Touchdown!

where other transportation cannot go and other aircraft of its class dare not land the Lockheed c-130 Hercules operates with sure footed ease the sturdy transport scoreboard is studded with hundreds of successes airlifting hefty payloads into and out of fields that could bog down a truck now the Husky Hercules has done its job in some of the worst conditions the elements can devise runway is that couldn't have been smoother to feels that couldn't have been rougher the airplanes performance hinted at things to come routine operation from primitive air strips in every quarter of the globe top trials on softer confirmed the aircraft's built-in ability to take punishment seasoned veteran of combat deployments disaster relief and economic development activities in the tropics and scientific and military resupply missions to both poles the hercules has been equal to the task thanks to United States airforce c-130s which flew in tools to build roads underdeveloped Eastern Peru is on the threshold of economic expansion reverse thrust and braking were used a good advantage on the jungle air strips the heavy machinery is helping Peru tap the riches of this lush Valley in searing tropical summer heat the hercules airlifted a total of 260 tons of cargo to the backcountry roadsides the earth Gilley's flew back and forth over the Andes to complete the airlift in less than five days flying time in 1959 in response to a call from the Navy the United States Air Force dispatched heavily laden ski Quintin c-130s across thousands of miles of desolate ocean and ice-covered land to resupply scientific outposts on the vast Antarctic continent the Navy later procured a number of ski equipped Hercules of its own from that year when the Air Force aircraft proved they thrive on cold and high altitudes c-130s have made logistics records at the South Pole temperatures on the windswept plateau sometimes sink to as low as 60 below and some of the runways are at 10,000 feet elevation already proved to be at home on rough fields of all kinds the c-130 was put through its paces to determine what kind of stole short takeoff and landing performance could be expected with pilot technique and configuration changes three different aircraft took part in a joint army air force demonstration that falcon field Fort Bragg North Carolina first to land on the unsurfaced strip was an experimental testbed c-130b with blowing type boundary layer control at it the production version of the airplane can be expected to have substantially improved performance over this one-of-a-kind testbed then ac-130 be modified with higher ratio gearboxes and 14 degrees of additional flap deflection was demonstrated the Air Force pilot starts the flaps down the moment the aircraft starts to roll short brown roll after touchdown is demonstrated by the modified Hercules the modified c-130 has another go at the unsurfaced strip third aircraft to take on the unpaved his trip was a standard production c-130b straight out of the Tactical Air Command inventory the aircraft was operated by a combat crew for whom a 50-foot obstacle would have been no problem the standard B model Hercules displays a high rate of sink than minimum Flair for a short ground roll maximum cargo weights were 24,000 pounds and temperatures reached in 90 degrees during the assault aircraft demonstrations wherever war clouds have gathered lockheed c-130 hercules transports have brushed in the men and material to keep the peace United States Air Force c-130 s provided an air bridge to Lebanon when the Middle East was threatened air lifted tubes and equipment to Formosan to thwart communist aggressive threats I read war materiel to India when Communist China crossed its border and blew military aid to Vietnam to help stem the red tide in Southeast Asia in over 800,000 operational hours the Huskie lockheed c-130 hercules has made over 280,000 landings and takeoffs from strips of every description an assault transport that gets in and gets out of some of the most treacherous and isolated spots on the face of the earth