FORT INDIANTOWN GAP, Pa. - Residents of the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre area may have been a tad startled on the afternoon of Sept. 14 when they saw the fuselage of a C-130 aircraft flying through the sky. Especially since the tail section was nowhere in sight.
Members of the Pennsylvania Army National Guard's 104th Aviation Battalion airlifted the plane in two massive pieces from Forty Fort Airport in Luzerne County to Tobyhanna Army Depot in Monroe County using a CH-47 Chinook helicopter. The tail section arrived at Tobyhanna a few hours after the fuselage.
The pilots, Chief Warrant Officers Jeff Reep and Patrick Quinton, said the 11-ton payload was among the largest loads they had ever seen carried by a Chinook. In fact, the crew was slightly nervous about the heavy cargo, they said, so they reduced their airspeed and were careful to avoid populated areas en route to their destination.
"The load was swaying more than we had anticipated," said Reep, "so it took a little longer than we had hoped to get to our destination. But you have to expect the unexpected when you're carrying a non-standard load."
Apparently, a C-130 is about as non-standard as it gets.
"I don't think this has ever been done before," said Reep. "But thankfully, the engineers at Tobyhanna Army Depot did a great job preparing the load for us."
Missions such as the C-130 airlift benefit all parties involved, said Reep. The depot saves tremendous amounts of time and money by using a helicopter instead of trucks to transport the aircraft. Guardsmen, meanwhile, get to participate in an excellent training opportunity.
"The mission went very well and we got a lot of positive feedback," said Reep. "Anytime we can lift something it's a good day for a Chinook pilot. That's what we're in the business for."
The reassembled C-130, which had previously been used by a soon-to-be-inactive Air Force Reserve unit, will now be used to test the various electronic communication systems developed and maintained by the depot. The systems must be able to be transported by a C-130, so having the aircraft on site will expedite the projects.