Whipped Cream Difficulties

We have Science Sunday. I think I need to declare either “Travel Tuesday” or “Travel Thursday”, for the alliterative value.

We could sort of have a two-fer today, since it isn’t just Travel Thursday, but TWA Thursday. Sit back, relax, perhaps have a cup of TWA coffee, or some TWA tea.

(Somewhere, I hear Pat Cadigan yelling “DWIGHT!” the way she used to yell “GARDNER!”)

(I still miss Gardner.)

“The World of TWA”, from sometime in the glorious 1970s.

The film follows (in droning voiceover) a typical American couple as they travel around the world on TWA, starting in London, England, and continuing to Paris, France, Rome and Pisa, Italy, the Holy Land including the Sea of Galilee, Greece, Egypt, India, Thailand and finally Hong Kong.

I’m a little surprised they didn’t stop over in Hawaii. And speaking of Hawaii…

Bonus video #1: according to the YouTube notes, this is a Coast Guard video (composed of actual 8mm footage and some re-enactments) about Pan Am Flight 6.

Pan Am Flight 6 (registration N90943) ditched in the Pacific Ocean on October 16, 1956, after two of its four engines failed. The aircraft took off from Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii, at 8:26 p.m. HST on the flight’s last leg to San Francisco. After passing the point of equal time, the flight received permission to climb to an altitude of 21,000 ft (6,400 m). When that altitude was reached, the No. 1 engine began to overspeed as power was reduced. The First Officer, who was flying the plane, immediately slowed the plane by further reducing power and by extending the flaps, and an attempt was made to feather the propeller. The propeller would not feather and the engine continued to turn at excessive RPM. The captain decided to cut off the oil supply to the engine. Eventually, the RPM declined and the engine seized. The propeller continued to windmill in the air stream, causing excessive drag that increased the fuel consumption. As a result, the plane was forced to fly much slower, below 150 knots (280 km/h), and lost altitude at the rate of 1,000 feet per minute (5.1 m/s). Climb power was set on the remaining three engines to slow the rate of descent. The No. 4 engine then began to fail and soon was producing only partial power at full throttle. At 2:45 a.m. the No. 4 engine began to backfire, forcing the crew to shut it down and feather the propeller.

This sounds very similar to the plot of “The High and the Mighty”, but the movie came out in 1954 (and the book in 1953).

I’ve seen that once, on TV, and I’d like to see it again. Lawrence has the DVD, but we have to wait until RoadRich can join us. (This isn’t ‘Nam, this is movie night. There are rules.)

(It’s also interesting to me that Robert Stack plays the pilot on the verge of cracking up. Compare to “Airplane!” Was this a deliberate choice? Wikipedia talks about the choice to cast Stack, but is silent on this specific point.)

Bonus video #2: inside the Eero Saarinen designed TWA Flight Center in 2014.

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 16th, 2020 at 2:00 pm and is filed under History, Planes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.