Ct-43a (b737-200)

[TSR2]

Just been watching Aircrash Investigation on NatGeo about the crash of a USAF CT-43A Flight IFOR21 near Dubrovnik in 1996.
The programme stated that the CT-43A was 'almost identical to the B737 (200) commercial passenger aeroplane' but during the reconstruction, several views showed a third crew member on the flightdeck at what appeared to be a flight engineers station. However, in every view this third person was forward facing and was never seen facing the side instrumentation panel.
Were any B737's manufactured for a 3 man flight crew or was this just 'artistic license' for reconstruction purposes, or was there another reason for the presence of the third person?

[BelArgUSA]

Hola TSR -
xxx
I have not seen the movie you cite in reference about the T-43.
xxx
Fact is, the 737-200 was flown initially by 3 cockpit crewmembers by a few airlines in the USA, United and Western, as far as I recall, even though designed for 2 pilot crew sans F/E... This was based on an old FAA rule that required airplanes over 80,000 lbs gross weight to be operated by 2 pilots + flight engineer. I cannot recall what the USAF did with with the T-43.
xxx
Sometimes, the USAF crews airplanes differently than their civilian equivalents. The KC-135 tanker is flown by 2 pilots and a navigator, no flight engineer (although it is an equivalent of the 707 type).
xxx
With United and Western, the 737 "third crewmember" did very little, but the walkaround, and participated in check lists, or paperwork, maybe in charge of a few things here or there. Fact is, when UAL and WAL finally supressed the third pilot of their 737s, they also reduced the amount of flight time and duty time that could such crew be assigned by roster.
xxx
In Argentina, as an example, we always have 3 pilot crews in the 747-400s, although a "2 pilots only" type aircraft, because of the length of flights and duty time required for typical 747-400 routes. As we started to phase-out the 747-200s, rather than retiring the flight engineers, we qualified most of them with a pilot licence, and made them "cruise co-pilots". These crewmembers continue the many functions that they did with the 200s, such as walk-around, monitor fueling, and parts of cockpit set-up, write bug cards and are also participating/read some check lists, and must be present in the cockpit for takeoff, approach and landing.
xxx
:)
Happy contrails