Flying boat

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Flying boat
Short S23 'C' Class or 'Empire' Flying Boat

A flying boat is a specialised form of aircraft that is designed to take off and land on water. The fuselage is also a floating hull and has a shape reminiscent of a boat. Such aircraft are sometimes stabilised on the water surface by underwing floats or by wing-like projections from the fuselage, but these do not provide the main buoyancy of the aircraft.

Flying boats are a type of seaplane that always float on their fuselage (or hull), other seaplanes are floatplanes which use floats. Flying boats were some of the largest aircraft of the first half of the 20th century. Their ability to alight on water allowed them to break free of the size constraints imposed by general lack of large, land-based runways, and also made them important for maritime patrol and air-to-sea rescue, capabilities put to great use in World War II. Following World War II, their use gradually tailed off, with many of the roles taken over by land aircraft types.

In the 21st century, flying boats maintain a few niche uses, such as for dropping water on forest fires and for air transport around archipelagos.


Contents

[edit] History

[edit] Origins

Curtiss NC Flying Boat "NC-3" water-taxis before takeoff, 1919.
Curtiss NC Flying Boat "NC-3" water-taxis before takeoff, 1919.

In 1913, the boat building firm J Samuel White of West Cowes on the Isle of Wight, set up a new aircraft division and produced a flying boat. This was displayed at the London Air Show at Olympia in 1913[1]. In that same year, a collaboration between the S.E. Saunders boatyard of East Cowes on the Isle of Wight and the Sopwith Aviation Company produced their "Bat Boat", an aircraft with a consuta laminated hull that could operate from land or on water [2]. The "Bat Boat" completed several landings on sea and on land and was duly awarded the Mortimer Singer Prize[3]. It was the first all-British aeroplane capable of making six return flights over five miles within five hours.

Before World War I the American pioneer aviator Glenn Curtiss, who had been experimenting with floatplanes, joined with Englishman John Cyril Porte to design a flying boat that could take the prize offered by the British Daily Mail newspaper for the first aerial crossing of the Atlantic ocean.[4] Porte developed a practical hull design with the distinctive 'step' which could be married to Curtis' airframe and engine design. The resulting large aircraft would be able to carry enough fuel to fly long distances and could berth alongside ships for refuelling. The war interrupted Porte's plans.

[edit] World War I

From 1914 Curtis produced his "America" flying boat, several examples of which were acquired by the Royal Naval Air Service and tested at their Seaplane Experimental Station, now run by Porte. Porte developed this model into the Felixstowe F.1 and its larger derivatives, used for coastal patrols and hunting U-boats.

The Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company independently developed its designs into the small model 'F', the larger model 'K' which was licensed to Dmitry Pavlovich Grigorovich as the Shchetinin M-5 for the Imperial Russian Navy, and the Model 'C' for the US Navy. Curtiss among others also built the Felixstowe F5L, the last of Porte's designs for US use.

[edit] Between the wars

The Curtis NC-4 became the first airplane to fly across the Atlantic Ocean in 1919. In the 1920s and 1930s, flying boats made it possible to have regular air transport between the U.S. and Europe, opening up new air travel routes to South America, Africa, and Asia. Foynes, Ireland and Botwood, Newfoundland and Labrador were the termini for many early transatlantic flights. Where land-based aircraft lacked the range to travel great distances and required airfields to land, flying boats could stop at small island, river, lake or coastal stations to refuel and resupply. The Pan Am Boeing 314 "Clipper" planes brought exotic destinations like the Far East within reach of air travellers and came to represent the romance of flight.

In 1923, the first British commercial flying boat service was introduced with flights to and from the Channel Islands. The British aviation industry was experiencing rapid growth. The Government decided that rationalisation was necessary and ordered five aviation companies to merge and form state-owned Imperial Airways. Imperial became the international flag-carrying British airline, providing flying boat passenger and mail transport links between Britain and South Africa using aircraft such as the Short S.8 Calcutta.

Supermarine Southampton
Supermarine Southampton

In 1928, a new world achievement in aviation attracted the attention of the Australian public when four Supermarine Southampton flying boats of the RAF Far-East flight arrived in Melbourne on a circumnavigation and flag-waving mission. The RAF crews were warmly welcomed by the waterside crowds, and the flight was considered proof that flying boats had evolved to become reliable means of long distance transport.

Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services, better known as Qantas, had been registered in Brisbane during November of 1920. With good levels of public support for the new faster public transport and agreements to carry domestic mail, the outback airline grew. By 1931, Qantas was trialling land plane flights connecting with Imperial Airways services. Mail was now reaching London in just 16 days - less than half the time taken by sea.

Government tenders on both sides of the world invited applications to run new passenger and mail services between the ends of Empire, and Qantas and Imperial were successful with a joint bid. A company under combined ownership was then formed, Qantas Empire Airways. The new ten day service between Sydney's Rose Bay and Southampton was such a success with letter-writers that before long the volume of mail was exceeding aircraft storage space. A solution to the problem was found by the British Government, who in 1933 had requested aviation manufacturer's Short Brothers to design a big new long-range monoplane for use by Imperial and the RAF. Partner Qantas agreed to the initiative and undertook to purchase six of the new Short S23 'C' class or 'Empire' flying boats.

Delivering the mail as quickly as possible generated a lot of competition and some innovative solutions. A variant of the Short Empire flying boats, Maia and Mercury, was a strange-looking solution where a four-engined floatplane Mercury was fixed on top of Maia, a Short Empire flying boat[5]. The idea was to use the lighter, faster and shorter-range Mercury (the winged messenger) to speed up the delivery of the mail once Maia had brought it to within range of its destination.

Sir Alan Cobham devised a method of in-flight refuelling in the 1930s, so that the Short Empire flying boats serving the transatlantic crossing could be refuelled over Foynes on the River Shannon in Ireland without needing to land[6]. A Handley Page H.P.54 Harrow was used as the fuel tanker[7].

Dornier Do-X flyby over a seaport town in the Baltic 1930
Dornier Do-X flyby over a seaport town in the Baltic 1930

The German Dornier Do-X flying boat was noticeably different to its UK and US built counterparts, using wing-like protusions from the fuselage to stabilise on the water. It was powered by 12 engines and could take to the air with 170 people on board[8]. It flew to America in 1929 [9], crossing the atlantic via an indirect route. It was the largest flying boat of its time. Only three were built. Two were sold to Italy.

[edit] World War II

The military value of flying boats was quickly recognized, and they were utilized by various nations in tasks from anti-submarine patrol to maritime search and rescue. Aircraft such as the PBY Catalina, Short Sunderland and Grumman Goose recovered downed airmen and operated as scout aircraft over the vast distances of the Pacific Theater and Battle of the Atlantic during World War II. By the end of World War II, nearly 350 Gooses (they are never referred to as Geese) had been built. They helped the U.S. military and their allies with reliable transportation to remote locations all over the world.

The largest flying boat of the war was the Blohm und Voss Bv 238 which was also the heaviest plane to fly during the Second World War.

In November 1939, the structure of Imperial Airways was changed to create British European Airways and British Overseas Airways Corporation. BOAC continued to operate flying boat services from the (slightly) safer confines of Poole Harbour during wartime, returning to Southampton in 1947[10].

[edit] Post World War II

Hughes H-4 Hercules.
Hughes H-4 Hercules.

The Hughes H-4 Hercules in development in the U.S. during the war was even larger than the Bv238, but it did not fly until 1947. The "Spruce Goose", as the H-4 was nicknamed, was the largest flying boat ever to fly. That short 1947 hop of the 'Flying Lumberyard' was to be its last however, a victim of post-war cutbacks and the disappearance of its intended mission as a transatlantic transport.[11]

Following the end of World War II, the use of flying boats rapidly declined, though the U.S. Navy continued to operate such aircraft (notably the Martin P5M Marlin) until the early 1970s, even attempting to build a jet-powered seaplane bomber, the Martin Seamaster. Several factors contributed to the decline. The ability to land on water became less of an advantage owing to the considerable increase in the number and length of land based runways, whose construction had been driven by the needs of the allied forces during the Second World War. Further, as the speed and range of land-based aircraft increased, the commercial competitiveness of flying boats diminished, as their design compromised aerodynamic efficiency and speed to accomplish the feat of waterborne takeoff and alighting. Competing with new civilian jet aircraft like the de Havilland Comet and Boeing 707 was impossible.

BOAC continued to operate their flying boat services out of Southampton until November 1950.

Aquila Airways Short S.45 Solent flying boat 'Sydney' taking off from Funchal.
Aquila Airways Short S.45 Solent flying boat 'Sydney' taking off from Funchal.

Bucking the trend, in 1948, Aquila Airways was founded to serve destinations that were still inaccessible to land based aircraft[12]. This company operated Short S.25 and Short S.45 flying boats out of Southampton on routes to Madeira, Las Palmas, Lisbon, Jersey, Majorca, Marseilles, Capri, Genoa, Montreux and Santa Margherita[13]. The airline ceased operations on 30th September 1958 [14].

From 1950 to 1957, Aquila Airways also operated a service from Southampton to Edinburgh and Glasgow[15].

The flying boats of Aquila Airways were also chartered for one-off trips, usually to deploy troops where scheduled services didn't exist or where there were political considerations. Three Aquila flying boats were used during the Berlin Airlift[16]. The longest charter, in 1952, was from Southampton to the Falkland Islands[17]. In 1953 the flying boats were chartered for troop deployment trips to Freetown and Lagos and there was a special trip from Hull to Helsinki to relocate a ships crew[18].

Saunders-Roe Princess G-ALUN
Saunders-Roe Princess G-ALUN

The technically advanced Saunders-Roe Princess first flew in 1952 and later received a certificate of airworthiness. Despite being the pinnacle of flying boat development, none were sold, despite Aquila Airways reportedly attempting to buy them[19]. Of the three Princess that were built, two never flew and all were scrapped in 1967

Helicopters ultimately took over the flying boat air-sea rescue role.

The land-based P-3 Orion and carrier-based S-3 Viking became the US Navy's fixed-wing anti-submarine patrol aircraft.

Qantas flew a flying boat service from Rose Bay NSW to Lord Howe Island until 1974.

[edit] Modern versions

The shape of the Spruce Goose was a harbinger of the shape of later aircraft yet to come,[citation needed] and the type also contributed much to the designs of later ekranoplans. However, true flying boats have largely been replaced by seaplanes with floats and amphibian aircraft with wheels. The Beriev Be-200 twin-jet amphibious aircraft has been one of the closest 'living' descendants of the flying-boats of old, along with the larger amphibious planes used for fighting forest fires. There are also several experimental/kit amphibians such as the Glass Goose, the LSA SeaMax, Aeroprakt A-24, and the Seawind.

The ShinMaywa US-2 (Japanese: 新明和 US-2) are large STOL aircraft designed for air-sea rescue (SAR) work. US-2 is operated by Japan Self Defense Force.

The Canadair CL-215 and successor Canadair CL-415 are also examples of modern flying boats.

Chinese Harbin/Shuihong 5

US PBY Catalina serving as an aerial firefighting plane

Japanese ShinMaywa US-2

[edit] See also

[edit] Notes and references

  1. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  2. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  3. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  4. ^ Enhanced by a further sum from the "Women's Aerial League of Great Britain"[1]
  5. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent. Norman Hull.ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  6. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent. Norman Hull.ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  7. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent. Norman Hull.ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  8. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent. Norman Hull.ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  9. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent. Norman Hull.ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  10. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  11. ^ Its claim to true flying status is disputed as it made but one short flight in its life
  12. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  13. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  14. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  15. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  16. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  17. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  18. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6
  19. ^ Flying Boats of the Solent, Norman Hull. ISBN 1-85794-161-6

[edit] External links

v • d • e
Lists relating to aviation
General
Military
Accidents/incidents
Records