(This article, featuring Charlie Morris, class of 1936, appeared in the November 2005 issue of Business & Commercial Aviation)  3/29/06

Jacked up JetStar

Report #18
By Charlie Morris  

Left: A World War II bomber pilot, Charlie Morris became one of the founding fathers of modern business aviation when he joined Socony Vacuum in 1951. At the time of his retirement from Mobil 33 years later, he oversaw a global flight department with 300 people operating 52 aircraft.

When I got out of the Air Corps in 1947, I anticipated a career with the airlines. And I had one, for a while. I flew with Pan Am, but got furloughed in 10 months. After that came a stint flying Peruvian International Airlines DC-4s between New York and Santiago, Chile. It was great while it lasted, which wasn't very long. Next was All American Airlines, a USAir predecessor. Again the experience was good, but after three years I wanted something more.

That came after I submitted a résumé to a pilot placement outfit and got an invitation to interview with Socony Vacuum Oil Co. (Mobil Oil). The company was then operating a Twin Beech and a just-purchased DC-3out of Roosevelt Field, Long Island. The year was 1951 and corporate aviation was in its tenuous infancy, a condition underscored by the fact that the purchase and outfitting of the DC-3 barely survived a five to four board vote since so much money was at stake -- $126,000.

Intrigued by the aircraft-for-business concept, I left the airlines forever. It turned out that corporate aviation fit me like a London-tailored suit.

Our lumbering mahogany and suede Douglas soon gave way to a Super Ventura that, although an unpressurized piston twin, delivered an impressive 220-mph cruise. Our executives were in a hurry.

By the mid-1950s  we were flying airplanes from bases the world over and in 1957 I was put in charge of the whole enterprise. Life was good. Grumman was by then developing the Gulfstream, the first made-for-business turbine-powered airplane, and I was eager to add one to our fleet. But our company was undergoing reorganization at the time, and I was told to stick with the Ventura.

The wait proved to be fortuitous because presently Lockheed announced it was building a big business jet it called the JetStar. I just knew we could use one of those and Lockheed was in complete agreement. Well, I recall the day I boarded the two-engine demonstrator for a demo flight out of La Guardia. By then a veteran of thousands of hours in multiengine piston aircraft, I was flabbergasted by the JetStar's power, performance and quiet. It represented a new aviation era. I was a little apprehensive -- would I ever catch up with such a machine? -- but wanted one.

As it turned out, Howard Hughes had lusted for the JetStar first, buying a half dozen of them, which he then stored, unused, in hangars around the country. He was an odd, but very rich man. Then for reasons unknown he told Lockheed he wanted to sell three aircraft and so they contacted me.

It's indicative of how much my company by then embraced its air fleet. When I told the board the JetStar would cost $1.2 million -- 10 times what we'd paid for the DC-3 -- the members didn't flinch. They wanted to fly jets, too.

Our JetStar, emblazoned with the company's red Pegasus, was an immediate hit when we put it to work in 1961. Our executives loved its range, speed, and big, comfortable cabin. In fact, it was so popular that our passenger loads kept climbing and soon we began trading range for people. Just about then Lockheed came out with an upgrade, replacing the Pratt & Whitney JT12-6s FOR -8s. It was just what our bird needed so I signed up for the program.

I sent the JetStar to AiResearch on Long Island where it would be modified to beef up the fuselage and landing gear and the four-engine exchange. As that work was nearing completion, I took off for a well-earned vacation of Rocky Mountain fishing.

One morning when I had trout and lures on my mind, the cabin phone rang. I picked up the receiver and heard my chief mechanic say, "Charlie, we have a problem." Boy, did we. His message still rings in my head. He used words like "explosion" and "destroyed." My vacation ended with that call; I was on the next airplane home.

It turned out the mods had been completed and just a pressure check remained to confirm fuselage integrity. AiResearch had flown in a couple of its test specialists from California. But rather than bring their own equipment, they decided to use the Long Island gear. The problem was the equipment wasn't the same, and gave different pressure presentations.

Normal pressurization on the JetStar was about 8.9 psi at 35,000 feet, but the aircraft had a burst design of 21 psi. The test called for taking the cabin up to 17 psi, and the experts so set their instruments. But the Long Island equipment delivered double the pressure, and so they were trying unwittingly to pump the vessel to 34 psi!

Lockheed built one tough bird and ours held together to 26 psi before the thing exploded in the hangar. When it cracked, people dove for cover. They could have been killed.

The part that finally gave out was a windshield post. When I came to inspect it, the aircraft looked to be in good condition, but the truth was the whole pressure vessel had been twisted and stretched.

After some temporary repairs, a couple of Lockheed test pilots cranked up the four new engines and flew the broken bird -- unpressurized and gear down -- back to Marietta, Ga. Everyone was impressed.

The people at the factory gave the thing a good going over and determined that the fuselage was a goner, but everything else - the empennage, gear, wings, engines and tail were fine. So, they removed the good stuff and stuck them on a new fuselage and sold it - to someone else. We wanted and got an all-new Dash 8 JetStar underwritten by AiResearch, as I recall.

When I recounted that odd experience to Otto Pobanz, the long-time head of Federated Department Stores' flight department, he brightened and said, "Congratulations, Charlie. Yours was the only stretched JetStar in the world."

That's true. And there will never be another like it.

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