pocket knife, a Luger pistol, and no food. He arrived at Nenana half-starved and exhausted. He had lost twenty pounds. [And felt he needed a bath.]
LEARNING HOW TO FLY IN WINTER
While flying the Stinson Detroiter biplane between Nome and Fairbanks—with charter work at both towns—Noel and Ralph Wien developed procedures for winter flying that soon became widespread in Alaska’s fledgling aviation industry. In deep cold, upon an airplane’s landing, if it was to remain for a time, oil was drained immediately from the engine and heated before replacing it. In winter, a plumber’s pot1 went everywhere with an airplane. With it was a tent-like canvas engine cover. To heat the engine, the canvas cover was draped over the engine, and the pot was fired up inside it. The cover concentrated the heat on the engine, and was also used to heat the drained oil. This required at least an hour, commonly more, depending on temperature, wind, size of engine, and other factors.
A gasoline-burning plumber’s pot used to heat aircraft engines during winter. It sits atop a wood-burning stove. A small tent can be folded inside the stove. If a plane is forced down in the wilderness, the tent and stove could be a life saver. AUTHOR
Airplane cowlings are designed to keep the engine cool while in flight. In deep cold, as -20 F. or -30 F. or colder, engines need less cooling, and Noel and Ralph learned how to modify with baffles and other techniques the flow of air to maintain a warm engine in such temperatures.
The Wien brothers designed new, efficient skis for an airplane. Upon landing a plane, the skis were run up on a pole or board to keep them from freezing down overnight. Wings were sawed with a rope to remove overnight frost, which, if left, spoiled lift, and could keep a plane from flying. Wing covers were soon developed—they could be whisked off the wings quickly, and were easier on fabric covered wings than sawing with a rope.
Airplane windshields were covered overnight to prevent frost from forming. Cold weather lubricants were used; some lubricants hardened in deep cold, and controls, ailerons, flaps, and other working parts didn’t work properly with them. A common modification was made to oil tanks by putting a valve and a drain in the bottom, not the side, so they drained quickly and completely.
Lagging was applied in critical areas of the engine. This was a method of insulating by winding asbestos cord around engine parts and coating it with waterglass (sodium silica gel) which sealed it from becoming oil-soaked. (Asbestos is no longer used; various modern materials are now available.) These and many other cold weather techniques kept the Wien planes aloft through long and deep cold winters.
They learned, too, to carry sufficient emergency gear so pilot and passengers could survive an emergency landing in the wilderness.
THE FOX FILM EXPEDITION
In the spring of 1928, the Wien brothers, Noel and Ralph, bought, for $3,500, from the Bennett-Rodebaugh company the two-cockpit Waco biplane C2775, powered with an OXX-6 (twin magneto) 100-hp engine. Business was good, and they planned to use it for short flights, and for abbreviated landing fields. Noel started to teach Ralph how to fly in it.
While this was developing, in April, Wien Alaska won a contract for $6,000 to fly from Fairbanks to Barrow five men and 2,800 pounds of movie-making equipment for a Fox film expedition.
The Waco would have been useless for this job. Noel hired Russell Merrill of Anchorage Air Transport and his Travel Air biplane to participate.
All went well until the two planes—the Wien Stinson Detroiter, and Merrill’s Travel Air—bound for Barrow and beyond the Brooks Range, ran into fog on the North Slope. Both planes were on wheels, and they were forced to land on a tiny frozen, snow-covered, lake.
The Detroiter, with wide tires, handled the snow well. The Travel Air, with narrow tires, bogged down. Next day, with clear weather, Noel took off with the Detroiter and one passenger and flew 115 miles to Barrow, planning to return with shovels and other equipment to get the Travel Air into the air.
When Noel tried to return to the tiny lake, which was one among uncounted thousands of lakes on the vast, flat, North Slope, he couldn’t find it. For days he flew frantically, fighting fog and snow, searching.
Merrill and his two passengers remained at the Travel Air for a week, at which time the passengers left to walk for help. Merrill waited a few more days and followed. All three were eventually found, but they were barely alive, starved, and nearly frozen. Merrill especially suffered, and was near death. He was ill for weeks afterward.
At Fairbanks there was no word from either plane, and attempts were made to get a plane from Bennett-Rodebaugh at Fairbanks to fly a search. A.A. Bennett demanded $5,000 for one search flight, and even after agreeing to that, he stalled because of one problem or another. He appeared delighted that his competitor (Noel Wien) was missing, and said that he doubted that the missing men were alive.
Finally, Matt Nieminen, from Russell Merrill’s Anchorage Air Transport, flew north with a key transmitter (Morse code radio) so he could report back. Noel and Nieminen then flew a search together, and finally located Merrill’s airplane, but by then no one was there. Nieminen’s radio was unable to reach Fairbanks, or even Wiseman, so for weeks those in Fairbanks had no word the lost planes and the men who had been in them.
It all ended well, but it was a harrowing experience for all involved—including those waiting at Fairbanks.
RALPH WIEN’S MAIL FLIGHT
That spring of 1928 Wien Alaska Airways had a contract to make three mail flights from Fairbanks to Nome. The third and last flight was scheduled for May 23. Noel was missing on the North Slope when that date rolled around. Ralph Wien and the newly purchased Waco were the only resources of the Wien company then available.
Ralph had only eight hours of dual instruction as a pilot, and had flown solo for a scant two hours. He had never made a cross country flight alone, had not figured out any navigation problems, although he had frequently flown with brother Noel on long flights. He had landed an airplane only on the relatively long and smooth Fairbanks Weeks Field.
If Wien Airways failed to make the May 23 mail run, it could have lost the mail contract. Ralph, despite his lack of flying experience, decided to fly the mail to Nome. He would honor the contract.
When the first class mail for the Seward Peninsula arrived in Fairbanks by ship and train, he loaded the 500 pounds into the front cockpit of the Waco, and, despite having a heavy cold verging on pneumonia, climbed the little biplane into the Fairbanks sky and headed north.
The route called for eleven landings, some on rough, short runways. Ralph made every one on schedule, and nonchalantly delivered the mail as if he did it every day. On his return to Fairbanks, when asked if he had any problems on the flight, he replied succinctly, “None.”
Later, brother Noel, and another veteran bush pilot, Bob Reeve, called the flight, “One of the greatest flights ever made in Alaska.”
Ralph flew commercial flights with the Waco from Fairbanks until Noel’s return on June 16.
WIEN HEADQUARTERS AT FAIRBANKS
For two years Wien Alaska Airways had provided service year around between Nome and Fairbanks. Now Noel and Ralph decided to headquarter at Fairbanks, and in early 1929 they built a big new hangar at Fairbanks’ Weeks Field. Their “fleet” of airplanes included the faithful old Stinson Detroiter No. 2 biplane C5262, a grand new Hamilton Metalplane NC10002 (see following), the Waco
