Sud-Est SE.2010
| Sud-Est SE.2010 Armagnac | |
|---|---|
|
|
| Type: | Airliner |
| Design country: | |
| Manufacturer: | |
| First flight: |
April 2, 1949 |
| Production time: |
until 1952 |
| Number of pieces: |
9 |
The Sud-Est SE.2010 Armagnac was a four-engine long-haul airliner produced by the French manufacturer SNCASE . With a takeoff weight of over 77 tons and a wingspan of almost 50 meters, it was one of the largest civil aircraft and offered space for up to 160 passengers. In addition to the prototype from 1949, eight series aircraft were built in Toulouse . Due to a lack of economic efficiency, they were scrapped from the end of the 1950s, the last two in 1968 and 1975.
history
The SE.2010 Armagnac was the successor to the SE.161 . Development began in the early 1940s for Air France . The aircraft, initially designated as SE.2000, were intended to be used in transatlantic traffic. The Second World War delayed development. The first flight took place on April 2, 1949.
The plan was to deliver 15 aircraft to Air France. In 1952 the airline withdrew the contract. This was justified with the insufficient range for the transatlantic traffic. The Armagnac was considered too big for economic use on alternative routes. Another point of criticism was the unsatisfactory engine performance. Since series production had already started, eight more copies were completed and offered to other airlines.
construction
The Armagnac was an all-metal aircraft designed as a mid- wing aircraft and had a retractable three-legged landing gear. Four were used as drive Pratt & Whitney R-4360-B13 Wasp Major - radial engines with 3500 hp the strongest available engines. They turned out to be too weak due to the heavy aircraft weight. Four- blade controllable pitch propellers with a diameter of 4.65 meters were used.
A special feature was the unusually large fuselage with a circular diameter of 4.70 meters. This was subsequently expanded to create enough space for bunks . Since the range was reduced from 6500 to 5000 kilometers as a result of this redesign, transatlantic flights were only possible to a limited extent.
Up to 160 people could be accommodated in the pressure-ventilated passenger cabin. The standard seating provided for 78 seats, on long-haul flights the plan was to transport 60 to 64 passengers in bunk beds.
use
Of the eight completed series aircraft, four went to TAI between May and November 1952, which used them to fly the routes to Abidjan , Casablanca , Dakar and Tananarivo, as well as making pilgrimage flights to Mecca . The aircraft had been loaned to the company free of charge by the French government in the hope that it would order more. However, due to the lack of profitability, TAI withdrew the machines from the spring of 1953. The last aircraft left the fleet in June 1953 after only eight months of service.
The airline SAGETA (Société Auxiliaire de Gérance et d'Exploitation de Transport Aériens) was founded specifically for this purpose to transport freight, mail and soldiers from France to French Indochina . The shareholders of the new company were Aigle Azur , Air France, Transports Aériens Intercontinentaux (TAI) , Union Aéromaritime de Transport (UAT) and the manufacturer SNCASE. It took over seven aircraft from the government on a free loan basis to serve the route from Toulouse to Saigon (usually via Beirut , Karachi and Calcutta ). The first test flight on this route began on December 22, 1953. At the end of July 1954, all 7 Armagnacs were in service.
At the end of the Indochina War in 1954, the Armagnacs were initially parked. Two machines were still used in 1956 to bring the French athletes to the Summer Olympics in Melbourne . Until October 1958, machines of this type were used by SAGETA on short and medium-haul routes, e.g. B. to Great Britain , Djibouti and Tunisia . From 1955, the machines, which were then just five years old, were gradually scrapped. The last machine served as a test vehicle for the development of an afterburner for the ATAR turbojet engine. At the end of 1958, the five remaining aircraft were parked again in Paris-Orly at the end of 1958 and transferred to Bordeaux-Merignac airport in early 1959 , where the last one was scrapped in 1975.
Incidents
From the first flight in 1949 to the end of operations in 1959, the Armagnac suffered two total write-offs of aircraft. A total of five people were killed in both cases.
- On June 30, 1950, a Sud-Est SE.2010 Armagnac ( aircraft registration F-WAVA ) of the manufacturer SNCASE had an accident while taking off from Toulouse-Blagnac airport . Part of the wing nose had come loose and led to the accident. The machine caught fire and was destroyed. Of the eleven inmates, two were killed, as well as one person on the ground.
- On January 29, 1957, an SE.2010 Armagnac (F-BAVG) of the French airline SAGETA had an accident during an unsuccessful go-around attempt in the fog at Paris-Orly airport . The machine was used for an Air France charter flight from Tunis and was already making its second attempt at approach. Since full throttle was given too late, the plane hit the right wing, which then came loose. The hull broke into four parts. One passenger and one crew member were killed, the other 68 (according to another source 64) occupants of the aircraft survived, 30 of them injured.
Technical specifications
| Parameter | Data |
|---|---|
| crew | 7–9, including 3–4 flight attendants |
| Passengers | 64-160 |
| length | 39.63 m |
| span | 48.95 m |
| height | 13.50 m |
| Wing area | 235.60 m² |
| Empty mass | 37,813 kg |
| Takeoff mass | 77,500 kg |
| Cruising speed | 460 km / h |
| Top speed | 525 km / h |
| Service ceiling | 6800 m |
| Range | 5150 km |
| Engines | four air-cooled 28-cylinder radial engines Pratt & Whitney R-4360 -B13 Wasp Major; 3,500 PS each (approx. 2,570 kW) |
See also
literature
- Derek King: The Sud-Est SE2010 Armagnac , in: Air-Britain Aviation World , September 2012
- Helmut Kreuzer: All Propeller Aircraft 1945 - Today , Ratingen 1989, pp. 35–36
- John Stroud: European Transport Aircraft since 1910. Putnam & Company, London 1966, pp. 198-199.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Leonard Bridgman (Ed.): Jane's All The World's Aircraft, 1952-53. Sampson Low, Marston & Company, London 1952, p. 18.
- ↑ Gerard, Gourlan, Le musee UTA, Armagnac (French), accessed on August 22, 2017
- ↑ Gerard, Gourlan, Le musee UTA, TAI (French), accessed on August 22, 2017
- ↑ Stroud 1966, p. 198.
- ↑ Stroud 1966, p. 199.
- ↑ SE-2010, in: Klassiker der Luftfahrt 5/2014, pp. 30–33
- ↑ Accident statistics SNCASE SE.2010 Armagnac , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on December 17, 2017.
- ↑ accident report SE.2010 Armagnac F-WAVA , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on 11 December 2018th
- ^ Air-Britain Archive: Casualty compendium part 69 (English), June 1998, pp. 98/56.
- ↑ accident report SE.2010 Armagnac F-BAVG , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on 11 December 2018th