ISTAT Jetrader - Winter 2019 - 39

Less than three months later, on 18
March 1939, during a flight south
of Seattle, that first airplane for
Pan Am was being demonstrated to
representatives of TWA, KLM and
the Dutch Air Ministry. Doing sideslip tests at 11,000 feet, the aircraft
stalled, rolled over into a spin and
entered a steep dive. Then the wings
and horizontal tails were torn off by an
abrupt pull-out. All 10 occupants died in
the crash. More details of the accident
can be found in the public database of
the Flight Safety Foundation's Aviation
Safety Network.
A few days after the accident,
the American representative of KLM
said his company was "satisfied with
the extensive tests given the Boeing
Stratoliner before the accident" and still
planned to go ahead with its order, but
the deal was never consummated.
One of the lasting outcomes from
this accident was that vertical tail
surfaces of the remaining production
models of the Stratoliners were to be

enlarged to help avoid spins, or at least
to help recover from spins. Moreover,
B-17 bombers manufactured from
then onward were also fitted with the
larger vertical tail that became so
famous. Later on, Boeing B-29s and
Stratocruisers vertical tails had the
same signature silhouette.

Howard Hughes Butts
in at TWA
In July 1938, Howard Hughes had set a
new record by circling the world in the
shortest time (three days and 18 hours).
When he learned of Boeing's plans for
the Stratoliner and its speed and range
capability, he decided to buy one so he
could beat his own record. Boeing said
it would gladly build a Stratoliner for

Hughes, but only after the 10 orders for
Pan Am and TWA had been fulfilled.
But Hughes was in a hurry, so he
bought a controlling share of TWA stock
and then rewrote TWA's contract so the
first Stratoliner on order for TWA would
be bought by the Hughes Tool Company
for Hughes, and TWA would buy the
other five. Eventually, Hughes came to
own about 80% of TWA's stock, and
the name was changed to Trans World
Airlines in 1950.
To prepare the Hughes aircraft for
the round-the-world flight, the interior
was to be left in bare-bones condition,
and eight additional fuel tanks were
installed in the cabin. This aircraft was
already on the production line with the
original "small" tail like the one on the
ill-fated first production aircraft that

LEFT: The Stratoliner was the first cabinpressurized commercial airliner, allowing it
to fly above bumpy weather. Note that the
size of the vertical tail on this TWA aircraft
is enlarged.

RIGHT: Pan Am Stratoliner
Clipper Flying Cloud's main
wheels and tail wheel being
lowered for landing at Dulles
Airport on August 2003.

LEFT: Author's Google Earth
Street View picture captured
by the "Print Screen" feature.

Jetrader

Photo courtesy of Sunil Gupta via Wikimedia Commons.

An Inauspicious
Beginning

When Howard Hughes learned of Boeing's plans
for the Stratoliner and its speed and range capability, he
decided to buy one so he could beat his own record.

Photo courtesy of SDASM.

to be pressurized, allowing it to cruise
above the weather where the ride
would be smoother. The aircraft had
a crew of two pilots, a flight engineer
and two attendants, with seats for 33
passengers on daylight flights, or 25
passengers in a combination of berths
and sleeper seats for overnight flights.
The paper design work for the
Stratoliner had been essentially
completed by December 1935, but
actual production did not begin until
the first orders were placed in 1937.
Pan American Airways (Pan Am)
ordered six (later cut back to four), and
Transcontinental & Western Air (TWA)
ordered six with options for 17 more.
Royal Dutch Airlines (KLM) also planned
to order several.
The first to fly - on New Year's Eve,
1938 - was the first one planned to be
delivered to Pan Am after completing
flight testing and certification.

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ISTAT Jetrader - Winter 2019

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of ISTAT Jetrader - Winter 2019
