Perfectly valid technique in Albert.

3 Engined Ferry T/O required a sign off by Group however.

You are of course correct.

And there is the classic story around about a C47 being started ‘Briggs ‘n Stratton’ style, with a rope around the prop hub!

Standard back up procedure, certainly during the war, even to be found in some flight manuals.Alternative if you had a second airframe available was for him to park in front and use his prop wash to spin up your dead engine.

I went inside an airworthy C-123 at Oshkosh in 2017, but didn't see it fly. It's a big aircraft.

Slight thread drift but one of the best Vietnam era books I've read is "Flying Through Midnight", concerning C-123 operations during the secret war in Laos:


https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....931c78535c.png

The key section of the book is a gripping description of a night-time emergency diversion, with no lights, navaids or comms, descending through jagged limestone mountains to land at the secret CIA airstrip at Long Tieng (Lima Site 20A):


https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....ddc1e6691f.png

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....67f99882ca.png

Once saw a 130 do a three engine take off from a SF Camp next to the Cambodian Border....ground fire took out the number one engine during the landing.....and without a doubt had it remained on the ground for any length of time it would have been destroyed.

It departed at a fairly flat manner with some noticeable yaw seen but went on to a major airfield for repair.

It used every inch of the runway and was some admirable airmanship to watch.


Perhaps the ultimate C-123 story is one that occurred during the evacuation of the Khan Doc SF Camp as it was surrounded and ultimately overrun by NVA Forces.

To close the circle.....Mort the USAF Combat Controller mentioned in the article was the last Man out of Khan Duc having been one of three Combat Controllers mistakenly inserted there at the very end of the evacuation.

Mort was a scuba diving and beer drinking buddy of mine when I was working in the Philippines.

He never mentioned his experience there until one. of his Team Mates from Clark AFB told me about it and I asked him to tell me his story.

It was an amazing thing that happened that day.

My Chinook Unit lost an aircraft there and that story is an interesting one as well.

The C-123 Pilot received the Medal of Honor for his rescue of the three Combat Controllers.

There are some detailed accounts of the Khan Doc incident that bear reading.


https://www.littlerock.af.mil/News/C...8046/kham-duc/

Sorry, Treadigraph. No need for fuel-it was a “Ground Cafe/O-Club Extension”.

A Keith Ferris painting of the event:
https://www.historynet.com/wp-conten...scues-lead.jpg

15 degrees change of runway alignment might have made life a bit easier!

Somewhere there's a pic of a whole herd of passengers doing that on a DC-2 somewhere in the Dutch East indies - might have been in the London -Sydney Air race

Back in the day, at Habilayn (up-country from Aden) the Beverley would charge down the runway on three, unfeather and start the dead one, come to a shuddering halt in a great cloud of dust, then smugly taxy back, load the troops and depart. I never flew Beverleys, buy it was fun to watch.

Read this thread and logged in immediately to the South American river bookstore to buy Flying through Midnight. Only available in hardcover at forty two quid. Anyone know about availability in paperback?

Try World of Books https://www.wob.com/en-gb . When I looked earlier, they had one copy available......at £5!

Try this site: It is my first “Go To” in my demented quest for Aviation or Maritime books.
https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/Sea...20T%20Halliday

Thanks BEagle. Got it.

Please come back and tell us what you thought of the book. It's many years since I read it. I need to dig out my copy and read it again.

PS Lots of cheap used copies on http://abebooks.com

PPS I see albatross beat me to it!

Twin Pioneers had a long pole,with a hoop on the end,for turning the prop,minimising `hydraulicing` before starting,sometimes used for starting,but `Brakedwell` would be the man to tell of `derring-do`...

You can download it here - free trial offer.

https://masterpdf.pro/download/43304...alliday-john-t

Ben Tre Thai C-123 early morning damp PSP one prop failed to go into reverse scratch one of the five of our aircraft parked along side the strip crew sun bathing on the Huey roof made a hasty exit stage right when they saw it coming

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....1c4ae4b5e1.png
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....520a4a0193.png