One Hundred Years of U.S. Navy Air Power (50 page)

CHAPTER 11

Straight Up: Vertical Flight in the U.S. Navy

Kevin J. Delamer

THE EARLY DEVELOPMENT OF NAVAL HELICOPTERS: SOMEONE ELSE'S PROBLEM

T
he story of naval aviation is the tale of a century spent surpassing artificial boundaries and constraints, often imposed by individuals who were not themselves naval aviators. The history of rotary-wing aviation in the naval Services is a parallel story. The first demonstration of the capability of a helicopter to operate from a ship was sponsored by the Maritime Commission and was conducted by an Army Air Force pilot on 7 May 1943. Colonel R. F. Gregory completed his preflight checks at Stratford, Connecticut, started the aircraft and “pulled pitch”—that is to say, raised the control lever in his left hand, the collective, increasing the pitch on all of the main rotor blades simultaneously. This increased pitch generated increased lift and the XR-4 helicopter rose into the air, stabilized for a moment, and headed for the Long Island Sound, where the SS
Bunker Hill
lay at anchor with U.S. Navy representatives embarked to witness the demonstration. The ship was a tanker modified with a plywood landing platform amidships. The arrangement of the landing platform, athwartships and surrounded by cargo-handling posts and booms, was less then optimal. Like many of the conditions in which naval rotary-wing aviation developed, this arrangement was a precedent that would require time to overcome. Colonel Gregory completed twenty-four
¹
flights from the deck of
Bunker Hill
that day, with intervening landings of the pontoon-equipped XR-4 on the water of Long Island Sound.
²
In a sense, naval rotary-wing aviation was born that spring day, with an Army pilot at the controls. But the decisions that gave birth to naval rotary-wing
aviation predate this demonstration. They were largely decisions made by officers of the United States Coast Guard.

There were a number of promoters of military helicopters. Colonel Gregory was a supporter, having been involved in efforts to adapt the Sikorsky VS-300 into a militarily useful aircraft. The senior leadership of the U.S. Navy did not include any advocates for this new technology. Far from embracing the helicopter, a series of attempts were made to assign the tasks associated with developing this new technology to someone else—anyone else! Initially, the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations declined to participate in the development of military helicopters, requesting instead that the U.S. Army Air Force proceed with the development and advise the Navy once a suitable model was available.
³
Even after the Army had determined that the VS-300 met the established criteria, the Navy remained skeptical. The Bureau of Aeronautics did issue a planning document in July 1942 calling for the procurement of four helicopters to be used in experiments, but in February 1943, Commander in Chief, U.S. Fleet assigned the task of exploring the use of ship-based helicopters for anti-submarine warfare to the Coast Guard.
⁴
The U.S. Coast Guard operated as part of the U.S. Navy during time of war, but the assignment of the development task to that Service did not represent a ringing endorsement of the new technology.

The pontoon-equipped XR-4 flights from the USS
Bunker Hill
in May 1943 marked the birth of naval rotary-wing aviation
.

The simple fact is that Navy helicopters, now so ubiquitous a part of every naval operation, owe their existence to the U.S. Coast Guard. The development of naval rotary-wing aviation begins before the U.S. Navy expressed any interest. In May 1940, when Igor Sikorsky conducted his first public demonstration, officers of the U.S. Coast Guard were present. Commander Watson Burton, the Commander of Air Station, Floyd Bennett Field, and Commander William Kossler, Chief of the Aviation Engineering Division at Coast Guard Headquarters immediately recognized the capabilities that the new technology represented. Additional demonstrations for the U.S. military followed, witnessed by an expanding circle of Coast Guardsmen including Lieutenant Commander Frank Erickson.

Erickson was destined to have a profound impact on the development of Navy helicopters. An early helicopter enthusiast, having read about Sikorsky's prewar experiments, he “saw great possibilities for an aircraft that could be operated from the deck of a small ship.”
⁵
In June 1942 Erickson had reported to Air Station Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, New York, as the executive officer. Shortly after his arrival, Commander Kossler, who had taught at the Coast Guard Academy when Erickson was a cadet, made a routine visit to Floyd Bennett Field. The substance of their discussions revolved around Sikorsky's helicopters. Before the end of the month Kossler's assistant, Lieutenant Bill Kenly, was sent to an appointment with Igor Sikorsky—by way of Brooklyn. Kenly asked if he could get someone to fly him to Stratford, Connecticut, for his meeting. Erickson later learned that the stop at Brooklyn was a subterfuge aimed at judging the true level of his interest in the project.
⁶
If Kossler had any doubts, they were alleviated by the enthusiastic response of the executive officer. The date was 26 June and Erickson was en route to becoming Coast Guard Helicopter Pilot Number One.

The fervor demonstrated by these Coast Guard pioneers was arrayed against determined skeptics at the Navy's Bureau of Aeronautics. In November 1941 President Franklin Delano Roosevelt issued an executive order placing the Coast Guard under the operational control of the Navy.
⁷
This fact constrained the efforts of the Coast Guard to purchase helicopters. By law, Coast Guard aircraft procurement was controlled by the Bureau of Aeronautics (BuAer), an organization hostile to the idea of developing rotary-wing aircraft. In 1942 it was a large bureaucratic organization with a wide scope of responsibility including fleet operations, procurement, research, development of shipboard systems supporting aircraft, and numerous other functions. The divisions, committees, and boards that performed these functions had evolved into a variety of fiefdoms, none of which experimental helicopters fell into comfortably. The attitude of the Navy as perceived by the Coast Guard leadership was simple. The helicopter had originally been proposed as a “flying lifeboat.” When Commander Kossler initially discussed the procurement of helicopters with Coast Guard flag officers the response was emphatic: “Hell, Bill, the
Navy is not interested in lifesaving, [
sic
] they just want to get on with the business of killing the enemy.”
⁸
While the later assignment of submarines and patrol aircraft to the recovery of downed airmen belies this attitude, the realities in early 1942 of an avalanche of immediate, critical tasks assigned to the bureau at the very least drove experimentation on helicopters to a very low priority.

Against this backdrop, Erickson accompanied Kenly to Stratford, Connecticut. After conducting what the official history termed an “inspection,”
⁹
he spent two nights composing his report.
¹⁰
The proposal was also shaped by the state of the war in the Atlantic. May and June 1942 were the months in which the Allies lost the greatest tonnage to date to submarines. Of over 1.2 million tons of merchant shipping lost in two months, over 90 percent was lost on the fringes of North America.
¹¹
Erickson recognized the potential utility of the helicopter for anti-submarine warfare. Initially envisioning these aircraft as scouting platforms that could extend the search horizon of convoy escorts, the proposals redefined the proposed use of rotary-wing aircraft from the Coast Guard–specific task of rescue operations to a task with which the Navy was struggling: anti-submarine warfare. Erickson's concept involved the operation of helicopters from platforms mounted on merchant vessels, providing additional search assets and allowing a smaller number of escorts to protect effectively a larger convoy. Unescorted merchantmen could also be provided with a means of detecting and thus avoiding submarines.
¹²
Erickson also posited the use of helicopters to deliver depth charges more accurately than did fixed-wing aircraft. He proposed a procedure that would later become helicopter in-flight refueling (HIFR) and suggested that helicopters could rescue the crews of vessels that did fall victim to submarines. These rescue operations, while a core Coast Guard capability, were couched in terms of relieving other ships in convoys of this dangerous task that made them more vulnerable to submarines. While the broad array of potential benefits did convince his immediate superiors within the Coast Guard, the Navy remained skeptical. The Bureau of Aeronautics did issue a planning directive that called for the procurement of four Sikorsky helicopters for further research and development.
¹³
A planning directive proved to be a far different thing than an aircraft on hand.

Erickson's proposals did receive strong support from his chain of command. The Commanding Officer of Air Station Floyd Bennett Field and the District Commander, Rear Admiral Stanley Parker, who was a qualified aviator himself, both strongly endorsed Erickson's letter.
¹⁴
In November 1942, Parker also made the pilgrimage to Stratford to see Sikorsky and his machine. More importantly, Parker wrote a personal letter to Vice Admiral Russell Waesche, Commandant of the Coast Guard, suggesting that the commandant view a demonstration of the Sikorsky helicopter. On the advice of Parker, Coast Guard pilot number seven and the senior aviator in the Coast Guard, Vice Admiral Waesche, did just that on 13 February 1942, witnessing what Erickson called “a very impressive demonstration.”
¹⁵
So impressed
was the commandant that upon his return to Washington he requested a meeting with Admiral Ernest J. King, Chief of Naval Operations (CNO).

Outside the Coast Guard, events were in motion that would further the cause of developing Navy helicopters. Grover Loening, a German immigrant who received the first postgraduate degree in aeronautical engineering granted by Columbia University, was an aviation pioneer. He was also a consultant to the War Production Board, an organization chartered to regulate the production of war material and the allocation of resources. Loening supported development of helicopters for anti-submarine warfare. He also advocated that the project not be carried forward by the Navy Bureau of Aeronautics, but rather that it be assigned to the Maritime Commission, War Shipping Administration, or the Coast Guard. Concurrent with Loening's intercession on behalf of rotary-wing, anti-submarine aircraft, Britain weighed in with an order for two hundred Sikorsky helicopters for anti-submarine work.
¹⁶
If the U.S. Navy was not sold on the concept, the Royal Navy certainly was.

All these events converged to provide the background for the meeting between Admirals King and Waesche. King remained under significant pressure to stem the losses among merchant shipping caused by submarines.
¹⁷
The British support for helicopters was a double-edged sword, as King and his British counterparts were famously adversarial.
¹⁸
In the end, the needs of the Battle of the Atlantic prevailed. Waesche offered another tool with which to combat the German U-boats. Two days after Waesche returned from Connecticut, King, either in his capacity as CNO or as Commander in Chief, U.S. Fleet, began issuing a series of directives. The Coast Guard was given responsibility for developing helicopters to combat the submarine threat. The Bureau of Aeronautics was directed to carry out tests to determine the suitability of the Sikorsky helicopter for ship-based anti-submarine warfare. The Commandant of the Coast Guard, in turn, appointed Kossler to lead the Coast Guard effort, which, in effect, made him responsible for the development of all naval helicopters. Kossler, in turn, arranged for orders for his friend Frank Erickson to report to Stratford, Connecticut, to begin training as a helicopter pilot. His instructors were Igor Sikorsky and C. L. “Les” Morris, Sikorsky's chief test pilot.

In May, a Combined Board for the Evaluation of Ship-Based Helicopter in Antisubmarine Warfare was appointed, with representatives drawn from the staffs of Commander in Chief, U.S. Fleet; the Admiralty (Royal Navy); the British Air Commission; the U.S. Coast Guard; and the Bureau of Aeronautics. Representatives of the Army Air Forces, the War Shipping Board, and the National Advisory Commission on Aeronautics—the predecessor of NASA—later joined the board. This board was, in today's lexicon, an interagency effort. Some question exists whether this helped or hindered the effort.

Colonel Gregory's demonstration on board SS
Bunker Hill
occurred three days after the creation of the board, long before the board would reach any decisions.
The U.S. Maritime Commission did not provide a representative to the Combined Board but did work closely with the War Shipping Administration, which had split off from the commission. The commission did provide the ship for the demonstration. Grover Loening, observing as a consultant to the War Production Board, pronounced the tests successful and described the takeoffs as “remarkable.”
¹⁹
The Bureau of Aeronautics was less sanguine, citing the calm conditions under which the tests were conducted. The board met ten days after the test and raised a series of additional questions. The most important questions revolved around the manner in which the helicopters would be employed operationally.
²⁰
Specifically, questions of basing the aircraft on merchant vessels versus escorts, the number of aircraft needed for an effective screen, and the number of flight hours between overhauls for the helicopters as compared to the hours required to cover convoys at all points to the acceptance of their value.