OV-10 Bronco (Unusual Aircraft Collection)

The OV-10 Bronco was used by the USAFin Vietnam as aforward air controllerlike the O-1 Bird Dog,O-2 Skymaster and LT-6 Mosquito, but the Bronco was specifically designed for this sort of work and was a much more capable aircraft than these others.   Strangely, though, the US Army had already introduced a purpose-built forward air controller called the OV-1 Mohawk just a few years earlier.

The Bronco's huge bulged canopy gives very good all-around vision to the pilot and observer.   There's also a large compartment at the back of the fuselage with a clamshell door where five paratroops or two wounded soldiers and an attendant can be placed.

The Bronco is a two-engined turboprop, which means it has enough power to operate in hot conditions or at high altitude.   It also makes it possible to carry up to three tons of weapons, so unlike its predecessors, this plane can do some serious damage to the enemy without help from anyone else.   As well as carrying bombs and rockets, standard equipment on the OV-10 includes four machine guns mounted in sponsons or little stub wings under the fuselage, similar to the stub wings on attack helicopterslike the Ka-50 Black Shark.   The Bronco's sponsons improve the plane's aerodynamics as well as providing racks to carry ordnance.

Supermarine Spitfire (World Fighter Aircraft Collection)

The Spitfire was the premier British fighter of World War Two, occupying a place in the British mind similar to that occupied by the P-51 Mustang in the mind of the American public.   Indeed, since the Battle of Britainand other aerial combat actually took place where the public experienced them, the emotional attachment of the British to the Spitfire was probably greater than the American attachment to the Mustang.

Both the Spitfire and the Bf109 had a liquid-cooled V12 engine, in the case of the Spitfire the same Rolls-Royce Merlin that powered later Mustangs, and the Spitfire and Bf109 were very closely matched.   A technological arms race developed, which the Spitfire eventually won because of the sheer number of innovations which were developed, and it was even able to stay competitive against new German types like the Fw 190.   In the end there were 24 main variants of the Spitfire, and no fewer than six different wing types, with many sub-types.   The aircraft you see here is a Mk IX "clipped wing" variant of the basic elliptical wing, a modification which allowed the aircraft to roll faster, making it more maneuverable, especially at low altitudes.

Ultimately more Spitfires were produced than any other Allied fighter, a total of 20351, and it remained in service with the RAF and numerous other air forces well into the 1950s, though Russia and the United States retired most of their Spitfires at the end of the war.

Mi-6 "Hook" Fire Fighting Helicopter (Unusual Aircraft Collection)

When the Mi-6 "Hook" first flew in 1957 it was the first Russian helicopter powered by jet engines, and the first helicopter in the world with two jet engines.   For 12 years it was the world's largest helicopter until it was overtaken by the colossal V-12 "Homer" The "Hook" held other world records including fastest helicopter (211 miles per hour around a circuit) and heaviest payload (26400 pounds).

It measures 108 feet long and has a rotor diameter of 114 feet, making it quite a bit larger than the B-17 Flying Fortress bomber, which was 74 feet long and had a wingspan of 104 feet.   When used as a passenger transport it normally seats 90 people, but when fitted with a high-density seating arrangement up to 120 people can be squeezed inside.

Most Hooks were fitted with 49 foot long wings part way down the fuselage, which provided about 20% of the lift when flying forwards.   The one you see here at the Russian Air Force museum at Monino, nearMoscow, doesn't have these wings because it's equipped to operate as a fire tanker, ready to use the nozzle below the nose to put out park bench fires whenever and wherever they happen!   When putting fires out the helicopter usually hovers, which makes the wings useless and can even cause problems because of the turbulence which occurs above a fire.

Sukhoi Su-27MK "Flanker" (World Fighter Aircraft Collection)

Here's an advanced version of the Su-27 Flanker, an Su-30MK which is fitted with a pair of small canard wings just behind the cockpit, as well as 8 hard points which allow air-to-ground ordnance to be carried in addition to the air-to-air weapons of previous versions, adding ground attack to the Flanker's original pure air-to-air role.

The Su-30MK has unbelievable maneuverability because of its thrust vectoring capability, which allows it to direct the output of its two engines in slightly different directions.   This enables it to perform bizarre low speed gyrations which have been dubbed the "cobra maneuver", the "bell" and the "somersault", in which the plane flips 360 degrees without losing any altitude.   These maneuvers can be used to fool an enemy's pulse doppler radar, which relies on movement of the target, making the Flanker disappear from the radar screen, at least for a few seconds.   How useful it is to slow down to a stop in the middle of aerial combat remains to be seen!

AC-47 "Spooky" Gunship (Unusual Aircraft Collection)

The AC-47 "Spooky" is a 1930s airliner which became one of the most feared weapons of the Vietnam war, thanks to the work ofChristian missionaries.

It was a missionary working in the South American jungle who discovered that it was possible to lower a container of medicine, food and other goods at the end of a rope from a light plane circling around a village to people waiting on the ground, and then to haul the container back up afterwards.   The US Air Force realized that they could do the same thing, only instead of lowering beneficial items down to grateful recipients on the ground, they used the concept to create a gunship which was able to rain down huge quantities of firepower onto enemy forces assaulting American positions at night.