Planes of My Past 4: The McDonnell Douglas DC-10

Toward the end of 2005, it started to become obvious that Independence Air was going to fail. The writing was on the crew room wall, so to speak. The fat lady wasn't singing, but she was definitely warming up her voice. (I know, that's enough of the cliché's). We had burned through nearly $400 million in 18 months. While there are many reasons why we failed, I am still very pleased to have tried. The employees of Independence Air are the best group of people I have ever worked with. It is probably the most fun have have ever had, and will ever have, in my career.

As the end of Independence was drawing near, I started to put feelers out for a job. I hope to find one before I was out of work, so I contacted some friends of mine. After being furloughed, one of my close friends had gone to a company called Gemini Air Cargo. They were a company, based at Washington Dulles, flying McDonnell Douglas DC-10's and MD-11's. My friend was on the MD-11, and was loving it as far as I could tell. I had always dreamed of flying the 'Big Iron,' so this might be my chance. He told me to send him my resume and he would walk it in to his boss, called the Chief Pilot. I then called another friend of mine who worked in the management side of Gemini. I told him that a friend was walking in my resume. He told me that if I really wanted the interview, that I should give him my resume to walk in. I immediately emailed him my papers and no kidding, the time from doing that, to interviewing and getting a job offer, was a week! In the airline business, that is lightning fast. The interview consisted of a written test and interviews with the Chief Pilot and the Director of Flight Operations. They told me I would probably be put on the MD-11, because of my glass-cockpit experience.

Normally in the airlines, when you show up to a company for your first day of work as a pilot, you choose the aircraft you are going to fly based on seniority and which aircraft were available. My class would have both the DC-10 and the MD-11 available. Gemini Air Cargo worked a little differently.  They told me that they would tell me what airplane I was going to fly in the official job offer letter that should arrive with the week. I was getting ready to go to Oshkosh for the annual Experimental Aircraft Association's Fly-in, so I told my roommate to call me as soon as the letter arrived. He called me three days later, saying the envelope had come. I said, tear it open and give me the news! I heard the paper tear open and unfold. He said, "you are the proud new co-pilot of a DC-10. ". It took me a few seconds to lift my jaw off the ground and respond to him. To say that I was surprised would be a huge understatement. I was going from the most automated plane in the world, the A-320, to one of the least automated airplanes in the world. (The picture at right was taken on a fuel stop in Benghazi, Libya).

The A-320 has an all glass cockpit (left), while the DC-10 (right) has what is lovingly referred to as steam gauges. This means it is all older style, round faced gauges. The DC-10 also has a third person in the cockpit, called the Flight Engineer(FE). The Flight Engineer monitors all of the aircraft systems from a panel located right behind the pilots. Modern aircraft have automated the monitoring of systems, removing the need for a Flight Engineer. The FE panel is a maze of switches and dials, that upon first glance, make your head spin. I was definitely a little scared going into training. As it turns out, the DC-10 FE panel is a very well thought out design. It was quite fun to learn it's inner workings. I have to say though, that is not true of FE panels on other airplanes.

Now, you probably want me to get stop rambling and tell you about the DC-10. TheDouglas Aircraft Corporation, based in Long Beach California, worked on a Heavy Logistic System design for the United States Air Force in 1965. The project was not chosen by the military, so Douglas decided to look into how the design could be suited for civilian purposes. Shortly thereafter, American Airlines put out a design request to the different aircraft manufacturers, for an aircraft smaller the the Boeing 747, but could fly long range routes, from shorter runways, and be airport-neighbor friendly. The McDonnell Aircraft Corporation merged with Douglas, creating McDonnell Douglas, and the DC-10 was the first offering by the merged company.

If you've ever wondered where the designations come from for airplanes, here's how. The first letters of the DC-10 stand for the Douglas Corporation. The B in say the B747, stands for the Boeing Aircraft Corporation. If you've flown on American or Delta recently, there is a good chance you've flown on the MD-80. The MD stand for McDonnell Douglas. The L in the L-1011 stands for the Lockheed Corporation. The first letters usually stand for the aircraft manufacturer. Now, back to the DC-10.

American Airlines ordered 25 of the the aircraft, while United Airlines ordered 60 planes.  The order was placed in 1968.  The first flight of the DC-10 was August 29, 1970, just 12 days before I was born.  Following nearly 1,000 test flights, the aircraft entered service in August of 1971.  It is still flown in passenger operations by Omni Air International.  They mostly do vacation charters and military troop transport.  The United States Air Force did eventually order the airplane to be an air refueling tanker aircraft.  It is called the KC-10 Extender and 60 of them were delivered to the Air Force.  McDonnell Douglass Stopped building the DC-10 in 1989, when it was replaced by the MD-11. 

The DC-10 has three engines, two mounted under the wings and one mounted in the tail. It was designed to be a medium to long-range airliner seating over 250 passengers.  One interesting tidbit, The Airbus A319 that I flew before the DC-10 had a maximum takeoff weight of 166,000 pounds.  The DC-10 carried more than that in fuel.  It carried 198,000 pounds of fuel and had a maximum takeoff weight of 572,000 pounds.  I flew the DC-10 series -30, that had an extra landing gear between the two main gear.  This supported the weight of the larger center fuel tank.  The longest flight I ever did on the DC-10 was 11 1/2 hours from Vatry, France to Miami, Florida.  We burned almost 186,000 pounds of gas.  That's 27,761 gallons of fuel.  I would hate to have pay that fuel bill! (at car pump prices of $1.50, that equals $41,641)  The engine we used had over 50,000 pounds of thrust each, and when it was lightweight, it climbed like a rocket ship.  I remember taking off out of Toronto once, ferrying the airplane empty to Dover, Delaware, where another crew was going to take it to Germany.  We had to do a maximum power takeoff, and the airplane climbed at near 10,000 feet per minute.

All in all, the airplanes were getting pretty tired by the time I got the chance to fly them.  Even though I was initially nervous about being awarded the DC-10, I am glad I got the chance to fly a plane with a flight engineer before there aren't any left.  Also, I flew with some great guys!  You depended on these guys when you were in places like, Lagos Nigeria, Entebbe Uganda, Libreville Gabon, Nairobi Kenya, and Benghazi Libya.  The experience I got while flying the DC-10 for Gemini Air Cargo definitely helped me get my current job.

Here are some videos I found of the venerable DC-10.  The first is a historical tribute to the airplane and details some of it's history. The last video is a tribute to Gemini Air Cargo.  For now, please return your tray tables and seatbacks to their upright positions.  Flight Attendants, please prepare the cabin for arrival!