Canadair CL-44

Canadair CL-44
Type:	Airliner , transport aircraft
Design country:	Canada
Manufacturer:	Canadair
First flight:	November 15, 1959
Number of pieces:	39

The Canadair CL-44 was a commercial and transport aircraft made by the Canadian manufacturer Canadair with four turboprop engines . The type, derived from the Bristol Britannia , was produced in small numbers in the late 1950s and early 1960s for the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) as the CC-106 Yukon and for civil airlines.

Design and development

In the 1950s, Canadair acquired the license to build the Bristol Britannia airliner. Based on this model, the company developed the CL-44, with which the RCAF wanted to replace its C-54GM North Star , in addition to the CL-28 Argus sea ​​reconnaissance aircraft . What was needed was a long-haul aircraft with which troops and materials could be transported to Europe. In January 1957, Canadair received an order for eight machines, which was later increased to twelve.

The RCAF originally requested the Bristol Orion drive. After the British Ministry of Supply canceled the Orion program, the decision was made to use the Rolls-Royce Tyne 11 turboprop engine . The fuselage of the CL-44 was lengthened by almost four meters and thus roughly corresponded to that of the Britannia 300. It received two lateral ones Cargo doors and a pressurized cabin . The wings and the tail unit were taken over from the CL-28 in a slightly modified form. The Yukon was able to accommodate 134 passengers in addition to a nine-man crew. Eleven crew members and up to eighty patients were intended for use as a hospital aircraft.

commitment

The first flight took place on November 15, 1959. The delivery was delayed due to engine problems. The original version CL-44-6 went to the Canadian Air Force as the CC-106 Yukon , which in December 1961 managed a flight from Tokyo to Trenton , Ontario over 10,860 kilometers in a good 17 hours. Another Yukon was able to stay in the air for almost 24 hours later, setting another record. In addition to eleven transport versions, the RCAF received two machines in VIP design . The aircraft also met with interest in the USA , but the US Air Force decided in favor of the Boeing C-135 for political reasons .

With the CL-44D4 a civil cargo aircraft was created. In order to be able to transport large goods and to speed up loading, the rear part of the hull could be folded away hydraulically within 90 seconds. Despite this unusual design, the aircraft was pressure-resistant . The buyers were the airlines Seaboard World Airlines , Flying Tiger Line , Slick Airways and Icelandic Airlines Loftleiðir , which used one of these aircraft as a passenger plane.

With the third version, the CL-44J, Canadair developed a stretched variant at the request of Loftleiðir that could accommodate up to 189 passengers. However, this increase in capacity had to be bought with a reduced range. Four CL-44D4 were converted in this way. The Icelandic airline operated the machines under the name Rolls Royce 400 PropJet . from which the erroneous name Canadair 400 resulted. In the late 1960s, these were the largest passenger aircraft in transatlantic traffic.

The CC-106 Yukon were decommissioned in March 1971 and sold to South America and Africa. Of the total of 39 CL-44s built, very few still exist, and so far no aircraft can be found in the museum.

Conroy Skymonster

CL-44-O Guppy / Skymonster

A CL-44D4 was later given an enlarged fuselage by Conroy Aircraft and was given the new designation CL-44-O. The aircraft that was supposed to transport the Rolls-Royce engines of the Lockheed L-1011 TriStar to the USA has become known under the names Conroy Skymonster or CL-44  Guppy . From 2002 the Skymonster stood at Bournemouth Airport (EGHH), sometimes with and sometimes without engines. At the end of 2006 she received the Philippine approval RP-C-8023 and was registered with the Australian HeavyLift Cargo Airlines , but not used by them. After a long period of storage in Bournemouth, the machine was sold to the USA in 2013.

use

Operator of brand new machines

The only civilian buyers of new CL-44s were:

• Flying Tiger Line
• Loftleiðir
• Seaboard World Airlines
• Slick Airways

Operators of used machines

Europe and Mediterranean:

• Aer Turas
• British Cargo Airlines
• British Air Ferries
• Cargolux
• Cyprus Airways
• Redcoat Air Cargo
• Trans Mediterranean Airways
• Transmeridian Air Cargo
• Transvalair

Military users

•  Canada

Incidents

From the first flight in 1959 to December 2019, more than half of the 39 Canadair CL-44s built, namely 21, were lost to total losses. This also includes two machines that have been missing since 1972 and 1976. In seven incidents, 140 people were killed, 12 more people are missing along with the two missing machines. Examples:

• On December 24, 1966, a Canadair CL-44D4-1 of the Flying Tiger Line ( aircraft registration number N228SW ) was flown into a settlement approaching Da Nang Airport , killing 111 people, including the four crew members and 107 people on the ground. There were 50 injured. The cause of the accident was that the approach was carried out below the weather minimum, in heavy rain, fog and at night, as a return to another airport was unthinkable due to low fuel reserves (see also flight accident of a Canadair CL-44 in Đà Nẵng 1966 ) .

• On December 2, 1970, a Canadair CL-44J of Cargolux (TF-LLG) crashed on the flight from Tehran to Dhaka shortly before landing at Dhaka-Tejgaon airport . The cause was a locking of the Gust Lock during flight, which made it impossible to control the machine. Four people on board and three on the ground were killed in the crash (see also the Cargolux accident in 1970 ) .

• On July 20, 1972, a Canadair CC-106 Yukon of Aerotransportes Entre Rios (LV-JYR) disappeared on a cargo flight from Montevideo ( Uruguay ) to Santiago de Chile in the Andes . Shortly before the last radar contact, she had flown into Chilean airspace near Las Cuevas (Mendoza) .

• On February 22, 1975, a Canadair CL-44 / CC-106 Yukon of Aerocondor Colombia (HK-1972) hit a tree 10 kilometers from the departure airport in Bogota-Eldorado and fell 1200 meters further into a mountain. All five crew members of the cargo plane were killed.

• On September 27, 1975, a Canadair CC-106 Yukon from Aerotransportes Entre Rios (LV-JSY) overshot the runway end at Miami International Airport , broke through the airport fence , struck a VW bus , fell into a canal, broke apart and burned out. Six of the ten people on board died. The cause of the accident was determined to be a rudder lock on the right elevator that was not removed before take-off (see also Aerotransportes-Entre-Rios flight 501/90 ) .

• On August 28, 1976, a Canadair CC-106 Yukon of the Aeronaves del Peru (OB-R-1104) was on a cargo flight from Lima ( Peru ) to Caracas ( Venezuela ). She never arrived at her destination and was declared missing. It is believed that the machine had an accident in a mountainous and forested area near the Shanisu River, about 400 kilometers north of Lima. The wreck could never be located.

• On September 2, 1977, a Canadair CL-44D4-2 of Transmeridian Air Cargo (G-ATZH) , with which a flight was to be carried out from Kai Tak Airport in Hong Kong to Don Mueang Airport, occurred immediately after take-off an engine failure on engine no. 4, causing a fire. The crew tried to return to the airport, but the fire spread to the fuel system and the wing structure. Only eight minutes after take-off, engine no. 4 broke off part of the right wing and the aircraft crashed into the sea (see also Transmeridian Air Cargo Flight 3751 ) .

Technical data (CL-44D-4)

Parameter	Data
crew	3 plus 1 loadmaster
Passengers	160
length	41.73 m
span	43.37 m
height	11.18 m
Wing area	192.7 m²
Wing extension	9.8
payload	29.960 kg
Empty mass	40,350 kg
Takeoff mass	95,000 kg
Cruising speed	646 km / h
Service ceiling	9,100 m
Range	8,990 km
Engines	4 × Rolls-Royce Tyne 515/50 turboprop with 4,270 kW each

See also

• List of aircraft types

Web links

Commons : Canadair CL-44  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Description on airliners.net (English)
• Detailed information on cl44.com (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ FAA registry, N447FT
2. ^ Tony Eastwood, John Roach: Turbo Prop Airliner Production List . The Aviation Hobby Shop, West Drayton, 2007.
3. ↑ Accident statistics Canadair CL-44 / CC-106 , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on January 24, 2020.
4. ↑ accident report CL-44 N228SW , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on 29 July 2020th
5. ^ Accident report CL-44 TF-LLG , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on July 29, 2020.
6. ^ Aviation Safety Network, Canadair CL-44, LV-JYR, July 20, 1972
7. ^ Accident report CL-44 HK-1972 , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on January 13, 2019.
8. ^ Aviation Safety Network, Canadair CL-44, OB-R-1104, August 28, 1976
9. ^ Accident report CL-44 G-ATZH , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on July 29, 2020.