Grandpappy

Oldsters of the Air Corps arriving in the Canal Zone nowadays are greeted by a familiar face. "Grandpappy," only air plane in the world that, is systematically referred to as "he," is still at work there.

"Grandpappy" is what flyers call the BIS, first of the really big modern U.S. bombers. He is only six years old, but such age automatically qualifies any plane as an octogenarian. Grandpappy is the only B15 ever built.

Originally designed (by Boeing) as a combat plane, Grandpappy long since has been only a packhorse. His insigne is an overloaded elephant. These days he thunders around the Caribbean carrying great quantities of cargo -- as much as 15 tons pay load per trip. Flying from the Canal Zone to Trinidad is routine for Grandpappy, whose great gas tanks enable him to fly 24 hours at a stretch.

New Jobs, Old Glories. Sometimes Grandpappy goes photographing; 1,000 miles out to sea and back, without landing, is still a great feat, but he does it with only a perfunctory grunt upon reaching base. Mostly he carries people and supplies, just as he once carried a full load of medicines to earthquake victims in Chile. That was five years ago last month. Grandpappy's pilot then was burly Major Caleb V. Haynes, now a Brigadier General heading the First Bomber Command at Mitchel Field, New York, onetime boss of all of Chennault's bombers in China.

Among Grandpappy's recent errands was a flight from an eastern Pacific base to the U.S. mainland, carrying 40 enlisted men home after many months on the unexciting, warless fringes of civilization. He has borne hundreds of girls from Miami to government jobs in the Canal Zone. Said a crew member: "The gals like him. They know they can trust Grandpappy."

Even in, the days of his husky grandchildren, the B-295, Grandpappy can still hold his head high. He can fly up to 200 m.p.h. since he got some big, new engines which could supply the horsepower for lighting a small city if necessary. His wingspread is 150 ft., 46 ft. longer than his cousins', the newer B-173, only 62 ft. shorter than that of his nephew, the lumbering, dullard Douglas B19. Grandpappy has clippings to show that, in 1939, he carried a pay load of 31,205 Ib. (total weight: 74,000 Ib.) to a height of 8,200 ft. This eclipsed the Russian record by 1,638 ft., 2,545 Ib.

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