The Da Nang Glider
                  Larry Westin - March 16, 2001
                    Updated Rev. B - 08/02/08

In the middle of 1969 Colonel Jack January was assigned as the
aircraft commander of Batcat crew 31, 554th Reconnaissance
Squadron.  On June 4, 1969, crew 31 was scheduled for a standard
combat mission.  Col. January replaced the assigned aircraft
commander Banner for this mission.  This was Col. January's 18th
flight since arriving for duty at Korat RTAFB, with the 553rd
Reconnaissance Wing, on April 9, 1969.  The airplane was Lockheed
Super Constellation USAF model EC-121R serial number 67-21487.

After takeoff the Lockheed EC-121R was flown out to the orbit
area.  After arrival at the assigned orbit, the airplane was
placed in cruise condition for a planned 8 hours on station.  

As was normal practice with the 553rd Reconnaissance Wing, one
pilot, either the aircraft commander or the co-pilot, would be in
the left cockpit seat (the aircraft commanders seat).  The right
cockpit seat (co-pilots seat) was occupied by one of the
navigators, and one of the two flight engineers on board would be
at the flight engineers station.  The off duty pilot, navigator
and flight engineer would rest until switching positions with the
on duty crew members.

As the aircraft assumed its normal orbit the pilot in the left
seat was 1Lt. Mason Ezzell, and the right seat was occupied by
Lt. Hardee one of the navigators for the mission, the duty flight
engineer was Sgt. Welch.  This mission was flown on the blue
orbit near Khe Sanh, at an altitude of 19,000 feet. Khe Sanh is
on the northwestern part of Vietnam, not too far south of the
DMZ, and a little east of the Vietnam border with Laos.

Shortly after assuming the assigned orbit all 4 engines stopped. 
An important point to understand is that the Lockheed Super
Constellation required hydraulic pressure from an operating
engine for the flight controls to operate.  With all 4 engines
stopped there was no hydraulic pressure, and the controls were
essentially frozen.  With all engines stopped the airplane began
to decelerate quickly, nosing over with the left wing dropping.

Lt. Ezzell tried to correct for the unusual attitude but the
controls would not respond because of a lack of hydraulic
pressure.  In a letter to me Mason Ezzell describes the immediate
action he took to save the airplane and crew.

"My first reaction was to grab the hydraulic release lever, just
to the side of my right leg, and pull it up to disengage the
hydraulic system and allow for manual flying of the aircraft
through the cable system.  Now I was flying the aircraft without
any hydraulics assist and it was like trying to control a large
bull.  My concerns were to keep the wings level and maintain
control while letting the aircraft continue in a gradual descent,
so the aircraft would not stall and go out of control.  All this
took place in less than a minute, although it seems like a life
time."

Colonel January was laying down in the bunk immediately behind
the flight deck as he was off duty when the incident began.  In a
letter Col. January sent to me about the incident he begins his
story of the Da Nang glider with: "Some say Silence is Golden,
however if you are enjoying a nap in a four engine aircraft, in a
bunk behind the flight deck, I say Silence is anything but
Golden."

Lt. Ezzell now had the airplane stabilized and heading for the
coast, but still with all 4 engines stopped, Col. January entered
the cockpit switching places with Lt. Ezzell, while the navigator
vacated the right seat and Lt. Ezzell took over now as co-pilot.

Lt. Ezzell continue in his letter to me: "Since we did not know
if we were going to have to bail out or possibly ditch the
aircraft the crew was notified to now put on there water wings. 
Now everybody had to take off all their equipment and put the
water wings on and then put all their equipment back on. When I
rang the bell to let them know that they might have to bail out
we suffered the only injury of the trip.  The person, who opened
the rear door, was hit in the head by the door as it pop open. 
He was not hurt seriously and just had a slight cut." 

As Col. January entered the flight deck the first visible
indication of the problem was that all four feather
switch/indicators were bright red.

Before continuing just a short description of the EC-121R
propeller system.  Each Wright R-3350 engine on the EC-121R is
equipped with a 3 blade, constant speed, full feathering,
reversible, Hamilton Standard hydromatic propeller.  "Feathering"
a propeller means rotating the propeller blades about 90 degrees
so each blade is streamlined with the wind, which gives minimum
drag.  If the propeller does not feather on an engine giving
little or no power, the propeller will wind mill which creates
substantial amounts of drag.  A wind milling (non feathered)
propeller on the failed engine of a Lockheed EC-121R can cause so
much drag, even with the other 3 engines operating at normal
power, to prevent the airplane from maintaining altitude, if the
landing gear and flaps are down.

On the Lockheed EC-121R there were two means to feather a
propeller, manually, and through the automatic feather control. 
The automatic feather control would feather a propeller IF the
throttle was more than half way advanced, AND the BMEP (torque)
of the engine fell below about 104, AND BMEP remained at or below
that level for at least 1 « to 2 seconds.  The reason for the
automatic feather control is to feather a propeller quickly when
an engine fails at a critical time, especially during take off.

Once the automatic feather control feathered the first propeller,
and it didn't matter which propeller was feathered, it
automatically disabled itself from feathering any other
propeller.  Lockheed designed the automatic feather control so it
could feather only a single propeller.

Second method to feather a propeller on the Lockheed EC-121R is
for the flight engineer to manually feather the propeller.  All
of the feather controls in the EC-121R are located at the flight
engineers station.  The manual feather control consists of four
large push button switches, each individually covered with its
own plastic guard.  To feather a propeller the flight engineer
must lift the plastic cover and depress the switch for the
propeller which is to be feathered.  When the switch is depressed
a circuit is made to a DC electric feather motor, which pumps oil
to the nose hub of the propeller.  The oil pressure forces the
blades to rotate to the feather position.  At the same time a red
light in the switch is turned on.  You REALLY want to know when a
feather switch is depressed.

The feather switches actually have three positions, push to
feather, neutral, and pull to unfeather.  After a propeller is
fully feathered the flight engineer pulls the feather switch back
to the neutral position.  With the feather switch in neutral the
feather pump motor is deactivated.

To unfeather a propeller the flight engineer must pull the switch
out.  Pulling the switch out activates the feather pump motor
again, but in this case the oil is directed to the back of the
hub where the oil pressure forces the propeller blades to rotate
back to the low pitch position.  Once unfeathered the feather
switch is returned to neutral to turn off the feather pump motor.

If an engine was feathered, and later an attempt is made to
restore power inflight, the engine is started first with the
propeller still feathered.  Once the engine is restarted and
turning, the flight engineer then pulls out the feather switch to
unfeather the propeller.  After the propeller is unfeathered the
flight engineer again returns the feather switch to the neutral
position which turns off the feather pump motor.

As Colonel January entered the cockpit he could see all four
feather switches with bright red lights on.  Looking out the
cockpit window he watched the blades come to a stand still as if
at a perfect attention.

Colonel January continued saying "my first goal was to prepare
the crew for bailout and head for open water, where recovery
wouldn't be hampered by the jungle and those pesky enemy troops.  

"The flight engineer initiated the standard engine start
procedure, starting engine #3 first, then #4, #2 and finally #1
in that order.  Number 3 engine started without incident and gave
the electrical power needed for communications with rescue and
other assistance agencies."  With Col. January now flying the
airplane, Lt. Ezzell was sending out May Day and handling the
radios.

Number #4 engine was then started and gained full power, and #3
propeller returned to the feather position.  When #3 engine was
restarted again, and gained full power, #4 propeller returned to
the feather position.  This sequence repeated numerous times.  

Number 2 engine was started, then #1 engine and both were left at
low power to provide stable electrical and hydraulic systems. 
"To my pleasant surprise neither #1 or #2 propeller returned to
the feather position for the rest of the flight."

While the cockpit crew was fully involved in making every effort
to achieve stable power, the back end crew prepared for bailout. 
This preparation involved finding and putting on your parachute,
destroying sensitive material, etc.  Little communications
occurred between the cockpit crew and the back end crew.  Radio
contact was maintained with the ground and rescue services so
others were aware of the rapidly changing situation.

By now open water had been reached and there were rescue aircraft
flying along side.  Now Col. January headed the airplane toward
the nearest U.S. air base, Da Nang.  As power was reduced to
loose altitude to land, the number of feathering incidents with
number 3 and 4 propellers greatly reduced.  As Da Nang came into
view an overhead circling approach was made to achieve the final
goal, "the aircraft and crew were on the ground safely."  All
four engines were operating before engine shutdown.

Most of the above is directly from the letter Col. January sent
to me, along with two telephone conversations I had with him. 
And I thank him for taking the time to document this incident for
me.  Additional information from a letter from Mason Ezzell,
along with telephone conversations help to put more of the pieces
of this incident together.

As far as I know there was never an incident with any model of
the Lockheed Constellation, or Super Constellation, before or
since, where all four propellers feathered inflight as they did
in June 1969.

Col. January also supplied some information about the aftermath. 
Somewhat later I read additional information from the official
histories of the 553rd Reconnaissance Wing.  

As you might imagine, there was some reluctance to fly the
aircraft again.  With all propellers standing still inflight it
makes it difficult to carry on with the business of flight.

Quite a bit of effort was put forward to find the culprit.  An
incident review board was appointed by the theater commander to
review the problem.  In addition to maintenance people from Korat
and Da Nang, the Senior Lockheed Research Engineer who originally
designed the Constellation propeller system reviewed the problem.

Even with all the expertise available the exact reason for all 4
propellers feathering was never identified for certain. The
airplane involved was now officially titled by the 553rd
Reconnaissance Wing as the "Da Nang Glider."  Because of the
inability to positively identify the cause a large number of
components were replaced on the airplane as follows:

Engines #3 and #4; Prop feathering pumps on #3 and #4; Prop
feathering motors #3 and #4; prop governors #3 and #4; propellers
#3 and #4; torque switches #3 and #4; spark plugs #1 and #2; plug
and receptacle connector #1 at the flight engineers station; prop
synchronizing box; both bus sectionalizing relays; all 4 prop
feathering relays; all 4 time delay relays; prop feathering
switches #1, #3 and #4; and the prop reversing coordination relay
panels #3 and #4 were overhauled at depot and reinstalled.

Even with all the items above replaced some additional steps were
taken before the test flights began.  The auto feathering system
was temporarily by-passed and a special panel installed to
indicate any unknown attempt to activate the auto feathering
system.  Two "no-can-feather" switches were installed in the
feathering systems for #2 and #3.

Several high speed ground runs were made at Da Nang.  With the
ground runs showing no problems it was time to flight test the
airplane.  By this time Col. January had been transferred from
the 554th Squadron to the 553rd Wing as the Chief of 553rd Wing
Stan/Eval.

The flight test crew for the "Da Nang Glider" was named "Flight
Test Crew 007."  The crew was made up of: Chief of 553rd Wing
Safety; Chief of 553rd Wing Stan/Eval; 553rd Wing Quality
Control/Flight Test Officer; 553rd Wing Stan/Eval flight
engineer; 553rd Wing Quality Control/Flight Test flight engineer.

The first test flight was 2 hours in length and flew around Da
Nang.  On the second test flight the airplane was returned to
Korat during a 4 hour flight.

Eight more test flights were conducted out of Korat for a total
test flight duration of 24 hours.  Beginning with the third test
flight some of the modifications made at Da Nang were
deactivated.  On the eighth and last test flight all
precautionary modifications had been removed.  At the end of the
test flights the title "Da Nang Glider," which the airplane was
officially referred to by the 553rd Reconnaissance Wing, was
dropped.  Col. January was the aircraft commander for all the
test flights.

On September 16, 1969, the airplane returned to normal
reconnaissance operations with Flight Test Crew 007 in the
cockpit, and crew 33 in the back end.

Col. January declined to give me the serial number of the
airplane involved.  However since the last Batcat loss occurred
on September 6, 1969, and this airplane resumed flying standard
reconnaissance missions on September 16, 1969, it was not
involved in any other mishap I am aware of.  It was later
returned to the United States where is was eventually scrapped.

UPDATE 05/30/05 - reviewing the official history of the 553rd
Reconnaissance Wing reveals the serial number of this airplane
was 67-21487, Lockheed construction number 4480, previously Navy
Bureau number 143206 before conversion to EC-121R.  When it came
time to return aircraft back to the United States for eventual
scrapping, 67-21487 was part of the first group of EC-121R's sent
by the 553rd Reconnaissance Wing to Davis-Monthan AFB in late
1970.  

My thanks to Colonel Jack January and Lieutenant Mason Ezzell for
taking their time to send me detailed letters, and talk with me
on the telephone about the incident, as well as a copy of the
553rd Operations Newsletter describing what steps had been taken
to make sure the incident was not repeated, and other
documentation providing additional information about this
incident.

Readers who can provide additional details about this incident
are asked to contact the author, Larry Westin, e-mail
<westin@westin553.net> or via postal mail at:

Larry Westin
21721 Verde St.
Tehachapi, California 93561
(661) 823-4707