The aircraft continued to fly freight for Pan Am for some years before being retired and burned at Brownsville, Texas. As Pan American expanded its operations into the area, Santa Maria was chartered to fly the first of the airline's mail flights from Key West to Havana, before Pan Am purchased West Indian Aerial Express outright, and the Pathfinder along with it. It was purchased by Basil Rowe to use for his pioneering air service in the West Indies, West Indian Aerial Express, christened Santa Maria. The remains of the aircraft were trucked back to Keystone, where it was rebuilt and re-registered (NC1612). Davis and Wooster were both killed, the former's face crushed and the latter's neck broken. Although he succeeded in bringing the aircraft down, he was unable to stop it as it skidded into a nearby bog and was wrecked. Unable to climb quickly enough to clear a row of trees, Davis attempted to turn the aircraft, but lost height and was forced to land. On 26 April 1927, a week before their planned departure, the aircraft crashed during a heavily laden test flight from Langley Field at Hampton, Virginia. Painted yellow, the aircraft was named American Legion after the sponsors of the attempt. The standard Liberty engines were replaced by Wright J-5s of approximately half their power. The first Pathfinder (registered NX179) was chosen by US Navy pilots Noel Davis and Stanton Wooster for their attempt at the Orteig prize to cross the Atlantic. A passenger cabin with seating for ten was added to the fuselage. Like them, it was a conventional biplane design with engines mounted in nacelles on the lower wing, but also added a third engine, mounted on the nose (as the single engine of the LB-1 had been). The Pathfinder was an attempt by the Keystone Aircraft Corporation to develop a civil transport version of the successful series of bombers that it was producing for the United States Army Air Corps as the LB-5 and its derivatives. The Keystone K-47 Pathfinder was an airliner developed in the United States in the late 1920s, built only in prototype form.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |