Editor’s Note: In September 2022, we presented “A Century of Carrier Aviation in the Pages of Proceedings.” Now, in celebrating our sesquicentennial year, we look at some of the works of Proceedings authors on the Navy’s other ventures in the skies, both heavier and lighter than air.
The exploits of early naval aviators such as Eugene Ely, the first pilot to land a plane on a ship, the USS Pennsylvania (ACR-4) in January 1911, are well known and have appeared often in the pages of Proceedings. Less well known are some of the tried and quickly discarded naval aviation innovations. For example, in the October 1938 Proceedings, in his article “Man-lifting Kites in the Navy,” Captain A. M. Charlton recounted his experience being lifted to more than 200 feet when Samuel Perkins tested a kite contraption on board the Pennsylvania not long after Ely’s ground-breaking feat:
Mr. Samuel Perkins came aboard in Tiburon, California. . . . The apparatus, as used, consisted of muslin kites with cedar frames. . . . First there were sent up 2 pilot kites, 9 feet by 9, each on a separate line about 500 feet long. . . . [They were attached] in such a way that they rose at a steep angle. The pilot kite lines were attached to a separate line of 1¼ -inch manila to which were attached 4 to 6 secondary kites, 6 feet by 6 feet. The secondary line was attached to the mainline of two-inch manila to which were attached the lifting kites, 9 feet by 9 and 5 to 10 in number...
The system was tried out first with a sandbag weighing 160 pounds. . . . A day or two later, the Pennsylvania got under way at 13 knots, and steamed directly into a gentle to moderate breeze. . . . Lieutenant John Rodgers was sent to an altitude of 400 feet. . . . When it was decided to hook on more kites, and, because I was lighter than Rodgers, try for a higher altitude, I was all for it.
But as I sat in the narrow bos’n’s chair with a life preserver on, binoculars hung around my neck, and a camera clutched to my chest, the kite string seemed a very flimsy thing to depend on. And as I felt myself going out and up over the stern of the ship, I didn’t feel so happy.
Needless to say, man-lifting kites were soon dismissed as the future of a young naval aviation community.
The Secretary of the Navy tasked Captain W. Irving Chambers with looking at possible roles for aviation in the Navy. In December 1912, Chambers wrote in “Aviation Today, and the Necessity for a National Aerodynamic Laboratory”:
The work of established aerodynamic laboratories has transported aeronautics generally into the domain of engineering, in consequence of which aviation has reached a stage of development wherein the methods of scientific engineers have replaced the crude efforts of pioneer inventors . . . The naval powers of the world are now devoting large sums of money to this phase of development.”
He offered his contemplated uses of “aeroplanes” in naval warfare:
A. They can be stowed, and used by all large ships [to]: reconnoiter an enemy’s port, or to search out his advanced bases, and to assist in the operations of a blockaded or blockading force; [to] locate and destroy submarine mines, submarines, and dirigibles, and assist in the operations of submarines and torpedo boats; damage an enemy’s docks; [and] provide means of rapid confidential communications.
B. They can . . . extend the “eyes of the fleet” in naval scouting.
C. They can be carried . . . on board any naval supply auxiliary . . . for scouting at advanced bases and for extensive use with expeditionary forces.
In 1914, 1915, and 1916, Proceedings had the pleasure of publishing its first articles by a Navy pilot—naval aviator number 14—Lieutenant (junior grade) R. C. Saufley: “Naval Aviation, Its Value and Needs,” “The Work Ahead of Naval Aviation,” “Seaplanes: Types Needed in the Navy,” and “Aeroplane Accidents: Causes and Remedies.” His overall premise was that aviation is a fact—let us get on with it. Saufley graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1908. Following Naval Aviation Camp, he was in the air. His articles captured his intense interest in advancing naval aviation and aviation technology, determining the aircraft required for Navy flight, and advocating for the important role of seaplanes. He crashed and died in 1916 on a flight attempting to better his own endurance record. Saufley Field at Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida, honors his memory.
U.S. Navy thinkers paid close attention to aviation developments among the great powers at the outbreak of World War I. An account of “The Development of Fleet Aviation During the World War,” was presented in the September 1938 Proceedings by Lieutenant Commander C. R. Brown. He wrote,
At the outbreak of the World War, the airplane was merely a trick machine. It gave more trouble than service. The engine was never ready at the moment required. It needed constant tinkering, adjustment, and repair. The airplane had a limited range and used labor and transport far beyond its value. By contrast, the airship, the Zeppelin in particular, had reached an advanced stage of development and, within its particular sphere, was a reliable weapon. This gave the German Navy a splendid air scout. . . . The British, who realized that through the airship the Germans had an effective naval air service, were strenuously engaged in remedying this condition. In fact, aside from their airship program, the Royal Naval Air Service was perhaps the most progressive aviation activity in the world at that date. They had developed fighting planes and armed them with machine guns—something military aviation was months in coming to on the Western Front.
. . . With the outbreak of war, many plans had to be modified or abandoned for new ones formed to meet conditions arising as the developing situations unfolded. England was haunted by the fear of invasion. The immediate concern of the British Naval Air Service, in co-operation with the [Royal] Navy, was the defense of the East Coast from attack, whether by sea or by air, and the safeguarding of the Channel for the passage of an expeditionary force to France. The Germans, obsessed by the belief that England would make an early attack on Heligoland Bight, supplemented their surface pickets with seaplane and airship patrols over that area. [Meanwhile,] Japan laid plans for using her airplanes in the siege of Tsingtao.
In May 1919, naval aviation took a leap forward when the Curtiss NC flying boat NC-4 crossed the Atlantic flying from New York State to Lisbon, Portugal, in 19 days, with several stops en route. That September, Proceedings carried a highly detailed, professional report, “Design and Construction of NC Flying Boats,” by Commander G. C. Westervelt, replete with photographs and technical drawings, describing the building of the new aircraft.
Mr. Curtiss returned to Washington with preliminary plans for two types of flying boats, embodying in their general characteristics the conclusions of the bureau—one, a five-motor, 1,700 horsepower machine and the other a three-motor, 1,000 horsepower machine. Both were biplanes, similar in design and differing only in size. . . . The hulls of these machines differed greatly from the conventional design. They were much shorter than the conventional boat hull, were shaped more like the pontoons of a seaplane, and with the intention that the tail surfaces instead of being supported by the hull would be carried by a system of outriggers in part from the upper wing beams, and in part from the stern of the hull.
Following World War I, airship design, experimentation, and application to warfare was a mainstream endeavor. In the October 1921 Proceedings, Lieutenant Commander Garland Fulton wrote in the first of his two-part article “Rigid Airships” (which included the following editor’s note: “This article was submitted before the unfortunate R-38 disaster. It contains, however, much information of current interest in regard to rigid airships.”):
The prospective acquirement of ZR-2 (ex-British R-38) [which crashed in England before delivery], and the construction in this country of ZR-1 mark the addition to the United States Navy of a new type of craft and make of current interest an outline of the characteristics of a modern rigid airship. . . . The first serious efforts to produce a rigid airship date to 1898 when Count Ferdinand Von Zeppelin, a cavalry general of Franco-Prussian War fame, and formerly Prussian military attaché in this country during the Civil War, employed two engineers, Kober and Kubler, to assist in the design and formed a company for the building of the new type of airship he had long contemplated . . . later officially known as “Zeppelins.” His early work was contemporary with that of Santos-Dumont with small airships of non-rigid and semi-rigid types. . . .
In the first years of the war a group of airships simultaneously patrolling the entrance to The Bight was sufficient to insure [sic] ample warning of enemy raids and to cause great annoyance to British submarines operating in the vicinity. . . . Airships were of outstanding importance to the operations of the [German] High Seas Fleet and were able to keep it fully informed.
The USS Shenandoah (ZR-1) first flew in 1923 and was destroyed by a storm two years later. In his 1924 Proceedings article, “Rigid Airships—United States Ship Shenandoah,” Lieutenant Commander H. T. Bartlett captured the U. S. Navy’s entry into the airship domain:
In 1917, the British, appreciating the value of rigid airships as fleet scouts, commenced building such ships, which construction culminated in the crossing of the Atlantic by the R-34 in the summer of 1919. Soon after this a wave of economy caused the British to close all airship stations and scatter the personnel. . . .
The Navy Department, therefore, through the Bureau of Aeronautics, after a careful estimate of the situation, enlarged its program of research and decided to push the design and construction of the Shenandoah, our first rigid airship. The great shed at Lakehurst was completed with docking rails of the German system, while a mooring mast of Scott’s design was constructed for use in bad weather. . . .
The Shenandoah is filled with helium, which is one of the reasons we hope for success from our Navy rigids. Helium is found in certain of the natural gases occurring in a belt which extends from Texas north-eastward through Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska. . . . Next to hydrogen, helium is the lightest known substance. . . . We must be very jealous of this gas, as its supply is evidently very limited, and once it has escaped into the atmosphere it is gone forever.
Advances continued across naval aviation, with the Naval Aircraft Factory in Philadelphia providing major support and development. In January 1926, Lieutenant Commander S. J. Zeigler wrote in “The Naval Aircraft Factory”:
The reason for the establishment of the Naval Aircraft Factory was the problem of aircraft supply, which faced the Navy Department upon entry of the United States into the World War. The requirements of the Army for aeronautical material were so much greater than the Navy’s that private manufacturers could only with great difficulty be persuaded to handle the Navy’s business. . . .
Ground was broken August 10, 1917. . . . [Sixty-seven] days later the first machine tool was in operation . . . on March 27, 1918, . . . 151 days after receipt of drawings, the first plane was given its successful test flight; and on April 2, 1918, the first two planes left the factory packed for shipment to England.
In 1924, as part of war reparations, the Navy acquired a German zeppelin and commissioned her as the 659-foot rigid airship USS Los Angeles (ZR-3). In 1929, Rear Admiral William Moffett, Chief of the Bureau of Aeronautics, sent for Lieutenant Ralph Barnaby, an early Navy gliding expert. As Barnaby recounted in his Naval Institute oral history, Moffett thought gliders could be put to practical use. Moffett asked Barnaby, “Do you think it would be possible to launch a glider from the Los Angeles?” Moffett told him to think it over, “because if your answer is yes, you’re going to do it.” Barnaby told him his answer was yes, if he could have the glider he had used in his soaring flights on Cape Cod.
Six months later, in freezing January 1930 air, Barnaby and his glider dropped from the airship at 3,000 feet over Atlantic City, New Jersey. The mission was a success.
The large airships carried a landing officer in case a landing had to be made at a place other than a Navy lighter-than-air base. When the airship was over the site selected, the landing officer would parachute down to organize those from the local fire and police departments as a landing crew. Why not have the landing officer glide down instead?
In his oral history, Rear Admiral Harold “Min” Miller looked back to 12 February 1935 when he was senior aviator in a heavier-than-air unit. He and his aviators flew trapeze-rigged F9C Sparrowhawk biplanes, taking off aloft and then hooking back to the belly of the 785-foot USS Macon (ZRS-5), one of the Navy’s last two rigid airships. A fleet exercise was underway in the Pacific off the coast of California, and Miller’s airplanes were flying forward and scouting over-the-horizon notional enemy units. On the second day, Miller and his three fellow pilots, having found the last of the enemy fleet’s cruisers, came back on board the Macon.
I reported to the officer of the deck that there was quite a tough weather front up ahead. We kept going north, and suddenly the ship just went through some maneuvers. The nose kicked up and pulled over to the right, and it went up and it went down, on and on and on.
I was in the control car. The word came back that the ship was breaking up aft, that some of the girders had carried away. . . . As one ring would collapse, the broken aluminum parts would make holes in the next bag,
and we would lose all that lift. . . .
It was obvious the crew wasn’t going to save the ship. At about 500 feet, we could begin to see the water and realize we were coming down. We landed in a horizonal position. Those with any sense lowered themselves into life rafts, and some didn’t even get wet.
Then the ship assumed a slow upward movement to a vertical position. Those of us still aboard were all up around the nose cone. There was a whoosh of some currents of air or gases coming from the ship. I had always heard that helium can make your vocal cords inactive. I practically lost my voice at that time. . . . We started letting go of the lines and sliding into the water. She finally, sort of like an old dog, lay down. Away she went and disappeared.
By the 1930s, the scientific effort to advance aviation in general was engaged at a breakneck pace. “It is impossible to overestimate the importance of research for naval aviation,” Chief of the Bureau of Aeronautics Rear Admiral A. B. Cook wrote in his October 1936 Proceedings article, “Naval Aviation.”
Chemical and metallurgical laboratories develop new alloys of greater strength and less weight, of improved resistance to corrosion, with special properties for ease in manufacture. Testing laboratories develop new structural combinations that give more efficient use of materials. Wind tunnels develop new wing sections and new methods of reducing drag and increasing lift. Model basins develop improved floats and hulls. Engine laboratories develop new engines of greater power and lower fuel consumption with improved reliability. Many other laboratories work on details such as radios, instruments, ordnance, fuels, oil, protective finishes, and safety devices. . . .
Adequate shore bases with sheltered operating waters or suitable tenders are necessary for the operation of patrol planes. The Navy is responsible for protecting our commerce in our sea lanes and for giving timely warning of enemy forces approaching our coast. The only practical means of accomplishing these important naval functions is an adequate combined force of surface vessels and patrol planes.
Writers favoring both lighter-than-air and heavier-than-air naval aviation continued to press their cases. In answering “Why Should the United States Have Airships?” from the June 1937 Proceedings, Lieutenant Commander F. H. Gilmer reviewed the successes of German and British airships in the World War—scouting, patrolling, mine and submarine detection, and convoy duties. He spelled out the differences between rigid airships—with their metal frameworks and gas bags within—and the nonrigid ships with no frameworks, their shapes and forms determined by the gas within their gastight outer skins. “The airship is the detection instrument par excellence. The spy basket which permits the airship to hide above a cloud bank without sacrificing its power of observation serves the same purpose as does the periscope for the submarine.” Nevertheless, when he wrote these words, the United States had only 11 airships in its military aviation inventory.
The research and industry that Rear Admiral Cook described were producing a far more capable, far bigger generation of seaplanes and patrol planes, aircraft such as the Martin Mariner PBM-3 flying boats with protective armament, protecting sea lanes and hunting submarines when war came in 1941. Future Chief of Naval Operations and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Thomas Moorer was flying PBY Catalina seaplanes in Pacific operations in 1942 when he was shot down by Japanese fighters and had to crash land in the ocean, where a merchant ship rescued him and his crew. Following other missions as patrol plane commander, he would be awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for his extraordinary achievement and heroic conduct delivering supplies to a beleaguered garrison at the island of Timor and evacuating wounded men.
Meanwhile, some early efforts to take aviation into the jet age took place right next to the Naval Academy. In September 1964, renowned U.S. rocket engineer Captain R. C. Truax recalled in “Rocket Development”:
During World War II, the city of Annapolis somewhat reluctantly became the cradle of American rocketry. The days, and sometimes the nights, were interrupted by stabbing flames and thunderous roars issuing from concrete emplacements across the Severn River at the Engineering Experiment Station. Wartime secrecy requirements made it impossible at the time to explain the rather mysterious and irritating goings-on. Early in 1943, however, a PBY airplane took off from the Severn River with these same flames issuing from cylindrical objects suspended beneath either wing. It then became obvious to one and all, and in particular the patrons of the Chesapeake Bay ferries which used to ply in and out of Annapolis, that the Navy was developing rockets to assist the take-off of heavily loaded seaplanes.
Jet-assisted take-off units were joining the ever-more-capable seaplanes in the war.
Early in World War II, the Nazi U-boat threat along the U.S. eastern seaboard galvanized renewed support for airships, in this case as a method to spot the boats and attack them with depth charges. In his October 1943 Proceedings article, “Blimps Blast Subs,” R. G. Picinich Jr. wrote:
Naval officials were hard put to cope with the onslaught of the submarines, for since the start of their offensive, the Nazis have often maintained over a hundred U-boats in American waters. . . . The few blimps available were invaluable in their aid to naval vessels and heavier-than-aircraft. . . . The work of airships in helping to curb the submarine attacks . . . was so impressive that a bill was presented to Congress, and passed, authorizing the construction of 48 of the lighter-than-air craft. Even before these ships were all delivered, their performance exceeded previous expectations. Congress was again called on, and in June 1942, a bill was passed empowering the Navy to construct 200 airships.
Ultimately, 168 airships were built.
The Lockheed P2V Neptune came into the Navy in 1947—a big aircraft at 92 feet long with a 103-foot wingspan. The age of nuclear weapons had dawned. There had been initial thoughts about using the aircraft as bombers from aircraft carriers. Two launched from the USS Coral Sea (CV-43) in 1948, but no carrier landings were ever made. Patrolling from shore would be the P2V’s life.
Future Rear Admiral Oakley Osborn was a Patrol Squadron (VP) 17 pilot and commander flying P2V Cold War missions out of Alaska over the North Pacific in the late 1950s. As he recalled in his Naval Institute oral history:
On board there was a pilot commander, copilot, two navigators, radio operator, electronic countermeasures operator, ordnanceman, plane captain, and second plane captain. The aircraft had two reciprocating engines and two jet engines. The jets were used to gain additional thrust for takeoff and also for high-speed, low altitude mining runs. If you ever lost a reciprocating engine in flight you could use one of the jets to assist. However, the jets were very inefficient on fuel consumption.
We were primarily conducting Soviet ship surveillance, low-altitude passes on merchantmen looking for military cargo. We also observed Soviet fleet operations and recorded ECM data, keeping 30 miles off the Soviet coastline. Some patrol planes were shot down. We were intercepted by Soviet aircraft three or four times during one deployment. Two MiGs would make the intercept. One would remain high and behind, while the other made a close pass. The year before, a patrol plane had been shot down in the Sea of Japan.
In his handsomely illustrated 18-page Proceedings article in the October 1961 issue, “Goodbye to the Gas Bags,” Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Robert H. Rankin reported, “Nearly half a century of lighter-than-air flying is ending.” Blimps would be deflated, preserved, and placed in war reserve storage. The last Navy airship organizations, Airship Patrol Squadrons One and Three and Fleet Airship Wing One, were scheduled for decommissioning on 31 October 1961.
Rankin traced the Navy’s rigid and nonrigid airships from 1915 on, evolutions in design, wartime uses, successes, and failures. “With the advent of World War II, non-rigids came into their own. During the war, dirigibles escorted 89,000 surface craft in 55,000 operational flights. Not a single airship-escorted vessel was lost to enemy submarines. Significantly, only one airship was lost in action and then only after its bomb release failed to operate, leaving it helpless over a surfaced submarine.”
A new mission emerged for the versatile P2V Neptunes. As the Navy expanded its annual Antarctic operations in the mid-1950s, Air Development Squadron (VX) 6 provided the aircraft. Over the next four years, while generating air support for the scientists, it photomapped thousands of square miles of the continent. Navy Chief Journalist Scot MacDonald recounted the long history of Antarctic exploration and mapping, including VX-6’s mission, in his November 1961 article, “Charting of an Unknown Land: The Antarctic Continent.” MacDonald wrote, “During its first season on the ice, the squadron used two R5D Skymasters and two ski-equipped P2V Neptunes. . . . The squadron normally uses ski-equipped P2V-7 Neptunes almost exclusively, though it has used an R7V Super Constellation and plans on flying a photo-configured ski C-130BL Hercules when it becomes available.”
The early flights in what was known as Operation Deep Freeze in 1956 were not successful, and even tragic in the case of the second flight. But, by 1957, the Navy had proved it could land aircraft on the ice, and VX-6 began allowing detachments to winter over at McMurdo, Little America V, and Ellsworth Stations.
In another photo-rich article, “P-2 and P-3 on Patrol (Pictorial),” in the November 1965 Proceedings, Navy Captain S. Dombroff captured the ending of the Neptune era:
The two major aircraft of the Navy’s land-based patrol squadrons are the venerable SP-2 Neptune and its ultimate successor the P-3A Orion. Over its life span, seven major versions of the Neptune have been produced. . . .
By 1958, a new aircraft was needed. . . . The answer is the P-3A Orion. This splendid aircraft, introduced into the fleet in August 1962, is a strengthened and modified version of the commercial Lockheed Electra. Powered by four turboprop engines, the P-3A has a top speed of over 400 knots but can “loiter” for long periods at speeds under 200 knots, permitting high-speed transit to submarine datum areas, with long on-station time.
In their August 1991 Proceedings article about Operation Desert Storm, “If It Was There, P-3s Found It,” Navy Commander Richard Brooks and Lieutenant Commanders Skip Hiser and T. K. Hohl looked at the remarkable work of upgrading the P-3 Orion from the early 1960s:
As the Soviet Union introduced quiet, more technically advanced nuclear-powered and diesel submarines, the P-3 went through a number of acoustic package enhancements to ensure that the Navy’s capability was more than equal to the threat. . . .Operation Desert Storm showed the P-3 to be even more useful and versatile. . . .
Within hours of the initiation of Operation Desert Shield, patrol aircraft commenced surveillance support of interdiction efforts on all sides of the Arabian Peninsula. . . . These detachments provided four or five missions per day that queried all merchant ships plying routes to Iraqi or Jordanian ports as well as activity in the vicinity of the Gulf of Oman. . . . The mobility and long range of the P-3s were complemented by U.S. Navy and allied helicopter missions, British Nimrods, and U.S. Navy Vikings. . . . The P-3 was the workhorse, logging in excess of 4,400 flight hours and querying more than 6,500 vessels during Operation Desert Shield. . . .
As Desert Storm commenced, the value of the more sophisticated patrol radar became immediately apparent. . . . The height of our support efforts was January 30 when we detected numerous Iraqi vessels, including patrol boats, minesweepers, and various support craft in the vicinity of Bubiyan Island and Kuwait Harbor. The subsequent wholesale defeat of the Iraqi naval force, commonly referred to as the “Bubiyan Turkey Shoot,” was the inevitable result.
In the second decade of the 21st century, another heavier-than-air page would be turned. “The planned deployment of the six P-8A Poseidons of Patrol Squadron 16 War Eagles in December heralds a return to broad-area ASW search missions,” wrote Lieutenant Commander Guy Snodgrass in his 2013 Proceedings article, “Naval Aviation’s Transition Starts with Why.”
The P-8A, with its efficient turbofan engines, nascent high-altitude payload capabilities, and forthcoming sonobuoy sensors (dubbed “Multi-state Active Coherent”) will greatly increase the ASW acoustic-search capability of a single aircraft over the outgoing P-3C Orion. . . .
The P-8A will rapidly meet or exceed P-3C capabilities over the next few years. It can transit faster, remain on station longer, and process more information, all while carrying more stores than the P-3C it is replacing. Moreover, the P-8A is also capable of remaining at high altitude during ASW operations, increasing its effective search area and improving its ability to employ non-acoustic sensors while reducing airframe fatigue. As a highly modular platform, the Poseidon will remain relevant throughout its service life by incorporating lower-cost payloads to adapt to changes in mission or environment.
The Navy’s adoption of rotary-wing aircraft that began in the 1940s and accelerated after the Korean War made clear that the helicopter would play a vital role in the future of naval warfare. In his November 1951 article, “The Helicopter in Combat,” Lieutenant Edward L. Barker explains this critical transition period of experimentation and adoption:
Appreciation of the helicopter’s military value, however, came as no surprise to those working with it. In the Navy alone, the helicopter’s tactical capabilities as a transport, a courier agent, and a plane guard during pre-Korean carrier operations had been demonstrated on numerous occasions. Experiments aboard the carrier Franklin D. Roosevelt [CV-42] during aircraft operations in the spring of 1947 proved that helicopters were far superior to “planeguard” destroyers in the rescue of downed airmen in the vicinity of the carrier. . . .
In replacing the destroyer for planeguard duties, the capable helicopter has done a much better job at less expense. It has provided yeoman service in this stand-by role which has resulted in the destroyer being released for other important jobs. There are pages of helicopter rescues to be found in the carriers’ war diaries with new accounts being added daily.
Since the early days of aviation, Proceedings has captured the Navy’s experimentation and development of all types of winged, nonwinged, and rotary-winged aircraft, both those heavier and lighter than air.