Courtesy of an e-mail from Eaton Rapids Joe, I was led to this account of a massive pig airlift operation.
Business pard's son flies 747's for Atlas Air. Latest load was around 900 pigs from Cincinnati, stop over in Anchorage. A reverse thruster had stuck, so they had to transfer those pigs to another 747. I figure the big plane can haul around 4 double decker, 18 wheeler (pot) loads of pigs. That's a pot load max of around 50K pounds or so, times 4, still under a 747 max load of 250-300K pounds. They were able to open the 747 nose and side doors to give those pigs some air while the new plane was being readied.
I googled Philippine pig problem and found out they have African Swine Fever Virus, which is contagious and deadly. So the govt is importing 32,000 breeding age pigs from USA and Europe, placing them in ASFV free areas. That virus kills pigs, but does not infect humans. Don't ya know those big planes stank after hauling all those pigs. Bud said the pigs were stomping, were actually shaking the plane. Big plane, but lots of stomping pigs. (Stomping, mad pigs.... would make a great Antifa demonstration).
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Wonder what a "pig ticket" for a half the way around the world trip would cost. And times 900.... And ultimately 32,000 pigs.... Only a govt could afford that, for sure not pig farmers.
There's more at the link, particularly comments from other interested readers. My favorite: "Ha! In the Philippines they'll offload 900 pigs and haul them off on three motorbikes, two garongs and a jeepney." Friends who've been there assure me that's more likely than not . . .
The story reminded me of one of the more "interesting" freight problems involved in flying the Hump, the air transportation of men, machines and equipment from India to China during the Second World War. I wrote about it at some length several years ago. One of the most difficult tasks was to fly mules and donkeys to China for use as pack animals, which were essential in the heavily forested terrain of Burma and nearby areas. The Hump loadmasters would cram anything up to a dozen into C-46 or C-47 transports, and fly them all the way to China. The trouble was, their urine would seep through the aluminum floor plates and corrode the control cables that ran from the cockpit to the tail. The problem was discovered one day when a C-47 pilot taxied out to the runway in China, to take off for a return flight to India, and discovered that the rudder would no longer answer to his control inputs. Subsequent inspection revealed that all the planes used for those animal cargoes were in just as parlous a condition, requiring major overhauls and the replacement of many control cables and surfaces before they could go back to work.
Of course, domesticated (or semi-domesticated) livestock is manageable as cargo. Wild animals . . . not so much. One of my favorite episodes was Operation Crocodile in South Africa in 1970. Conservationist Ian Player was trying to rescue a number of Nile crocodiles from an estuary threatened by severe drought. He appealed to the South African Air Force, which made available one of its then-new Super Frelon helicopters.
Hilarity - and a great deal of bad language - ensued. The game rangers and their assistants had to capture, then immobilize the crocodiles, one after another, and load them into cargo nets (a process in which the animals proved to be less than cooperative). The helicopter would then hover overhead (producing violent protests from the crocodiles, who didn't want anything to do with this strange bird), hook up the net, and airlift the croc to a safer place several miles up-river. Once there, it was lowered to the ground, the net was removed, and the ropes and tape and other immobilizing bits and pieces were taken off. This had to be done very carefully, always being prepared for some very high-speed maneuvers to get away from the by now extremely annoyed crocodile. Video footage of proceedings was very popular with everyone except those immediately involved!
Africa, of course, is a very strange place, and its animals and aviation have their own stories to tell. One of the worst is, I assure you, absolutely true. People sometimes accuse me of making it up, so I'll let you read the news report at the link to prove that no, I'm not.
Peter
Having help take little piggy to market, I suspect the noise from irritated hogs was just about the same decibel level as the engines. One pig squeals, they all squeal
ReplyDeleteWhen I was stationed at AFKN-Seoul for a year, I had some outside-the-post voice and English-language tutoring jobs, so I had good reason to travel a lot around urban Seoul - and one of the things I always marveled at was how much the riders of motorbikes could cram onto the back of those vehicles (which were usually reinforced with a heavy-duty brace.) The jaw-dropping example that I spotted on the avenue outside Yongsan Garrison's #1 gate one afternoon was a full-sized refrigerator/freezer, upright and balanced perfectly on the back of the motorbike.
ReplyDeleteLOL, Neil has some 'interesting' stories about hauling pigs for Air America too!
ReplyDeleteYou should listen to the stories from the guys over in the hangars that did the refurbishing of 747s out of the Middle East. They have a lot of experience handling cleanup from transporting animals juxtaposed against gold-plated toilets.
ReplyDelete1968 while attending college, I was a bag smasher for Braniff. One day the only cargo in the rear pit was a huge hog. The crate didn't hold his waste. For the rest of the shift we all smelled. The coveralls went directly into the washing machine that night.
ReplyDeleteNot animals but close, skydivers. The nominal load for a DC3 is 30 people. At an event in the 70s we had a DC3 operating and were building ever larger freefall formations. Loads got bigger, boundaries got pushed and on the last load we tooke 55 people and minimum fuel. It was a slow climb to altitude.
ReplyDeleteAir Travails
ReplyDeleteA long ago office mate, a Bolivian national, related a story of airborne “beef haulers” / “carniceros” in Bolivia. “Caballeros Del Aire”. Located at about 12K feet and absent a dependable road system and transport, La Paz, Bolivia is still somewhat dependent of air transport for delivery of food and other necessities. In the 1950’s it was very much dependent. Filling that need, a small fleet of surplus B-17, C-46 and C-47 aircraft provided transport of beef from lowland production centers in the Beni region to the high altitude of the Andes. La Paz is situated in something of a punchbowl, requiring incoming beef haulers to make a corkscrew approach. Sides of beef hung vertically in the cargo area and secured as best as possible still had inclination to shift if not sway with motion of the aircraft. As my friends story related, whether in the ready shack, on the ramp or on approach, operations no doubt were a Latin version of “Terry & the Pirates”.
On one occasion in RVN traveling from here-to-there, hitched a ride on a civilian Curtis C-46. Shared the area with several families of Vietnamese Popular Force (PF) troops, their families, chickens and a piglet or two. Impressed me be somewhere between “Pack Up Your Troubles In Your Old Kit Bag” and “Grapes of Wrath”.
I would they would use at least two jeepneys
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