C-130 Hercules (N24)

Video from the channel TVMissile_dE about Lockheed C-130 Hercules, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 1:23:27. Language: German. Video type: Documentary.

Documentary from the German channel N24, broadcast on 6 July 2016, dedicated to the C-130 Hercules tactical transport. The through-line is the Lockheed Martin assembly line in Marietta, Georgia. About 2,000 workers are employed there, and each aircraft goes through 14 stations of nine days each. Assembling one unit takes about six months, and around 24 units leave the factory per year, starting at a price of 60 million dollars. The program follows the production's setbacks: delays caused by storms, the search for a hydraulic leak, defective nuts found on five aircraft, and the preparation of a unit destined for South Korea.

The Hercules emerged from a requirement that arose during the Korean War: a transport able to carry 18 tons or 92 soldiers and to operate from short runways. It first flew in August 1954. The documentary reviews several episodes from its history. In 1957 it moved the 101st Airborne Division to Little Rock. At Khe Sanh, in 1968, it carried 65% of the supplies, about 7,000 tons. On 29 April 1975, a C-130A took off from Tan Son Nhut with more than 450 people on board and landed in Thailand. Today that aircraft is on display in Little Rock, home of the 19th Airlift Wing, which operates the largest C-130 fleet. One of those passengers went on to work as an engineer at Lockheed Martin.

The C-130J version is 5 meters longer than the original, at 34 meters, and its cargo hold is 37% larger. It carries four Rolls-Royce engines with six-blade propellers, which together produce more than 18,000 horsepower, 25% more power. The program also shows the aircraft in various missions: cargo and paratrooper drop drills by the Royal Canadian Air Force at Trenton, a Coulson aerial firefighting tanker with a tank of about 13 tons, and an MC-130J from the 27th Special Operations Wing, based at Cannon (New Mexico), refueling CV-22 Osprey tiltrotors in flight. About 2,500 Hercules aircraft have been built in 70 variants.