Largest Flight-Deck Crew

[seacue]

Is the original Boeing 314 flight deck crew complement of five a record for heavier-than-air craft?
http://www.zpub.com/sf/history/314c.jpg
"PAA nautical theme bestowed the crew with maritime ratings and uniforms. A master crew position, equivalent to a ship’s captain, was in overall command. His desk (without flying controls) was on the port side of the control cabin, third behind the (first) pilot and the navigator. With operating experience, this position was later eliminated."

Note the simple pilots instrument panel!
http://www.zpub.com/sf/history/B314instrumentpanel.jpg

[larssnowpharter]

I have flown on the 124 on a number of occasions. Normal flight deck used to be:

2 pilots
2 flight engineers
1 nav
1 Comms officer

There would often be a charter manager also.

[goudie]

Seacue
What a coincidence. Listened to a prog. on BBC yesterday about Flying Boats and then found the same pics on the 'net. Was amazed to see them here this a.m. Seems to me these wonderful craft were run on the lines of a ship, i.e. the pilots were actually the helmsmen!

[con-pilot]

Two aircraft that I believe would have a larger flightdeck are the Convair B-36 and of course the Spruce Goose.

[411A]

The Lockheed Constitution.

Only two were built for the US Navy and the normal FD crew count was...

Commander
1st pilot (occupying the LHS during cruise)
2nd pilot (RHS)
Flight Engineer
Radio officer
Navigator
In flight mechanic

For the last position, the inflight mechanic, he could, if it was necessary, access each engine from a walkway/crawlway inside the wing, just behind the engines (R4360's...and even with these, it was grossly underpowered).

The FD was very large....a square dance could well have been held there if the seats were removed.
The Constitution had two decks and could carry three hundred full battle ready troups

[ZH875]

The Nimrod R1 has a large flight deck crew.....




.....but the back end crew are even larger.:p

[brakedwell]

Bristol Britannia.
2 Drivers
1 Ginger beer
1 Marco Polo
1 Macaroni

[NRU74]

It looks as if the guy on the left hand side is doing the dhobi

[parabellum]

Since you mention 'heavier than air' what about the crew of the original airships? What, for example, was the crew complement of the R101?

[WHBM]

I have flown on the 124 on a number of occasions. Normal flight deck used to be:

2 pilots
2 flight engineers
1 nav
1 Comms officer

There would often be a charter manager also.
Antonov 22s also had this sort of crew, but in addition to those 6 listed there might be a translator (where none of the crew could speak English and none of the Soviet English-speakers could handle an aircraft crew position !) and sometimes a KGB "minder" for the crew when on the ground at Western points.

It's still common for Russian aircraft to have notably heavy flightdeck crews. The Bashkirian Tu154 involved in the midair with the DHL 757 over Switzerland a few years ago, for example, had a crew of 5 on the flight deck.

[Loki]

How many seats did the Chinese Tridents have? I`m sure I read somewhere that the flight deck was enlarged to accomodate extra bodies.

[Footless Halls]

I remember reading in "The German Giants", many years ago that some of the German R-planes had pretty enormous crews, with the Captain I believe often not the pilot.

Does anyone else remember the book? It was written sufficiently long ago that the author interviewed surviving crew-members and I always remember that one of them, asked what it was like to fly a Staaken R6 (or whatever it was called) remembered "we sweated like pigs".

Some of these aircraft had inboard mounted engines with propellers on outriggers driven by shafts or gears (highly inefficient and unreliable) and so had large crews on board to include engineers.

However, most sadly, I don't have a copy of the book to check.

Even so, it is surely true that the rigid airships of the 1920's and 1920's must hold the record for the largest flight-crews on a 'flight-deck'. One of the British rigid's (R34?) crew compartment survives, I think, at the RAF Museum at Hendon.

[ICT_SLB]

My copy of "The Role of the Bomber" by Ronald W. Clark states that the German six-engined "Giants" which bombed England in late 1917 had crews of up to nine, carried up to six machine guns and had a wingspan of 138 feet. There is a model of one in the Smithsonian and it's huge! Googling for a picture I came across this website http://www.bravenewworld.demon.co.uk/lists/germangiants/index.htm
IIRC the losses per ton of bombs from their WW1 raids prompted the near-panic among the authorities prior to the Blitz - they envisioned casualties in the 1,000s every day.

An old American history of Flight book I have gives the crew of an L-40 class Zeppelin as 22 but probably not all would be flight deck crew or on duty at the same time if they were to meet the maximum flight duration given of four days.

[Spooky 2]

At Pan Am in the B707 days it was fairly common to have;
1 Capt
2 F/O'
2 FE's
1 Nav

Of course there was only seating for five on the flight deck so one or more sat in a desiganted rest area in the cabin.

I use to occasionaly fly a former KLM 1049H. It had seating in the cockpit for;
1 Capt
1 F/O
1 FE
1 Radio Operator right behind the Capt.
1 Nav that was actually in the crew rest compartment just aft of the cockpit. Obviously if you added relief crewmembers to this group you had the makings of a real crowd.

[STATSMAN]

How many flight deck crew on a PIA 777, some with red & gold rings (are these FE) ?

[Blacksheep]

The 'Skipper/Helmsman/Navigator/Engineer/Wireless Operator' 5 man crew was fairly standard on large multi-piston flying machines. First to go was the Wireless Operator, followed by the Navigator then the Engineer.

The Helmsman (F/O) will be next. ;)

[dixi188]

Wireless operator went when Morse communications no longer required.
Navigators went with the introduction of INS, VLF/Omega, LORAN, GPS, etc.
Flight Engineer replaced by computers, but only on new build types, not by modifications. (Except Fedex DC-10 and Atlantic Electra)
Hence I still have a job in the middle seat.:)

Also remember a "Strait and Level" (Roger Bacon) item years ago that came up with the ideal crew complement for a stopover of eleven. All of course had to take their cricket whites with them.

Safe flying.

[pigboat]

How about that Dornier X thing that had an engine for every day of the month. Probably had a half-dozen FE's. ;)

[Flypuppy]

The An-225 has a crew of 7 for normal ops;
1 x Captain
1 x FO
2 x Flight Engineers
1 x Navigator
1 x Communications specialist
1 x Loadmaster

The An-124 has a nominal crew of 6 but the one I saw had a crew of 15...

[ANW]

Refer this photo (http://www.edendale.co.uk/124/WFD.4.12.html)
As noted in the AN225 post above, there is, in addition to the flight deck crew, also a cargo manager/loadmaster and a large number of 'technicians' who travel down the back in the seperate upper rear compartment, just forward of the tail. The technicians include engineers for down route routine maintenance and personnel for loading cargo. Total crew complement can be quite high, I noted 18 on one occasion.

[TwoDeadDogs]

Hi there
I have had the opportunity to have a look around the inside of a few Russian aircraft over time and they all seem to have the same characteristics: an excess of persons, most of whom seem to be labourers/mechs;most smoke and will do so at every opportunity(and will profess not to understand when bidden to quench the fags!); the cleanliness of the aircraft and it's crew is in direct proportion to it's distance from the cargo apron,i.e, carry pax and it's reasonably clean and not too dented;carry cargo and it looks like a convention of winos running a tenth-grade tramp steamer.Often, only the pilots wear uniforms.Several times,I have seen security types accost Eastern european aircrew for non-wearing of yellow bibs:p.they usually get zero thanks for that!
Still, Russian aircraft are more interesting that Blandbuses.
regards
TDD

[Footless Halls]

Guilty of threadcreep I know but...

1) Is it a fact that the Boeing 314 was the only aircraft ever fitted with a porcelein urinal in the gents?

and

2) What happened to the Boeing 314's after the War? Short flying- boats, Sunderland derivatives and even some C-class boats were used for several years after the War. Wat about the Boeings?

[WHBM]

2) What happened to the Boeing 314's after the War? Short flying- boats, Sunderland derivatives and even some C-class boats were used for several years after the War. Wat about the Boeings?
Fate of each of the Big Clippers listed here :

http://www.flyingclippers.com/panam.html