Today in History: First global flight without landing takes off
It was the first ever nonstop circumnavigation of the globe.
On this day in 1949, the Lucky Lady II, a B-50 Superfortress, took off from Carswell Air Force Base in Fort Worth, Texas, on the first nonstop round the world flight.
Its predecessor, Lucky Lady I, was one of three Boeing B-29 Superfortresses that attempted a round the world trip in July and August 1948, flying from and back to Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona. One B-29 crashed in the Arabian Sea. Lucky Lady I, commanded by First Lieutenant AM Neal, together with Gas Gobbler, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel RW Kline, completed the 32 000km flight in 15 days, after making eight stops along the way and flying for 103 hours and 50 minutes.
Lucky Lady II, bearing a total crew of 14, started its round the world trip at 12.21pm on 26 February 1949. It took off from the Carswell Air Force Base and headed east toward the Atlantic Ocean.
After flying 37 742 km, the aircraft passed the control tower at Carswell again, on 2 March at 10.22am, marking the end of the circumnavigation, and landed there at 10.31am after having been in the air for 94 hours and one minute, landing two minutes before the estimated time of arrival calculated at take-off.
En route, the aircraft was refuelled four times by KB-29M Superfortresses, near Lajes Air Base in the Azores, Dhahran Airfield in Saudi Arabia, Clark Air Base in the Philippines, and Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii, using the grappled-line looped-hose technique. The aircraft flew at altitudes between 3 000 and 6 100m and completed the trip around the world at an average ground speed of 401km/h.
Its successor, Lucky Lady III was one of three Boeing B-52 Stratofortresses that made the circumnavigation in January 1957 as part of Operation Power Flite, flying from Castle Air Force Base in California and completing the 39 147km flight in 45 hours and 19 minutes at an average 863km/h with the assistance of aerial refuelling from KC-97 Stratofreighters. Eight years after Lady II, Lady III made the trip around the world in under half the time required by Lucky Lady II.
Information courtesy of: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucky_Lady_II.
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