I remember watching this as a kid but I didn't know how many mistakes were in the episode then. By 1958, no C-47's were still in olive drab. The long shots showed an obvious WWII aircraft since it was not only in olive drab but the insignia had no red bar in the the bars of the insignia. Those were added in 1947, shortly after the Air Force became an independent service. There's no way they could have used up all the Co2 on one engine fire, and trying to restart number 1 was worth the risk compared to a dead stick landing into terrain. The load master had a flip down seat with a seat belt in a the C-47. He would have been in that seat, not sitting on the floor next to a load of heavy boxes. The last thing any pilot would do is extend the gear for landing on an unknown surface. All it would take is one obstacle or hole and the plane flips over. The first rule after an emergency landing like that is get away from the plane! You do a fireman's carry to get the injured man out and then use a blanket to drag him if he can't walk. A fire in the aircraft, especially after already experiencing an engine fire and runaway prop, would rapidly kill them all. There was smoke on the outside of the plane, so everyone would have tried to get out, not sit there looking at a wound. The flight surgeon would have at least gotten into coveralls, not fly around in a dress uniform. He would have also had a medic with him, and they would have loaded a bunch of medical gear in the copter. The URC-4 survival radio had a switch on the side that you pushed up to talk and let go to listen. It wasn't like a speaker phone where you could just hold it out and talk. Their quest for radio accuracy got lost early on when the flight surgeon was talking on the radio at the same time the tower was talking to him. Two way radios don't work like that. I was a helicopter medic, and it would have taken a powerful storm to have not gotten at least close enough to the ground to dump out some gear. I've landed in far worse storms than that one. A doctor would have asked to get some fishing line or thread out of their survival kit, not use multistranded copper wire to tie off an artery. You can't pull with tight enough without slicing through the artery. If keeping pressure on the gut was enough to stop the bleeding, that''s what they would have done. Gangrene wouldn't have been an issue doing that for an hour. All they would have had to do was release pressure every ten minutes of maybe twenty seconds. Assuming this was the femoral artery, there was no blood getting to the rest of the leg anyway, and that''s where the risk of gangrene would have been, not high up like that. Of course, I wasn't a medic back then, and all I knew about helicopters is that they were really cool. Looking at it today, not only is it full of errors, but it had a bunch of USAF technical advisors and was filmed in cooperation with the Air Force. I guess I'm most surprised at what a really sloppy show it was, and the Air Force guys must have known it. My guess is the needs of the TV production overrode any complaining about accuracy.
I think that the very low budgets used on shooting this series may have hastened it's demise. Almost every show used stock footage, B actors and backlot sets. It's more accurate to consider these films as 'reproductions' like the modern show "Air Disasters".
Produced by George Burns' McCadden Productions and Airborne Productions {Burns and Al Simon}, and syndicated by NBC's "California National" film division during the 1958-'59 season. This episode, "Build Up" (aka "Flight Surgeon"), was originally syndicated in October 1958.
My dad flew around Africa visiting Portuguese colonies in a C47 when he was naval attache to Portugal back in the mid 1960's. Air attache did most of the flying. That plane later crashed in Spain too.
Good lesson on not properly securing cargo. Two straps for a tall crate? The cargo inspector in me cringes and I could see it coming. The M-15/UR Roanwell microphone is cool, I have one.
Besides all the stock footage (and why not? Everyone did and it was cheaper) every actor in this were familiar faces I've seen all my life. B movies mostly. Kinda neat.
I remember at Charleston AFB, SC when Chief Zimmerman asked me, "what base have you been transferred to"? "Travis", I said. Leaping out of his office chair, the chief bellowed, "TRAVIS!!.....ANYPLACE BUT Travis!
In 83 when I went through MEPS for my physical entering the Air Force, part of it was the Dr. asking me questions about my health and if I had ever done drugs or wet the bed. I had never wet the bed since I was about five, but if you answered yes to that question and it occurred in recent times, you were out. I heard these were washed up doctors that were paid by the recruit. Anyway, he had cigarette burning the whole time and his ashtray was full.
I remember watching this as a kid but I didn't know how many mistakes were in the episode then. By 1958, no C-47's were still in olive drab. The long shots showed an obvious WWII aircraft since it was not only in olive drab but the insignia had no red bar in the the bars of the insignia. Those were added in 1947, shortly after the Air Force became an independent service. There's no way they could have used up all the Co2 on one engine fire, and trying to restart number 1 was worth the risk compared to a dead stick landing into terrain. The load master had a flip down seat with a seat belt in a the C-47. He would have been in that seat, not sitting on the floor next to a load of heavy boxes. The last thing any pilot would do is extend the gear for landing on an unknown surface. All it would take is one obstacle or hole and the plane flips over. The first rule after an emergency landing like that is get away from the plane! You do a fireman's carry to get the injured man out and then use a blanket to drag him if he can't walk. A fire in the aircraft, especially after already experiencing an engine fire and runaway prop, would rapidly kill them all. There was smoke on the outside of the plane, so everyone would have tried to get out, not sit there looking at a wound. The flight surgeon would have at least gotten into coveralls, not fly around in a dress uniform. He would have also had a medic with him, and they would have loaded a bunch of medical gear in the copter. The URC-4 survival radio had a switch on the side that you pushed up to talk and let go to listen. It wasn't like a speaker phone where you could just hold it out and talk. Their quest for radio accuracy got lost early on when the flight surgeon was talking on the radio at the same time the tower was talking to him. Two way radios don't work like that. I was a helicopter medic, and it would have taken a powerful storm to have not gotten at least close enough to the ground to dump out some gear. I've landed in far worse storms than that one. A doctor would have asked to get some fishing line or thread out of their survival kit, not use multistranded copper wire to tie off an artery. You can't pull with tight enough without slicing through the artery. If keeping pressure on the gut was enough to stop the bleeding, that''s what they would have done. Gangrene wouldn't have been an issue doing that for an hour. All they would have had to do was release pressure every ten minutes of maybe twenty seconds. Assuming this was the femoral artery, there was no blood getting to the rest of the leg anyway, and that''s where the risk of gangrene would have been, not high up like that.
Of course, I wasn't a medic back then, and all I knew about helicopters is that they were really cool. Looking at it today, not only is it full of errors, but it had a bunch of USAF technical advisors and was filmed in cooperation with the Air Force. I guess I'm most surprised at what a really sloppy show it was, and the Air Force guys must have known it. My guess is the needs of the TV production overrode any complaining about accuracy.
I think that the very low budgets used on shooting this series may have hastened it's demise. Almost every show used stock footage, B actors and backlot sets.
It's more accurate to consider these films as 'reproductions' like the modern show "Air Disasters".
Produced by George Burns' McCadden Productions and Airborne Productions {Burns and Al Simon}, and syndicated by NBC's "California National" film division during the 1958-'59 season.
This episode, "Build Up" (aka "Flight Surgeon"), was originally syndicated in October 1958.
Air Loved Ones !
My dad flew around Africa visiting Portuguese colonies in a C47 when he was naval attache to Portugal back in the mid 1960's. Air attache did most of the flying. That plane later crashed in Spain too.
What a great tool,,,, Radio!!!
Good lesson on not properly securing cargo. Two straps for a tall crate? The cargo inspector in me cringes and I could see it coming. The M-15/UR Roanwell microphone is cool, I have one.
The pilot is the same actor who played a doctor in "When Worlds Collide".
They changed helicopters a couple of times.
Besides all the stock footage (and why not? Everyone did and it was cheaper) every actor in this were familiar faces I've seen all my life. B movies mostly. Kinda neat.
I remember at Charleston AFB, SC when Chief Zimmerman asked me, "what base have you been transferred to"? "Travis", I said. Leaping out of his office chair, the chief bellowed, "TRAVIS!!.....ANYPLACE BUT Travis!
A Flight Surgeon...who apparently smokes several packs a day...
It would have been odd if he wasn't, half the Flight Surgeons I knew of that era did
In 83 when I went through MEPS for my physical entering the Air Force, part of it was the Dr. asking me questions about my health and if I had ever done drugs or wet the bed. I had never wet the bed since I was about five, but if you answered yes to that question and it occurred in recent times, you were out. I heard these were washed up doctors that were paid by the recruit. Anyway, he had cigarette burning the whole time and his ashtray was full.
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