Much like my obsession with the U2, which has outlived another ‘replacement,’ I am always amazed by the C-130. Obviously, considering its long life of service, so is the military. I’m hard pressed to find any area where the C-130 doesn’t do something amazing. I guess maybe if you compared it to a Cessna 150 in a fuel economy test it might not come out on top. That said, I challenge you to put 92 people or 2 armored personnel carriers in a Cessna 150 and make it off the ground.
For today’s post, and some subsequent Warbird Wednesday posts, I thought I might highlight some of the more exciting C-130 Exploits. I figure the best place to start is with the USMC KC-130F Hercules that made several unarrested carrier landings and just as many unnassisted carrier takeoffs. So, if you watch the video above, you will see a KC-130F performing takeoffs and landings aboard the aircraft carrier USS Forrestal (CVA-59) in 1963. This specific aircraft has landed itself in the National Museum of Naval Aviation if you’d like to hunt it down, but any old Herc should do if you want to test it out (which I don’t recommend).
So there you have it, a C-130 will easily land on the deck of a carrier with up to 30,000 pounds of cargo/personnel. Based on the photo, unfortunately, I’m not sure there is any place to store a C-130 so I doubt it will see any carrier deployments that aren’t a round trip flight. In any case, be on the look out for future posts on the C-130’s exploits over the next few weeks. Oh, and in case you haven’t done it, please take a minute or five and fill out the Leaving Terra Firma reader survey. I’d really appreciate it and you’ll be rewarded with content more in line with your preferences.