On this day in aviation history: In 1954 some bad juju takes to the air. A mere 60 years ago today at Edwards Air Force Base in the high desert of southern California, McDonnell Aircraft Corporation test pilot Robert C. Little made the first flight of the F-101A Voodoo. During the flight the new interceptor reached 0.9 Mach at 35,000 feet. Pilot Robert C. Little flew P-51 Mustangs during World War II. He joined McDonnell Aircraft Corporation as a test pilot in 1948 where he flew the FH Phantom, and made the first flights of the F3H Demon, the F-101A Voodoo and the F-101B. He was next assigned as McDonnell’s chief test pilot and base manager at Edwards Air Force Base. He then made the first flight of the YF4H-1 Phantom II and conducted the early company tests of the airplane, going on to become the F4H program manager. Outside the cockpit, Little rose through the company’s ranks and after the merger with Douglas, became a corporate vice president, overseeing the operations of McDonnell-Douglas at St. Louis and McDonnell-Douglas Helicopters at Mesa, Arizona. The F-101A was an improvement of the earlier McDonnell XF-88 Voodoo. All 101s were production aircraft. There were no prototypes. The F-101A Voodoo was a single-seat twin engine supersonic interceptor. It was 67 feet long with a wingspan of 39 feet. Power was supplied by two Pratt and Whitney J57-P-13 turbojet engines, producing 10,200 pounds of thrust each, or 15,000 pounds each with afterburner. The F-101A had a maximum speed of 1,009 miles per hour at 35,000 feet. The Voodoo was armed with four 20mm M39 cannons with 200 rounds of ammunition per gun. The test flown by Little was transferred to General Electric for testing the J79 afterburning turbojet engine which would later power the McDonnell F-4 Phantom II. General Electric returned the Voodoo to the Air Force in 1959. Now obsolete, it was used as a maintenance trainer at Shepard Air Force Base, Texas. It was then given to a civilian aviation maintenance school and assigned a civil registration number by the Federal Aviation Administration. The airplane was sold as scrap, but was purchased by Mr. Dennis Kelsey. In 2009, Mrs. Kelsey had the airplane placed in the care of the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum, McMinnville, Oregon. After being partially restored by Evergreen Air Center, Marana, Arizona, it was placed on display at the Evergreen Museum.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Sep 2014 21:30:05 +0000