1950s was that of nuclear deterrence. As the war in Vietnam intensified, the Air Force Systems Command returned to the idea of a large air dropped bomb not as a weapon, but as a rapid combat engineering tool to clear out a helicopter landing zone in the jungle. The B-36 was no longer in service and the B-52's pylons and bomb bay systems weren't designed for the type of weapon the AFSC was considering. One option looked at using the Army's Sikorsky CH-54 Tarhe skycrane helicopters, but the choice eventually settled on the C-130 Hercules due to its speed and range over the CH-54.

The project was designated Commando Vault with the first test drops being conducted in October 1968. The first Commando Vault bombs were the smaller M121 series which weighed in at 10,000 lbs. They were filled with what was called GSX- gelled slurry explosive, a mix of ammonium nitrate, aluminum powder and a liquid gelling agent. GSXs were standard explosives in the mining industry. They were cheap and easily handled, mixed prior to each mission as the mixture tended to be come unstable with time. There is a big misconception that these bombs were fuel-air explosive weapons and they weren't for the simple reason that GSX is a completely inappropriate explosive for FAE applications as it had the consistency of mud and couldn't be aerosolized for an FAE weapon.

The first combat drops were made in Vietnam in March 1969 from the C-130 Hercules. The bomb was carried on a pallet-mounted cradle in the cargo hold and an extraction parachute pulled the load out the rear ramp. The bomb then separated from the cradle and it's own parachute deployed to stabilize it. An extended fuse probe nicknamed the "Daisy Cutter" triggered the bomb before it hit the ground, thereby clearing the trees but not leaving a crater which would preclude the use of the site as a helicopter landing zone. In 1970 a larger version was put into use, this one designated BLU-82/B and it weighed in at 6.8 tons and was about 80% explosive by weight. Also filled with GSX, the BLU-82/B was also dropped by the C-130 and also had a 4-foot stand-off fuse probe that for whatever reason, got the bomb the nickname "Daisy Cutter" when in fact the term "Daisy Cutter" referred to any extended nose probe fuse used on bombs during the conflict.

Accurate drop of the Commando Vault weapons required precise navigation and some of the drops in Vietnam were made using radar guidance as well as the MSQ-77 Combat Skyspot beacon guidance method that was also used to control the B-52 Arc Light drops over South Vietnam. One minute before the drop, the extraction parachute on the cradle of the bomb was deployed into the airstream out the open ramp while the pallet was restrained by the locks in the cargo rails in the C-130's cargo hold. At the release point- usually from a navigator on the flight deck or a ground radar beacon operator in the case of Combat Skyspot- the loadmaster released the locks, dropping the weapon. This also had the unique distinction of making the Commando Vault loadmasters the only enlisted men in Vietnam to deploy aerial weapons!

The minimum altitude for a drop was about 6,000 to 7,000 feet and even at that height, it wasn't unusual for the Hercules to be buffeted by the shockwave of the explosion. In Vietnam, about 200 of the smaller M121 bombs were dropped and about 250 of the larger BLU-82/Bs were dropped. In Desert Storm, the BLU-82/Bs saw action again as being very useful for clearing out large swathes of desert where the Iraqis had placed minefields to stall the Coalition advance. They were also a useful psychological weapon that were typically accompanied by leaflet drops on Iraqi units in the area. On the first night of the ground offensive, the first BLU-82/B drop was mistaken for a tactical nuclear weapon by some of the Coalition units in the area! Eleven BLU-82/Bs were dropped during Desert Storm.

The BLU-82/B was used again in Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, approximately 3-4 of them being used to hit some of the cave complexes where the Tailban forces were holding out. The last BLU-82/B drop was a test drop in Utah in 2008, the bomb having been since replaced by the more accurate MOAB- GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast weapon, also deployed by the C-130 Hercules.

Source: C-130 Hercules: Tactical Airlift Missions, 1956-1975 by Sam McGowan. Aero Publishers, 1988, p124-128.

Operation Carolina Moon: Bridge Busting with the C-130

One of the toughest targets in North Vietnam during the long war there was the Thanh Hoa Bridge over the Song Ma River. The bridge was a massive steel truss and concrete structure that carried a railroad down the center and a two lane road way on each side and was a major supply choke point from Hanoi and the harbor of Haiphong. Crossing the river at its narrowest point, sharp limestone ridges on each side gave it the nickname Ham Rong, or "Dragon's Jaw" as the American pilots referred to it. Because of its strategic nature on the supply route to the battlefields along the DMZ and to the Viet Cong in South Vietnam, the Thanh Hoa Bridge was a significant target and was recognized as such by the North Vietnamese who protected the area with some of the densest antiaircraft defenses outside of Hanoi and Haiphong.

Despite the initial attacks by F-105s from bases in Thailand, the bridge which was over-engineered, refused to drop. One USAF attack had 79 aircraft of varying times involved at the same time and yet the bridge still stood. Late that year the Armaments Development Laboratory at Eglin AFB in Florida had been doing research on using high-explosive weapons that focused their energy- similar to a scaled up version of a shaped charge used in anti-tank warfare. The command staff of the Pacific Air Forces running the USAF air campaign in Vietnam was notified of the possible destructive power of these new weapons, but they could only be carried by cargo aircraft and the only suitable would be the Lockheed C-130 Hercules. Since the AA defenses of the Thanh Hoa Bridge were so intense, a plan was formulated to have C-130s drop the weapons up river and let them float down to the bridge and detonate. The opeation was given the code name Carolina Moon.

Two experienced crews were chosen from the 314th Troop Carrier Wing at Sewart AFB, Tennessee. One crew was led by Major Richard Remers and the other crew was led by Major Thomas Case, both crews from the 61st Troop Carrier Squadron.

On 30 May 1966, Remer's crew took off first in a C-130E from Da Nang AB just after midnight local time. With a crew of seven, they flow at 100 feet above the South China Sea and then turned in towards the target area, remaining at 100 feet. There were two navigators aboard Remer's Hercules and there were two drop zones upstream from the Thanh Hoa Bridge selected. The first one was 2 miles up river and the second one was just a mile up river. Upon reaching the first point and meeting no resistance, Remer pressed on the the next drop point. Soon anti-aircraft gunfire opened up across the river valley but the successfully dropped their five Carolina Moon weapons in the river and flew all the way back to Da Nang on the deck, rarely exceeding 100 feet.

The following day reconnaissance photos showed the bridge still standing so that night, the second mission led by Major Case took off just over a hour after midnight from Da Nang. As with the previous night's mission with Major Remer, USAF F-4s conducted diversion strikes in the area and one of the pilots reported heavy anti-aircraft fire and large ground flash about 2 minutes before the drop zone for the weapons. Major Case's crew was never heard from again and it wasn't until well after the war ended into the present day that the crash site for the Hercules was finally identified with excavations under way.

It was later found that the special bombs did in fact detonate under the bridge as designed, but they simply lacked enough force to bring down the spans of the Thanh Hoa Bridge. It wasn't until 1972 during the Linebacker missions that F-4 Phantoms dropping brand-new laser-guided bombs (LGBs) managed to finally put the Dragon's Jaw out of commission.

Source: C-130 Hercules: Tactical Airlift Missions, 1956-1975 by Sam McGowan. Aero Publishers, 1988, p122-124.

Weather Reconnaissance Squadron FOUR (VW-4): The Navy's Atlantic Hurricane Hunters

Navy Weather Reconnaissance Squadron FOUR (VW-4), based out of NAS Jacksonville, Florida, for many years was responsible for the Navy's contribution to the hurricane hunting effort shared with the US Air Force and the Department of Commerce. For most of VW-4 history it flew the Lockheed WC-121N Warning Star, a veersion of the EC-121 airborne early warning version of the Lockheed Super Constellation. While not one WC-121N was ever lost on a hurricane hunter mission, by 1969 the Navy was looking at replacing the venerable old bird with a more advanced weather reconnaissance aircraft.

During the 1969 Atlantic hurricane season, Hurricane Inga formed near the Lesser Antilles and an unusual combination of weather factors had the hurricane wandering in two loops south of Bermuda (Inga would last 25 days, becoming the 4th longest lasting Atlantic hurricane in history). The Navy took the opportunity to perform a unique fly off of two candidate replacement aircraft along with the existing WC-121N Warning Star. They flew a Lockheed C-130 Hercules, a Lockheed P-3 Orion, and a Lockheed WC-121N Warning Star (Huh! All Lockheed products, too. Go figure.) in trail formation on repeated penetrations of the eyewall of Hurricane Inga. Fifteen miles separated each aircraft from the next aircraft in the formation as over twenty low-altitude penetrations were made into the eye. A multitude of factors were evaluated from propulsion systems, flying qualities and general handling in the severe turbulence of the eyewall as well as the structural integrity and payload capacity. The working environment was also taken into consideration considering the long flights that were a routine part of hurricane hunting.

Although both the C-130 and P-3 did well in the evaluation flights into Hurricane Inga, the Navy selected the P-3 Orion as the next Hurricane Hunter. Interestingly the USAF has been using the C-130 since 1960 for the hurricane hunting mission.

Existing P-3As were taken from the Navy maritime patrol fleet and stripped and reworked at Lockheed's Ontario, California, facility. All the ASW and sensor systems were removed and a weapons-bay mounted APS-20 radar was installed with a large M&M-shaped radome (and thus called the "M&M radome"), structural strengthening of the wings and a whole host of meteorological data-gathering sensors. The new WP-3As also had dual INS, Doppler and Omega navigation systems, one of the most extensive and advanced systems to be installed in an aircraft at the time. The interior layout remained essentially the same as that of the fleet P-3 Orions with the operator consoles reconfigured for weather research and data gathering.

The new WP-3A's first taskings with VW-4 were with Project Stormfury, a long running joint Department of Defense/Department of Commerce research project into cloud seeding of hurricane storm bands in an effort to attenuate the storm's intensity. Though the results were inconclusive, the idea of the military being involved with weather modification became a political hot potato with accusations by uninformed quarters of the "weaponization of weather". The WP-3As also participated in polar ice reconnaissance and winter storm studies on the US East Coast. In addition, the WP-3As were also deployed overseas to provide weather support and research for fleet operations.

In late 1974 as the result of post-Vietnam budget cuts, the Navy announced the closing down of VW-4 and its hurricane hunting mission which became official on 30 April 1975 and the WP-3As were pulled out of service and demodified for other roles. The military's contribution to hurricane hunting would be handled entirely by the USAF in cooperation with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Ironically, NOAA took delivery in 1976 of two even more highly-modified Lockheed P-3 Orions designated WP-3D which were even more advanced the Navy's WP-3As and still serve to this day.

Source: The Age of Orion: The Lockheed P-3 Story by David Reade. Schiffer Publishing, 1998, p119-122.

The Four Horsemen C-130 Demo Team

It was tough going if you were assigned to one of the USAF Tactical Air Command's Troop Carrier Squadrons (TCS) in the 1950s. In the hierarchy of the day, the pilots and crews of the airlift squadrons picked up the still-used sobriquet of "trash-haulers" and while the airmen in the bomber and fighter squadrons flew advanced aircraft that were often the cutting edge of technology and performance. The bomber crews of the Strategic Air Command won the lion's share of the USAF budget in the name of nuclear deterrence and the fighters of the Tactical Air Command were setting world records for speed and altitude and carrying the latest in missile and radar equipment.

But the troop carrier squadrons by and large were still flying piston radials in aircraft with technology not far removed from the aircraft of World War 2. Even the long-haul transport crews of MATS, the Military Air Transport Service, had it better than the guys who slogged around on intratheater missions in Douglas C-47 Dakotas and Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcars. The C-119 was so underpowered that its single engine performance was near-abysmal. Back then, the graduates of USAF flight training with the lowest scores went to the troop carrier squadrons.

That all changed when the Lockheed C-130 Hercules made its first flight in Burbank, California in 1954. The Hercules didn't have the sleekness and speed that its fellow Lockheed stablemates had, but it was tough, practical, and most importantly, powerful. The early model C-130s were hot ships. On the first flight of the Hercules prototype in August 1954, an aircraft with its weight would have usually needed at least 5,000 of runway to take off. The Herk prototype? It leapt off the ground in only 855 feet with the power of four Allison T56 turboprops. Spectators and invited guests were astounded that this portly aircraft had such performance. Lockheed chairman Robert Gross even exclaimed "Look at her climb!"

The first operational C-130As went to the 463rd Troop Carrier Wing at Ardmore AFB, Oklahoma. Pilot were ecstatic about flying a tough transport that handled like a fighter jet. There were even TAC fighter pilots who were transferring to the Hercules. Suddenly Herk pilots could walk into any officers' club with pride knowing that they had a "trash-hauler" that even the fighter jocks wanted to fly. It's pretty safe to say that the arrival of the C-130 Hercules was a massive morale boost for the troop carrier squadrons of the Tactical Air Command.

While the first operational C-130 units were with the 463rd TCW in Oklahoma, the Hercules training unit would be the 314th Troop Carrier Wing at Sewart AFB in Tennessee. There at Sewart would pilots, loadmasters and mechanics be trained on the Herk. While the 314th was still getting operational, flight crews from the 463rd TCW took their new mounts to bases all over the United States and participated in airborne exercises with the Army who were also excited about the arrival of the Hercules.

One of the units, the 774th Troop Carrier Squadron "Green Weasels" that was part of the 463rd TCW at Ardmore AFB happened to be at Fort Campbell, Kentucky for a week-long exercise with the 101st Airborne Division. One day the winds canceled a scheduled airborne drop, but four of the 774th TCS's C-130s were ready to go. So the flight crews took off anyway to make use of the time to get some formation flying practice in and spent several hours flying low over Kentucky and Tennessee honing their skills. On their return to the airfield at Fort Campbell, they made several low passes at high speed and in tight diamond formation. It donned on them- hey, why not form a demonstration team like the Thunderbirds to demonstrate the new Hercules everywhere?

Back at Ardmore AFB, they worked on their demonstration routine and suggested that they fly the routine for the personnel of the 314th TCW at Sewart AFB to show off the new planes that they'd be getting. TAC Headquarters approved the plan and the demonstration was a success. At first they called themselves the Thunderweasels, a combination of the Thunderbirds and the Green Weasels nickname of the squadron, but they settled on becoming "The Four Horsemen" after Knute Rockne's famous football offensive team at Notre Dame in 1924.

The Four Horsemen won official recognition from the USAF as an aerial demonstration team and from 1956 to 1960 they performed their routine of tight formation flying and sharp turns throughout the United States and even went overseas to Europe and the Far East. During one performance, the number three Hercules lost one of the outboard engines which had to be shut down. The crew feathered the prop and continued with the air show routine without a hitch!

HistoryNet has a good article that was published in Aviation History on the Four Horsemen I suggest for further reading.

Source: C-130 Hercules: Tactical Airlift Missions, 1956-1975 by Sam McGowan. Aero Publishers, 1988, p7-11.

It wasn't until summer of 1965 that the USAF's Air Rescue Service finally had a helicopter capable of sustained combat search and rescue operations in the expanding war in Vietnam. Previous helicopter rescue efforts relied on either the short-ranged Kaman HH-43 Husky or Air America's Sikorsky UH-34s, both of which weren't well-suited to the role demanded by the ARS. The transport version of the Sikorsky SH-3 Sea King, the CH-3C, had an aft loading ramp and boasted significantly better performance and load-carrying capability than anything else in-theater for CSAR. Due to their green and tan camouflage, the CH-3Cs got the nickname "Jolly Green Giant" which became their radio callsign, JOLLY GREEN.

But the Air Rescue Service wanted more out of the CH-3C despite the leap it presented. The USAF and Sikorsky developed a modified CH-3C version custom-tailored to combat search and rescue designated the HH-3E that had more powerful engines, titanium armor plating, gun mounts for M60s or GAU-2B Miniguns, and most importantly, more fuel. Not only did the HH-3E carry 200 more gallons of fuel over the CH-3C, but the landing gear sponsons were also plumbed to carry 200-gallon drop tanks. But the great technological and operational leap would be the ARS's desire to be able to refuel the HH-3E in midair.

No helicopter had been refueled in midair- the USAF had standardized on the Boeing flying boom which would have been impossible to use on a helicopter in addition to the speed mismatch between the KC-135 Stratotanker and the HH-3E. It was decided to use the Navy's probe and drogue method, but the slipstream of the tanker and rotor downwash made airborne refueling still tricky.

Sikorsky's engineers developed a telescoping refueling probe that when fully extended, put the tip of the probe just outside the rotor downwash. The USAF borrowed a US Marine Corps KC-130 Hercules for flight trials at Wright-Patterson AFB in Ohio. Pilots found that the boat-like hull of the HH-3E could in effect "float" on the Hercules' slipstream. Tests were completed in 1966 and Lockheed was contracted to convert 11 C-13oHs into HC-130 aerial tankers that also functioned as airborne controllers for any rescue operation. The first HC-130Ps arrived in SE Asia in November 1966 to join up with the HH-3Es already in theater since late 1965 (with the CH-3Cs being phased out by January 1966).

The Sikorsky HH-3E "Jolly Green Giant" would be the world's first helicopter equipped for aerial refueling, giving USAF combat search and rescue a quantum leap in capability at a time when the war effort in Vietnam was expanding daily.

Source: Wings of Fame, Volume 14. AIRtime Publishing, 1999, "'That others may live': USAF Search and Rescue, Part Two, 1958-1975 - The war in Southeast Asia" by Larry Davis, p22-25.

In 1965 seven US oil companies were prospecting Alaska's North Slope for oil and found that getting drilling equipment to the area was near impossible- there were no roads to the North Slope and the only way would have been to barge the equipment in via the Arctic Ocean but that could only take place for a few weeks each summer.

The problem was solved by Alaska Airlines who "wet-leased" the civilian Lockheed L-100 Hercules demonstrator from Lockheed for one month. In what became known as the "Thirty Day Miracle" the sole Hercules transported over 2 million pounds of equipment and cargo to dirt strips in the North Slope. Richfield Oil subsequently struck oil at Prudhoe Bay and that set off the great Alaskan oil rush.

Source: Herk: Hero of the Skies, by Joseph Earl Dabney, Copple House Books, 1979, p237-241.