Ice Pilots and Vintage Aircraft

[Martin4356111]

I've been engrossed in the latest series of Ice Pilots airing now on the Discovery Channel. If you haven't seen it, its a fly on the wall documentary following the aircraft and staff of Buffalo Airways in the NWT, Canada.

At the moment, they fly an eclectic fleet of World War two era aircraft such as the DC-3, DC-4 and C-46 Commando. They also operate CL215 water bombers and the Lockheed Electra.

It got me thinking just how long can they continue to operate these old aircraft both economically and safely? I understand that they have recently added more Electra's to the fleet but even the last built Electra is over 50 years old.

It also got me thinking, what do you replace them with? I once heard that the only replacement for a DC-3 was another DC-3! I Know a company now modernises them and turns them into a turbo Dak but surely something like second hand C-130's or turbo prop freighters would make more sense.

[Oily Nails]

They have lost a couple of aircraft recently in different accidents.

[Mave]

Went to a lecture a while ago by the British Antarctic survey- the distances they were flying in old twin otters was incredible. Slightly worrying was the dead man part of the transit from Argentina where they were still too heavy to maintain altitude with an engine failure, and not enough range if they dumped fuel...

[fatboy69]

I have been following the series for a number of years. Its an excellent series with some insane flying & some superb old aircraft.

[Hooli]

I guess you need proper engineering that can be fixed with two hammers while wearing thick gloves.

[davepoth]

Martin4356111 said:

It also got me thinking, what do you replace them with? I once heard that the only replacement for a DC-3 was another DC-3! I Know a company now modernises them and turns them into a turbo Dak but surely something like second hand C-130's or turbo prop freighters would make more sense.

Landing speeds come into it. The DC-3 stalls at 58 knots which is more than 40 knots slower than a C-130, and is probably the lowest of any cargo plane you could get hold of. A slow landing speed means you can get into a lot of places that otherwise would be impossible.

[johnOjohn]

Martin4356111 said:

...surely something like second hand C-130's or turbo prop freighters would make more sense.

Doubt it would be C-130s, they cost a lot and civilian ones (L-100s) are rare. An ex-military C-130 would probably be quite limited in what it could be used for because of type certification issues.

[Dr Jekyll]

There was an outfit in Coventry using a fleet of DC3s and a DC6 until quite recently. The utilisation was low so it was worth putting up with high running costs to keep the capital investment down.

[Martin4356111]

Dr Jekyll said:

There was an outfit in Coventry using a fleet of DC3s and a DC6 until quite recently. The utilisation was low so it was worth putting up with high running costs to keep the capital investment down.

Atlantic Airlines/Air Atlantique. They sold one, maybe more of their Electras to Buffalo.