Pilots

"I fly the world's biggest biplane." It wasn't an ego-laden boast, only a quiet statement of fact from a soft-spoken, 60-ish man with a demeanor that says he's been around the patch a few times. Tom McMurtry made the statement at the Experimental Aircraft Association's 1995 International Fly-in Convention in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, standing beside his stunning Boston maroon-and-yellow Waco UPF-7, surely one of the most beautiful Wacos in the world.

"World's biggest biplane" immediately brings to mind the Soviets' huge Antonov AN-2 biplane, but McMurtry smiled at my guess and admitted this biplane was much bigger: "It's the [Boeing] 747 with the space shuttle attached."

McMurtry's introduction to aviation came while he was in Navy ROTC at the University of Notre Dame. One of his instructors had just come back from the Korean War and made quite an impression on the young lad — a "true professional." That influence was the primary reason McMurtry entered Naval aviation.

McMurtry's military career began with the Beech T-34, but he quickly advanced to the SNJ — his was the second-from-last class to fly the noisy, round-motored advanced pilot-trainer. McMurtry thought that it was a terrible fate at the time but admits the experience has served him well through the years. After training, he flew Grumman F9Fs and later SNBs (the Navy's name for the Beech 18), then was assigned to a photo recon squadron, and eventually flew heavy attack missions in Douglas A-3 Skywarriors. After seven years in the Navy, including the required sea duty and test pilot school at Naval Air Station Patuxent River in Maryland, McMurtry joined Lockheed for three years, where he flew the U-2 spy plane. In 1967, he was hired by NASA at Edwards Air Force Base, California.

One of his first assignments at NASA was weather check flights for the X-15 project, which was just winding down as he came aboard. Mc-Murtry flew the rocketplane's planned approach path in jet fighters, sampling weather, winds, and turbulence, making especially sure that the X-15 pilot could see the landing zone, since the little speedster had no real navigation equipment to speak of.

McMurtry's test-pilot skills were then called to action with the Vought F-8 Crusader super-critical wing project. He flew the first flight of that airplane and almost 100 subsequent sorties. McMurtry also flew the first flight of the oblique-wing AD-1 (Ames Dryden) designed by a man familiar to many in general aviation — Burt Rutan. The airplane's unique wing pivoted in the center of the fuselage, allowing it to swing to sharp angles to reduce drag at high speeds, then back to perpendicular with the fuselage to regain low- speed performance for landing. McMurtry also flew such airplanes as the Lockheed YF-12 and, later, the Lockheed SR-71. It was an exciting time to be a test pilot for NASA.

As the lifting bodies and early space shuttle tests became hot projects, McMurtry was selected as one of two original project pilots for the approach and landing tests that involved launching the space shuttle off the top of the 747. He's stayed current in the big Boeing ever since.

What's it like flying the "world's biggest biplane?" "I wish I could say it's really challenging and tough to fly when the shuttle is aboard, but that's just not true. It really doesn't change that much with the shuttle on top." Carrying a Douglas DC-9-sized airplane around on your back creates huge amounts of drag, though, and "there's certainly some shaking from airflow separation around the shuttle that is transmitted to the 747's tail surfaces and airframe."

McMurtry is chief of NASA's flight operations at Edwards. He doesn't just fly a desk, however; he stays current in the McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 and is participating in testing a McDonnell Douglas F-15 fitted with axisymmetric nozzles. The nozzles give vectoring thrust capability to the nimble fighter.

McMurtry flew Cessnas and Pipers at NASA but never spent much time in small airplanes until 20 years ago when he flew with a friend in a Stearman. It wasn't long before he bought his own biplane, a UPF-7.

Seven years later his mechanic told him that it badly needed restoration: "I'm a pilot," he laments, "not a mechanic." The old Waco went to a tech school for restoration and sat for years, almost untouched. While his biplane was disassembled, McMurtry saw an ad for Waco parts in Rockville, Indiana, offered by a man named Tom Flock.

McMurtry had grown up in Rockville, a small town in the corn belt west of Indianapolis. He remembered a man named Tom Flock, a few years his senior in high school; Flock was quite a basketball player and became one of McMurtry's idols during his formative years. He called the number; it was the very same Flock.

Flock and McMurtry renewed old ties, and Flock soon agreed to accept McMurtry's disassembled Waco parts in trade for half interest in one of Flock's stunning Waco restorations. That was nearly 10 years ago, and McMurtry has kept "his half" of the UPF-7 at Edwards ever since.

McMurtry expects to complete his CFI training by year's end so that he can teach his kids to fly. McMurtry won't start them in the Waco, however; he's thinking about a Cub, which he calls "a fascinating airplane." This from a man who has flown the SR-71, the U-2, and the "world's biggest biplane."