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(moved) A lost R4D 6 on the ice of the Arctic Ocean forever

AlaskaAV

GONE WEST
Mission, TX
The Arctic Research Lab located at the Point Barrow Air Force Station, Alaska, actually a Navy base operated by the Air Force at the time, 1950s and 60s, and under civilian contract, flew several R4Ds in support of research ice islands that floated around the Arctic Ocean near the north pole. The resupply of those sites was quite a project at times. The normal procedure for the aircraft was to use two different octane of avgas. As I recall, one was 100/130 and the other was 115/145 but I might be one grade too high on each. Anyway, two different grades, one for take off, climb and landing and the other for cruise. Once the aircraft got to the floating ice stations, they were refueled out of drums with a hand pump, usually one drum of the lower grade on each side. On one trip, this was all done as usual except there was a new employee doing the fueling. Why are the fuelers always the new hires?

Once airborne and returning back to Point Barrow, the tanks were switched over to the lower grade of fuel for cruise. It didn't take long before the engines almost quit running completely. They were low enough that there was not enough time to clear the fuel lines after they switched tanks back to the higher octane fuel. They made a gear up landing on the arctic ice with very little damage to the aircraft. The other R4D at Point Barrow immediately cranked up and headed out to find them. All ended well of course except for the dead bird.

It seems the kid that did the fueling had tapped into drums of arctic diesel fuel used for the generators and heating stoves.

About 10 years later, the Director of the Lab, Dr Max Brewer, a friend of mine, was showing me some photos of that aircraft. It was sitting on a pedestal of ice some 30 foot high right under the aircraft where the sun could not get to it. All the ice around it had melted down that much just from the heat of the 24 hour sun. What a very strange site. Several years later, Dr Brewer sent a C-185 out and they set up an explosive charge under the aircraft to bring it down. This was done for fear someone would start poking around and the ship would come down on them.
Read: law suit.
Oh how I wish I had a photo so share with everyone.

When I was there, they were still flying R4Ds but with much larger engines (B-17s?). They also moved the oil coolers topside at about 11 and 1 o'clock so the flight crew could see them from the cockpit. Flying the arctic with the DC-3s caused lots of problems with oil coolers freezing up in the winter causing cracks and loss of oil.

One of their R4Ds had a 500 gal fuel tank mounted inside the fuselage for extended range. On the end of the tank facing the passengers was a big red sign etched with white letters reading: NO SMOKING Contents of this tank equal the power of an atomic bomb. Sure made believers out of all passengers and no one ever thought about smoking.

A very good friend of mine, Bobby Fisher, was their chief pilot and had a lot to do with getting things set up the way he wanted it. I have often seen him top off with fuel which was right at normal aircraft gross weight with normal engines and than load maybe 5 or 6,000 pounds of cargo and take off on a 13 hour nonstop flight from Point Barrow to Greenland to resupply a floating ice station. We had a 5,000 foot PSP surface runway and he would use every foot of it to lift off.

By the way, Bobby was also the first person to land a C-185 at the North Pole. More about my friend later.

An added observation. While the US had floating ice island research stations, so did Russia and not far from ours and all this durring the cold war. Dr. Brewer had an idea. How about if we dropped in to say Hi to those scientific personnel without asking the powers at be of Russia and the US. On one trip, I understand he asked Bobby to fly over at very low altitude and rock the aircraft (normal greeting actions) while the crew members waved. The return from the ground was the same with many arm signals of come on down to show they wanted the aircraft to land. This did not happen that trip but on the next trip in that area, Dr. Brewer loaded up with some extra special items (fresh fruit, fresh meat, etc) with a plan to stop. The flight crew again flew over very low and received the same reception so they landed. What a reception they got from the Russians. Remember, this was late 50s or early 60s and the governments might have been very close to war but not the scientists. They stayed many hours and shared a meal with everyone. Time to go and lots of special Russian gifts were given. It was not long after that when a Russian aircraft did the same thing at one of our floating island research stations only they landed on the first pass. Dr Brewer had stocked all sites with special items just in case the Russians stopped by. As usual, lots of special bread to exchange by the Russians just as they do in space now. There were many more exchanges and not many people knew about it at the time especially the powers at be. Dr. Brewer had his own ideas of how to advance research over the world. He should have been a world organizer.
It is so strange that the two governments could fight so hard with words at top levels but the scientists could share everything.

It was such an honor to know and be a friend of Dr. Brewer.

Later Wien Alaska Airlines (Wien Air Alaska) did most of the resupply work with our good old DC-4, 940, and our 749 Connie, 7777G.
 
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