Newspapers / Piedmont Aviation Employee Newsletter / Feb. 1, 1963, edition 1 / Page 4
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PAGE FOUR THE PIEDMONITOR FEBRUARY, 1963 StaAAM PoMe^kiqe^ A/lany Factors Make Flight Safe w 9 (Part two of a series by Robert spections. Nor, for that matter, the house at a Las Vegas The “airline of the stars” is a slogan already claimed by an other airline, but through the years Piedmont has had its share of celebrities too. From the back files is offered this photographic sampling of the many illustrious employees of show business who took a Pacemaker and liked it. n TV personality Jack Lescoulie poses with Agent J. W. Helms. The Brothers Four as they leave Lynchburg. Faye Emerson arrives to play a one-night stand. Queen of the Twist June Wilkerson. (Part two of a series by Serling, Aviation Editor, United Press International) ROUTINE is, perhaps, the best word to use in describing commercial aviation today. It is applicable to 99 percent of the 1,500,000 scheduled flights oper ating in the U. S. annually. How about the other 1 percent? They may be out of the routine for reasons ranging from minor me- c h a n i c a 1 difficulties to rare emergencies. And in the case of the latter, there is a vast buffer area between an emergency and an actual disaster—an area made up of such accident-pre venting factors as rigid, even ruthless pilot training, alternate mechanical and electronic sys tems to take over for compon ents that have malfunctioned, and myriad emergency devices that literally transform an emer gency into routine avoidance of trouble. An airline flight can be com pared to an iceberg, which has three-fourths of its body hidden from view. Likewise, what a traveler sees on a flight is only about 25 percent of what has gone into that flight. He comes into contact with the ticket agent, baggage handling, ramp personnel and—once on board— the cabin attendants. He does not see the weather planning, the pilot-dispatcher conferences, the pre-flight in- INT secretaries swoon over John Payne. Julian Morton grins at the Tobacco Queen. has he seen the experiments and tests that went into the design of the aircraft in which he is fly ing. Seldom is he aware of the vast human-electronic system that controls air traffic and keeps it separated safely. He as sumes his plane has been main tained carefully, but he would be surprised to know how care fully. Safety is predominant, primary and positive with the airlines. More people are directly con cerned with the safety of each flight than the number devoted to passenger service itself — which figuratively is only the top part of aviation’s iceberg. More money is spent to assure safety than on any other phase of airline operations—and safety is the one area in which there is no corner - cutting for econ omy’s sake. In 1961, for example, the U. S. scheduled airlines wound up with a net loss of $37,000,000. Yet this did not keep them from shelling out $60,000,000 just to train and flight check crews, nor spending $574,000,000 on maintenance and inspection of aircraft! THE MOST TELLING argu ment for the safety of modern air travel comes from a section of the American businses world that would look with a jaundiced suspicion on the odds in favor of gambling table—namely, the in surance companies. These coldly impersonal, fan tastically conservative firms, who once charged $1 for every $5,000 of flight insurance, now offer $10,000 protection for 25 cents. This is double the protec tion for one-fourth the price, or odds of 40,000 to one against a fatal mishap. Actually, the odds are even greater because the 25 cents includes such un derwriting costs as commissions, profits and airport rent. The ac tuaries of an insurance c o m- pany follow the laws of probabil ity as rigidly as the earth fol lows the law of gravity; they lit erally do not place bets on un known quantities or vague pos sibilities. Life insurance rates for air line pilots are the same as those for grocery clerks, bank tellers and all other citizens whose daily exposure to danger approx imates that of a chess player. This item assumes more signifi cance when it is realized that 30 years ago many insurance com panies refused to insure pilots, and those who did charged stiff premiums under their “hazard ous occupation” rules. This is why an airline pilot will tell you, in more serious ness than humor, “the most dan gerous part of my job is the ride to the airport.” Anjound ^Ue> Sifltem PROMOTIONS F. C. Livengood, Stk. Clrk. to Buyer, INT-A G. A. Ficke to Ld. Agt., CVG TRANSFERS G. D. Schuman, BAL to DCA W. C. Clark, DCA to INT NEW EMPLOYEES Phil White, Jr. Stk. Clrk, INT Raymond Sutcliffe, Jr. Stk. Clrk., INT R. W. Sutphin, Linecrew, CPA Betty Brannock, Jr. Gen. Clrk., INT-P David Cooper, Cleaner, CVG-F David Chalmers, Co-op Trainee, INT Nancy Mabe, Sec., re-employed, INT L. C. Wilson, Fit. Instr., re-em- ployed, ORF-FB Richard Iden, Oper. Agt., DCA G. W. Geyer, Oper. Agt., DCA David Morris, Oper. Agt., HTS T. B. Cecchini, Oper. Agt., DCA B. J. Thompson, Oper. Agt., FAY W. E. Foster, Jr. Mech., INT-FB B. D. Shelton, Jr. Stk. Clrk., INT BELOVED MATRON . , . (Continued from Page One) the Martin 404 taking its place. This particular Pacemaker has an especially proud history. It was bought from United Air lines, and was one of the origi nal Douglas airliners built to United’s specifications. In its day it was the fastest, most conven ient form of passenger travel, zooming across the U. S. con tinent in only 19 hours. Number 40V was flown by such aviation immortals as Jack Knight, the first pilot to fly air mail at Faithful Lady and mail night, Hamilton Leigh many other famous air pilots. At present it has spent 60,025 hours and 42 minutes in the air, a total of nearly seven years of continuous flying. The other re maining Piedmont Three, 56V, has a record of 47,688 hours and eight minutes, or nearly five and a half years of continuous fly ing. Renews Itself During that time these air planes have undergone several major overhauls, a maintenance procedure which involves strip ping the aircraft down to its bones and literally building it over again. By this process, re quired periodically for any type of aircraft, the DC-3 changes and renews itself like a living organ ism. That’s why experts estimate it is possible for the Three to continue flying indefinitely. Another reason the DC-3 con tinues to fly is that she’s so safe. With a large wing surface the Three is very stable at slow speeds, and unlike some of her more temperamental sisters, she has no eccentric flying charac teristics. Pilots love her because in addition to her stability, she is a “forgiving” airplane and if necessary can practically fly herself. War Stories There is a story that a few years ago a C-47, the Air Force equivalent of the DC-3, ran out of gas over Missouri farm coun try. The pilot and crew para chuted to safety as the engines failed. A few moments later the pilot-less plane landed gently in a field. The damage it suffered was to a wing as it hit a hay stack. Many stories came out of World War II illustrating the outstanding air worthiness of this airplane. One of the most amazing happened during an in strument flight of an Army C-47 A mid-air collision with another C-47 cut 18 feet off one wing as cleanly as if a surgeon had been at work. The pilot, Capt. Loyal Penn, flew the airplane with 18 feet of wing missing to the nearest air strip, brought her down, and landed as if it were just a routine flight. Piedmont came by some of its DC-3’s by rather unusual meth ods. For instance, number 54V made a unique arrival by water. The airplane was being used by the U. S. Coast Guard at Eliza beth City, N. C., as a ground training lab for mechanics. Pied mont bought the Three but due to security regulations was not allowed to visit the Coast Guard station and make enough repairs to get the plane airborne. There was nothing left to do but put it on a barge, ship it out to a little Manteo landing strip off the North Carolina coast, and work on it there. After putting on an engine, propellers, landing gear, wings, and control surfaces, the DC-3 sturdily climbed into the air and flew to Winston-Salem for more main tenance work. War Heroes Several of Piedmont’s Threes were veterans of World War II. Military versions of the airliner carried troops, delivered sup plies, and performed aviation feats which are still legends. Maintenance crews at Pied mont’s Winston-Salem base had to repair a number of bullet and shrapnel holes on these airplanes before proceeding to other work. One can imagine that these grizzled old warrior DC-3’s must have been more than a trifle startled when, after entering the maintenance hangar as wounded, dirty, he-men, they emerged to find themselves transformed in to clean, dainty “Peggy Pace maker.” The company described this change in “sex” by putting out a little booklet in the mid-1950’s titled, “How I Became a Lady, by Peggy Pacemaker.” In it the transition from Army work horse to Pacemaker was traced “I just knew they couldn’t make a lady out of me,” wrote “Peggy.” “We had always yelled and bellowed and I just didn’t think we could learn to speak softly and be quiet. And if we didn’t, we wouldn’t be wanted by anyone. Can you think of a more terrible fate than not being needed by anyone?” All Ladies Piedmont made ladies out of all the Threes it purchased, re gardless of their backgrounds. They were so well behaved that by 1958 a fleet of 21 were flying 4,726 hours a month, with an average during the working day of one take off and one landing every minute and a half. Though most flights were rou tine and therefore not very colorful, still there is that oc casional exception. Such was a chartered DC-3 flight to Lexing ton, Ky., a few years ago, when a Captain was surprised to find that he was not only flying an airplane but a very active court room as well. It seems a wealthy man had discovered that his sister and her husband had become dope addicts. After futile months of begging them to go to the fed eral hospital at Lexington, Ky. and try to be cured, he decided to take care of matters himself. LEX Charter He called Piedmont, chartered a DC-3 for Lexington, and in vited his sister and brother-in- law along. On board were a doc tor, three nurses, a sheriff, and a judge. By the end of the trip the couple was flying higher on mor phine than they were in the air plane. The moment the landing gear touched the Lexington run way, the judge convened court, issued his orders, and when the aircraft came to a halt the sher iff escorted the pair to the hos pital and, let us hope, a cure from their addiction. There are other stories told about the Three, some happy, some tragic, and some dealing with incredible recoveries by DC-3’s suffering mid-air mishaps which might have downed an air craft with less will to survive. They have ardent fans all over the world, with their comments ranging from an approving nod to lyrical praise. Perhaps the attitude of those who fly it, and the spirit of the aircraft itself, is best summed up by a Piedmont commuter who once said, “I would wrap my arms around this old gal and give her a big hug everytime I get on. I know she’s going to get me there and back with no fuss.” (Ed. note—Onr thanks to H. K. Saunders, L. H. Jackson, and Ralph Dampier for furnishing part of the information on which this article was based.)
Piedmont Aviation Employee Newsletter
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Feb. 1, 1963, edition 1
4
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