Founded in 1923, the National Museum of the USAF gathers one of the most remarkable aircraft collections in the World.
Its extensive facilities, placed at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton (Ohio) and opened in 1971, accommodate a great number of aircraft, distributed by historical periods using didactic criteria, some of which are unique examples.
To be exact, in the sector dedicated to the 30´s historical period, an old Martin B-10 bomber is exhibited, recreating one of the ten aircraft that in 1934 flew from Washington, D.C., to Fairbanks (Alaska) in what became a landmark in the history of American Military Aviation.
Since no examples of the B-10 had been preserved in the United States, the Museum authorities searched one for a long time until they took notice of the existence of a plane in Argentina, stored in a Technical School in the Greater Buenos Aires, where it had been received from the Argentine Navy as training material, once it had been discharged from its Naval Aviation.
In 1970, the Martin was symbolically transferred by Argentine authorities to the U.S. government to finally become a part of the, by then, known as USAF Museum collection.
A revolutionary bomber
The Martin B-10 gave way to a bomber development era that gradually led to the construction of the great four-engined bombers that were vital in World War Two to overcome the resistance of enemy forces.
The B-10 was a development from the Martin 123 Prototype, produced by the Glenn L.Martin company of Baltimore (Maryland), that had been delivered in March, 1932 under the experimental name “XB-907” to be tested at the Wright Field facilities.
After succesive modifications – a larger wingspan, new engines, enclosed pilot cockpit and rear section, etc -, the United States Army Air Corps ordered its mass purchase.
It was initially presented in the 1934 Aviation Yearbook as the Mystery Bomber, since it represented a remarkable technological advance: Totally built in metal, it presented such innovations as retractable landing gear, internal bomb storage, rotating gun turret and enclosed cockpits with an instrument panel that included artificial horizon, directional gyro and autopilot.
It was 50% faster than all the bombers of its time (a maximum speed of 350 km/hour) and as fast as the existing fighters.
Those advances led to consider the B-10 as the “air power wonder of its time”, according to general Henry “Hap” Arnold.
One of the negative aspects of this plane was that, because of the limited space of the pilot cockpit, some instruments such as the fuel and oil manometers and the oil thermometer were placed outside of it, in small panels placed in the point of union of the engine hood with the wing leading edge.
The crew included the pilot – placed at the engines height -, a bomber-gunner at the front and an observer/radio operator at the rear. Eventually, a fourth member could be added, next to the bomb bay with no external vision. Its armament comprised a 7,60 mm Browning machine gun in the front and rear turrets plus a third one in the rear ventral sector of the airframe and could load 1.000 kg of bombs.
Between 1933 and 1936 121 B-10 were bought, in what was the most important aircraft purchase of the USAAC since the end of World War One.
32 B-10 with new Pratt and Whitney engines instead of the original Wright Cyclone engines were bought and designated B-12, fitted with aditional oil tanks for long-range missions.
The Martins strengthened the USAAC Bomber Aviation, but the outcome of World War Two, in which the United States entered after the surprise attack of Pearl Harbor Naval Base by Japanese aviation , led to a great advance in technology, causing pre-war aircraft to be quickly and prematurely obsolete, including the B-10s.
The plane was successfully sold to foreign countries as the Martin 139W; it was exported to Holland (120 139WH), China (9 139 WC), Thailand (23 139SM), Turkey (20 139WT), the Soviet Union (a single 139WS) and Argentina (22 139AA, 12 139WAN and a demostration plane 139WA)
To be continued with… “The Washington-Fairbanks flight”
About the author:
Alejandro Vidal was born in Buenos Aires city in 1964. Law Degree (Buenos Aires University). War History studies (Argentine Army Staff School). Humanitarian International Law diploma (National Institute of Air and Space Law). History of Buenos Aires diploma (University of Buenos Aires). Adjoint Professor at the John F.Kennedy University, Buenos Aires.
He has published about 60 articles on historical subjects, mainly of Military History, and he recently published “Argentine Military Aeronautics: Genesis and evolution until its institutional autonomy”, a 200 pages work referred to the 33 year-process that led to the organizational Independence of present day´s Argentine Air Force.
He es a Full Member and present-day President of the Tres de Febrero Historical Studies Board, Corresponding Member of the Newberian National Institute and Adherent Member of the Military History Argentine Institute (Argentine Army).
He won several literary awards and distinctions, acted as a jury in literary and artistic contests and was awarded the Newberian Academic Cross, Second Class.
