Test Pilot

1. From reader Rick Cohen: During what war did the United States first use a remotely controlled drone to attack an enemy?

2. This legacy question was asked in the first edition of "Test Pilot" (March 1994): Which lightplane manufacturer designed and manufactured an automobile immediately after World War II in an effort to offset canceled military contracts and a dim outlook for general aviation?

A. Beech
B. Cessna
C. Piper
D. None of the above

3. From reader John Schmidt: On August 12, 1941, an Ercoupe became the first airplane to make a “jet-assisted takeoff” (JATO) using a solid-propellant rocket producing 28 pounds of thrust to supplement the piston engine. What was the first U.S. airplane to take off using rocket power only?

4. A pilot in an airplane with a true airspeed of 200 knots flies from point A to point B under the influence of a 50-knot tailwind. The same wind is encountered on the return trip. Trouble is, the distance between point A and point B is unknown. Assuming an instantaneous turnaround over point B, what is the average groundspeed for the flight?

5. What is the origin of the expression air pocket?

6. What was the fastest production fighter aircraft of World War II?

7. The pivotal altitude of an around-pylon maneuver is determined by an airplane’s

A. groundspeed.
B. indicated airspeed.
C. true airspeed.
D. None of the above.

8. A pilot makes a forced landing in the Northern Hemisphere and is uncertain of his position. He sights along the long edge of his plotter and notes from a plumb bob hanging from the center of the plotter that Polaris, the North Star, is 37 degrees above the horizon. What is the pilot’s approximate latitude?

Test Pilot Answers

1. World War II. An inexpensive twin-engine drone manufactured by Interstate Aircraft and carrying a 2,000-pound bomb was flown into a Japanese anti-aircraft battery near Bougainville on September 27, 1944. The TDR-1 had an RCA television camera in its nose and was guided by a pilot in a Grumman Avenger.

2. A. The automobile was called the Beech Plainsman and featured an air-cooled engine. The project was abandoned in 1946 when it became apparent that the development of new aircraft models—including the Model 35 Bonanza—would require all of Beech’s available talent.

3. It was the same Ercoupe. Eleven days later the propeller was removed and six JATO bottles attached under the wings thrust the airplane and its pilot, Army Capt. Homer Boushey, into the air from March Field, California, for a short but memorable flight.

4. 187.5 knots, irrespective of the distance between points A and B. To verify that this is so, determine the out and return times required to fly any arbitrarily selected distance. Then use the total time required to make the round trip to determine average groundspeed. It’s a simple time-speed-distance problem.

5. The term was coined by Charles Willard (one of Glenn Curtiss’ first flying students) in 1910 when he returned from a flight saying, “The air was as full of air pockets as Swiss cheese is full of holes.”

6. The rocket-powered Messerschmitt Me 163B-1a Komet had a maximum speed in level flight of 596 mph, an initial climb rate of 9,800 fpm, and an endurance of 7.5 minutes. More than 350 were produced.

7. D. An around-pylon can be conducted at any altitude; however, the pivotal altitude of an on-pylon depends on groundspeed.

8. 37 degrees north. Latitude is equal to the altitude (angular elevation) of Polaris above the horizon. When the observer is at the North Pole (90 degrees north latitude), Polaris is directly overhead (90 degrees above the horizon), and when at the Equator (zero degrees latitude), Polaris is on the horizon (zero degrees of elevation).