At one point in the movie, John Wayne's character says something to the effect "every gallon of gas brings us a mile closer to land."
One mile per gallon. That sounds about right. Not too bad for a big flying machine.
Comments from any pilots?
KR
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Warning: Incorrigible punster. Do not incorrige.
Not bad for a Hummer either LOL
shareNot a pilot, but an aviation history buff...
Operating normally, each engine on the DC-4 consumes 100 gallons of gas per hour, so the normal fuel consumption for the airplane is 400 gal/hr. Since it cruises at 227 mi/hr, the mileage works out to about 0.5 MPG.
Maybe they get better mileage in Hollywood?
SteveB
The almanac shows the distance from Honolulu to San Francisco as 2398 miles. The Honolulu terminal crew reported (and the aircrew confirmed) 3050 gallons aboard. That works out to .78 miles/gallon, and should (we hope!) include a reasonable margin of error.
So at least Dan Roman was in the ballpark, saying "each additional gallon means 1 additional mile".
/Bill
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They took off with 3050 gallons and had 30 gallons left in the tanks after landing. The 30 gallons is indeed mentioned.
share[deleted]
I am/was a pilot. I think the 400 gals/hr is wrong. Those engines should
have consumed 50 gals/hr each giving 15+ hours to dry tanks. The fuel
supply should allow for flight to destination and then to an alternate field,
probably Reno, in case of weather problems and then an additional 45 minutes.
At 400 gals/hr there is not enough fuel to get to San Francisco. I would
quibble with the scene where John Wayne shines a flashlite on the wing and
we see fuel leaking out. By that time the crew would have cross-fed any
fuel in that tank to others, there would have been none to leak.
I saw the film on first release as an employee of The Cape Cinema in Dennis,
Cape Cod, Mass. I now own a good copy, DVD, thanks to the AMC channel.
Don Femia
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What I don't see anybody figuring is the fact that only THREE engines are turning this whole time, but with the three that are running at a higher RPM and boost, they might use the same amount.
Gravity doesn't exist...the world sucks!
[deleted]
In real life several things would occur right away. The pilots would increase power to the 3 other engines. The plane would be slowed to a speed that would increase range. If it was just a simple engine failure the prop would be feathered to reduce drag. The plane would contiue on to destination, just slower. But here, no prop and the engine hanging down which increases drag, plus a loss of fuel. Also, the plane would be in an unbalanced yaw to the left with most power on the right and drag on the left. This increases fuel consumption. In real life a pilot with the age and experience of the John Wayne character would have, secretly, an extra 100 gallons of fuel added to the calculated load. The airlines don't like this as it costs a bit to haul the extra weight. I assume that's why he thought they could make it while the others didn't. I make this guess because the plot comes from a book "Fate is the Hunter" by Ernest Gann who was a very experienced transport pilot.
Once the damage occurs lots of things are working against the crew. First, the aircraft will be in a "yaw" position due to unbalanced thrust increasing drag.
The damaged engine hanging down would also increase drag. The three engines now have to supply more power than normal flight using more gas per hour. They decended to a lower altitude which gives less ground speed for a given air speed - less distance per gallon. The slower speed might help a bit on gas used, but not a great amount compared to the other problems. No info on what caused the prop loss. I'll guess it was bearing failure between the engine and propeller.
When I was flying that same track many years ago we had a better metric - every minute out was a day's swim back.
share[deleted]
The 50 gal/hr/eng is about right for normal cruise settings.Do you know how slow the fuel transfer pump is on a C54? The ones the airlines were using on Pacific route were mostly civilianized C-54 8 tankers.
shareThe Navy rescue plane's pilot requested the airliner climb higher to make the intercept easier; they were told no, because every xx feet (can't remember number of feet) they climbed would lose them a mile closer to land.
Mountain Man
Loved the one about the 'minute vs. days swim'. This was also in a day when they actually 'flew' the airplane most of the time. A good pilot and flight engineer could work together to squeeze every mile out of those radials, prop pitch, they did lighten the load, mixture etc.
Many A-1 jocks (carrying as much ordinance as a WW2 B-17) could loiter for as long as 12 hours just playing with those two things.
In the film the interception B-17 - interception, not rescue, since a B-17 is not a flying boat that can land on water - is not a Navy but a Coast Guard aircraft. Commisioed officers of its crew wear the cap badges of Coast Guard commissioned officers. The score overplaying some scenes centered in and around the B-17 is the Coast Guard march "Semper Paratus" ("Always Ready").
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