WARBIRDS SKYRAIDERS
62 FLYPAST June 2018
WARBIRDS SKYRAIDERS
USAF, US Navy and the Marine
Corps standardised the designation
protocol, and the AD-5W became
the EA-1E. The following year
135152 was retired from active
service, by which time it had lost its
radome.
After many years of storage in
Memphis, Tennessee, it was sold
and civil registered as N65164. The
Skyraider was restored in Florida and
flown again in 1992. It was acquired
by Cavanaugh in 2008 and, after
some minor restoration work, was
returned to its original VAW-12
livery, as ‘703’ complete with the
unit’s bat symbol on the fin.THREE FORCES
Part of the Cavanaugh fleet since
2016, the single-seater has a
significant pedigree. Built as an
AD-6 (from 1962 an AH-1H), it
was accepted by the US Navy on
August 29, 1955 as 139606. It
was assigned to attack squadron
VA-215, based at Naval Air Station
(NAS) Moffett Field, California,
from September 1955 until August- When not shore based,
VA-215 operated from the flight
deck of the USS Bon Homme
Richard. (See page 60 for 139606’s
full career with the US Navy.)
Retirement came in August 1967
when 139606 was flown to the giant
‘bone yard’ at Davis-Monthan Air
Force Base, Arizona. Despite more
than ten years of intense activity,
the Spad’s operational life had not
ended, and it was ‘exhumed’ from
storage to be taken on charge by the
USAF.
A new life awaited it in Vietnam,
with the 6th Special Operations
Squadron from the bases at Pleiku
and Da Nang. In 1972 the Skyraider
was transferred to the South
Vietnamese Air Force (SVNAF) and
flown by the 518th Fighter Squadron
of the 23rd Tactical Wing at Biên
Hòa.
Just before the fall of Saigon,
139606 was flown to U-Tapao in
Thailand on April 29, 1974, one of
the last aircraft to escape. After the
engine was shut down, the ground
crew discovered the pilot’s family
squeezed into the rear fuselage.
The A-1H was transferred back to
the USAF and as such was transferred
to Takhli on May 5, 1974 as the last
Skyraider to fly with the Americanmilitary. It remained in storage at the
Thai base until 1979, when it was
repatriated and sold on the civilian
market, becoming N3195B initially
and then its present N39606.
‘Six-Zero-Six’ was operated until
2015 by the Museum of Flight at
Santa Monica in California. The
Skyraider flies today in vivid colours
as ‘500’ of VA-176 ‘Thunderbolts’,
as flown off the deck of the USS
Oriskany in the early 1960s. The fin
and rear fuselage are painted with the
image of a thunderbolt culminating
in a cartoon hornet with vicious
sting.MIG KILLER
The versatility of the Skyraider
has become the stuff of legend. It“Despite more than ten years of intense activity, the Spad’s
operational life had not ended, and it was ‘exhumed’ from storage
to be assigned to the USAF”By 1926 the 18-year-old Ed Heinemann
was a fully-fl edged draughtsman,
working with Donald Douglas at Santa
Monica, California. The following year
he was designing sub-assemblies for
the International Aircraft Corporation at
Venice, California. The fi rst full aircraft he
was responsible for was the Moreland Trainer in 1928 at El Segundo, also in California.
His next appointment was with another giant of the US industry, Jack Northrop, who had
set up shop at El Segundo. Heinemann assisted with the BT-1 dive-bomber in 1937 before
the Northrop Corporation was absorbed into the Douglas Aircraft Company.
Heinemann was appointed chief engineer and commenced a phenomenal run of
successful designs including the Boston/Havoc light bomber, the SBD Dauntless dive-
bomber, A-26 Invader, the Skyraider and the Skyrocket Mach 2 jet-plus-rocket research
aircraft. He then specialised in carrier-borne jets: the F3D Skyknight all-weather
interceptor, F4D Skyray delta, A3D Skywarrior twin-jet bomber and the A4D Skyhawk. In
1962 Heinemann joined General Dynamics, before fi nally retiring in 1973.THE GENIUS OF ED HEINEMANN
Right
Known as ‘The Bats’,
VAW-12 wore a bat-like
logo on the fi n and rudder
in the early 1960s.
Right centre
With other aircraft from
the Cavanaugh Flight
Museum fl eet in the
background, A-1E 139606
shows off its wing fold
and load of ten high-
velocity aircraft rockets.