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| - I flew in "Flaming Mamie" on many Flight Icing Research missions from The Cleveland NACA Lewis Flight Propulsion Lab. between January 1947-50.
:I sat in the Navigator's seat to take photos in flight. The system used hot gases for heating the leading edges of the wings and tail sections. This method was invented by Lewis Rodert who won the Collier Trophy for this work. I was on her when we lost the starboard engine on takeoff and was safely brought down by pilots Howard Lilly and Joe Walker, both later killed in flights in NACA/NASA planes at Muroc AFB; Lilly in the Douglas D-558-1 Skystreak and Walker in a F-104 chase plane. Walker went into orbit with the X-15 on one of his flights.
:''Flaming Mamie''
:After the Flight Icing Research program which the B-25 shared with a B-24 Liberator, ''Flaming Mamie'' was turned over to NASA Lewis Cleveland for use in the Full Scale Aircraft Crash Fire Program at the Ravenna Ohio Arsenal and was among 57 planes used in the seven-year program. The aircraft was scrapped but not in the conventional way but "died" in the furtherance of air safety. These two aircraft were the most were "de-iceable" planes in the world. On two separate occasions, both planes experienced the gathering of seven inches of ice in 70 seconds and lost 70 miles per hour and got down on the ground with the ice still clinging to the aircraft after making runs testing the amount of ice that could be accumulated. All aircraft, military and airlines, use the anti-icing or de-icing systems today from the program started in the early 1940s ending in 1957. It is said that no aircraft has ever been lost using the equipment if the equipment is turned on. The B-24 was returned to the Air Force and scrapped in the conventional way. It is too bad that one of these historic planes, so important to aviation air safety was not preserved in the Air Force Museum WPAFB where two other Lewis Lab planes are housed today. Icing photos are available through NASA Glenn Research Center (formerly Lewis) in Cleveland. I was one of two flight photographers working in the program. (en)
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