Wiley Post and the Winnie Mae: Around the world twice with one eye in much less time than Jules Verne's legendary "80 days."

I noticed recently a news item that caused my eyebrows to elevate a bit. A Bombardier Dash-8 was on final approach to the Belfast City Airport in Ireland when the captain's prosthetic forearm became detached from a special clamp fitted to the plane's yoke…oops. The momentary loss of control probably contributed to the bounce when the airplane touched down but no one was injured. The captain has pledged to be more careful in the future about checking the attachment on his artificial limb. Good for you, sir…fly on.

Bombardier Dash-8

That prosthesis-failure event prompted me to consider another unusual impairment for aviators, namely monocular vision…i.e. having only one operative eyeball. You would think a pilot thus handicapped would be hard-pressed to operate an airplane safely, especially during the approach and landing phases of a flight.

But as it turns out, many (if not most) pilots in the one-eye category are able to overcome the limitations imposed by monocular vision and fly quite safely. A case in point is Wiley Hardeman Post, who managed to fly around the world by himself in 1933 despite the fact that an accident seven years earlier had resulted in a complete loss of vision in his left eye.

Monocular vision presents two problems…loss of depth perception and reduced field of vision, both critical conditions for pilots. I consulted with Dr. Steven Kirkland, a  veteran aviation medical examiner who told me "One-eyed folks learn to accommodate...that is, they learn to interpret their visual cues adequately to function normally. It does take both time and experience to do, but they eventually do and all is well, at least at general aviation speeds. The issue of visual field reduction becomes more problematic at jet speeds and flying in hostile environments...a co-pilot obviously helps!"

I have no idea how many one-eyed aviators might be flying today with current medical certificates but there must be a significant number of such pilots because FAA medical standards include minimums for monocular vision. Apparently, it is not a big deal.

The early years

Wiley Post, born in 1898 in Texas, struggled through an early life filled with hard knocks.­ Following frequent moves with his cotton-farming family he quit school after the seventh grade and in 1913 attended an air show that changed his life…Wiley decided he would become a pilot. He enrolled in an aviation school and subsequently joined a training camp at the University of Oklahoma but World War I ended before he could finish.

With few jobs available, Post hired on as a "roughneck" in the Oklahoma oil fields, ran afoul of the law in 1921 and spent some time in a correctional institution, after which he became a part-time parachutist for a flying circus known as "Burrell Tibbs and His Texas Topnotch Fliers."

Disaster struck in October 1926. While working on an oil rig Wiley got in the way of a metal chip that destroyed the vision in his left eye. The patches he wore for the rest of his life became one of his trademarks. ­­­

Despite that terrible loss Post refused to quit flying. He trained himself to overcome the negative effects of monocular vision and used the $1800 insurance payment to buy his first airplane. Before long he was hired as the personal pilot for F. C. Hall, an Oklahoma businessman who owned a Lockheed Vega named for his daughter, Winnie Mae. In time, Hall gave Post carte blanche for use of the Winnie Mae, a move that set Wiley on the path to long-distance flights and high-altitude research.

A unique airplane for a unique pilot

The Lockheed Vega was virtually all wood except for the engine and landing gear. The fuselage was a circular molded-plywood structure with room for six passengers or the large auxiliary fuel tanks Wiley installed for his long-distance flights…the pilot sat alone in the single front seat. I squeezed into the cockpit of a Winnie Mae clone a number of years ago and decided I would be a basket case after sitting there for long periods of time as did Post (20-hour plus legs were routine during his round-the-world flights).

The Vega's fuel capacity varied depending on the mission; for routine passenger flights the tanks probably held only 100 gallons but Post said he needed 500 gallons of fuel for his 1931 trip around the world…and just to be sure he added a 30-gallon tank under the pilot seat.  

The Winnie Mae's powerplant was a Pratt & Whitney R1340 radial engine modified to produce 500 horsepower, making the Vega a fast airplane for its time…top speed 185 mph, normal cruise speed 165. Wiley made the most of all that power by winning the National Air Race Derby in 1930 whereupon the Winnie Mae's fuselage was inscribed appropriately:

Los Angeles to Chicago 9 hrs. 9 min. 4 sec.

 

No doubt emboldened by the Vega's superb performance and his personal ambitions, Wiley—joined by Australian navigator Harold Gatty—departed from Roosevelt Field on Long Island on June 23, 1931 in an attempt to fly around the world in the shortest possible time. The Graf Zeppelin, a huge (as in 800 feet long) German airship that had circled the globe in 21 days two years earlier, held the official record for circumnavigation of the earth by air (to give you an idea of the Graf's size, the black spots directly beneath the airship are the ground crew).

The Graf Zeppelin

Post and Gatty returned to Roosevelt Field 8 days, 15 hours and 51 minutes after their departure. It was a relatively quick trip for the time but fell short of an official world record; the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale required pilots to travel at least 22,849 miles on a round-the-world record attempt…Post's trip distance was 15,474 miles.  

Let's do it again, Winnie...just you and me 

But Wiley wasn't satisfied…he intended to repeat his 1931 flight but this time he planned to fly the Winnie Mae by himself on the same route and do it in six days. In preparation for the flight he installed an autopilot that he dubbed "mechanical Mike" (a personification that may have become "George" in later years) and a radio direction finder that could be tuned to any accessible radio source and indicate the direction to the transmitter.

Post's route around the world

The Winnie Mae's instrument panel was hardly worthy of the name, but it sufficed for the hours of darkness and flight in instrument conditions.

Wiley's solo flight launched from Floyd Bennett Field in New York early in the morning of July 15, 1933. He encountered numerous delays but none of them were as serious as his arrival in the tiny mining community of Flat, Alaska. Somewhat unsure of his position (that's pilot talk for "lost") Wiley chose to land on the first airport he saw, which happened to be the airstrip at Flat. Unaware that the runway was only 700 feet long and ended abruptly in a ditch, Post was unable to get the airplane stopped short of the obstacle…the Winnie Mae hit the ditch and nosed over, damaging the propeller and the right wheel (note the wheel pant lying on the ground).
 

The Flat miners turned out to help with the repairs and got the Winnie Mae back on her feet. A replacement prop was found in Fairbanks, 360 miles away, and was flown tuit suite to the accident site. While repairs were underway Wiley got a good night's sleep then flew to Fairbanks, refueled and continued on his way. His accident may have been the most exciting event in Flat's history.

Seven days, 19 hours and 49.5 minutes after he departed on July 15, Wiley landed at Floyd Bennett Field at midnight on July 22, having cut 21 hours off his previous around-the-world flight. He was the first pilot to accomplish a solo flight around the world.

Post exiting the Winnie Mae at the end of his solo flight

Higher, faster and welcome to the jet stream

With two lengthy flights under his belt Wiley turned his attention to the vertical dimension of the atmosphere and embarked on an exploration of high-altitude flight. He joined forces with the B. F. Goodrich Company to develop a pressure suit that would protect him from the extremely low air pressure and temperature at stratospheric altitudes. The result was a rubberized fabric suit with a liquid oxygen system for breathing and suit pressurization; it was truly the world's first space suit.

In September 1934 Wiley coaxed the Winnie Mae to 40,000 feet on his first flight using the pressure suit and somewhat later he set unofficial altitude records as high as 50,000 feet…believe me, he was all alone at that flight level.

Post also discovered the jet stream, which often increased his groundspeed eastbound by 100 knots or more. He flew ten high-altitude flights in the Winnie Mae; four of them were attempts to fly coast-to-coast nonstop but mechanical failures brought all four to a halt. Concerned for the Winnie Mae's condition, Wiley retired the airplane; it is now a permanent exhibit in the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC.

Based on his high-altitude knowledge and experience, Wiley offered a prophecy in 1934 that was amazingly accurate. He said, "I believe that, in the future, all flying will be done at 50,000 feet or so when the distance is great enough to warrant climbing to that height.  Transcontinental and transoceanic hauling of passengers and freight can be done in one half the present normal time, simply by use of suitable supercharging of engine, pilot and passenger cabin.  No radical changes in plane or engine are necessary, but of course, further refinements of plane and engine design and improved methods of streamlining will reduce the time even further." 

During his relatively short career Wiley Post made a number of significant contributions to aviation and was well rewarded for his efforts. He received the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Gold Medal of Belgium, the International Harmon Trophy and was enshrined in the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 1969.

The hardest knock of all

In 1935 Wiley set out to survey a mail and passenger air route from the west coast of the U.S. to Russia. He was accompanied by Will Rogers—good friend, humorist, fellow Oklahoman and newspaper columnist—who wanted to fly to Alaska in hopes of finding new material for his column.

Post and Rogers left Seattle in a Lockheed Orion float plane in early August enroute to Fairbanks then to the village of Barrow, Alaska, the northernmost community in the United States. Post encountered bad weather in the Barrow area and landed in a lagoon eleven miles south of the village. Following a visit with the locals on August 15, Wiley took off from the lagoon but the engine quit almost immediately; the right wing contacted the water and flipped the airplane upside down. Both men died instantly.

 Two airports are named in honor of Post and Rogers…the Wiley Post-Will Rogers Airport in Barrow, Alaska and the Wiley Post Airport in Oklahoma City.

Here's to Wiley. His was not a long life, but it was a full life…and he did it all with one eye.

(I am indebted to my good friend and fellow flyer, Calvin Pitts, who has been most helpful in editing this story. Cal has not only researched Wiley Post's history to a fare-thee-well, he flew around the world—with several different copilots—in an A-36 Bonanza in 1981 to commemorate
the 50^th anniversary of Wiley's solo flight. If Cal ever stops researching and starts writing, there will be a great new book in aviation libraries.)