Summary C-123 Provider could carry 61 passengers or 24,000 lbs cargo over 1,035 mi US Coast Guard used 8 C-123s for LORAN-C maintenance plus search & rescue C-123 was extensively used during the Vietnam War for spraying defoliant & as gunships The Fairchild C-123 Provider, a late 1940s design that made its first flight on October 14, 1949, and was produced until 1970, was a tactical transport most famous for use during the Vietnam War. But the C-123 was more than a tactical transport; it was also used as a US Coast Guard logistical transport, a spray plane, a gunship, and one used as a warbird. 5 Tactical Transport The C-123 could carry 61 passengers and/or up to 24,000 pounds (11,000 kilograms) of cargo 1,035 mi (1,666 km, 899 nmi).
Yes, the primary mission of the C-123 Provider was carrying humans, freight, or both. In fact, the C-123 could carry up to 61 passengers or 24,000 pounds of cargo with a cruise speed of 173 mph (278 km) and 1,035 miles (1666 km). Because of the C-123’s basic capabilities, the C-123 was widely used by the air forces of the nations below.
Nation Quantity Year of First C-123 Brazil 2 Unknown Cambodia 21 1973 El Salvador 3 1982 Laos 10 1973 Philippines 19 1973 Saudi Arabia 6 1957 South Vietnam 64 1971 Thailand 42 1964 United States 300+ 1953 Venezuela 18 1958 One can watch C-123 operations during the Vietnam War below: According to the National Museum of the United States Air Force, “By the fall of 1964, there were four USAF C-123B squadrons in Vietnam flying airlift and airdrop missions. Providers constantly flew troops and supplies to small, dirt airstrips at isolated bases in South Vietnam. Their relatively large cargo hold and excellent short field performance made them essential to holding these widely-scattered bases.
” Finally, one can take a 360 tour of a C-123K in the care of the Air Mobility Command Museum in Dover, Delaware. C-123K models are C-123s that between 1966 and 1969 had two General Electric J85-GE-17 turbojets of 2,850 lbs. thrust each installed to work with the radials to reduce take-off distances – and 184 received such enhancements.
But the airlift mission would be just one of the C-123's missions. Another would be in the service of the US Coast Guard . 4 US Coast Guard Plane The US Coast Guard used eight C-123s to support the LORAN-C network and for search & rescue.
The US Coast Guard used the eight C-123s in their care as Fairchild HC-123B Providers between 1958 and 1972 and somewhat differently than the world’s air forces. With a decent short-field capability and the ability to haul thousands of pounds of cargo, the C-123 would help keep LORAN stations operational in distant places like Alaska, Italy and Puerto Rico. Below is a Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum YouTube of a 1947 US Coast Guard LORAN promotional video: Eventually, aircraft would also use LORAN in the decades before the Global Positioning System (GPS).
Two land-based radio transmitters would send each other signals at a set interval, allowing plane navigators to use the time difference to find their exact location—when frequency and weather disruptions would not interfere. The LORAN C’s radio transmitters around the world would need to be maintained, so the C-123 Provider served as a necessary US Coast Guard transport to distant LORAN-C stations for maintenance and manning. But the HC-123B Provider also came with a Collins APN-158 Weather Radar that made the eight HC-123B Providers distinct as much as the US Coast Guard paint scheme from all the world’s C-123s.
Having a weather radar improves the safety of flight: Pilots use the radar to find and assess convective weather in the flight path. This assessment can then be used to plan the avoidance maneuver before Of course, having weather radar made safer flying the HC-123B for visual searches for persons and ships in distress, which was a secondary mission. However, the C-123 Provider would be known for more darker roles.
3 Spray Plane The C-123 would spray defoliant to deny cover and food to Communist guerillas. The C-123 was best known as a spray plane during the Vietnam War. Back in the 1960s, concerns about carcinogens and the environment were arguably insufficient, and the intent was to use chemicals to deny the Communist guerrillas cover for their attacks by destroying Vietnamese foliage.
From 1961 until 1971, 20% of South Vietnam was sprayed at least once. Each C-123 could carry 1,000 gallons of defoliant, and each spray plane C-123 would become UC-123B and then UC-123K after gaining two additional turbojet engines. But according to William A.
Buckingham, Jr’s report for the Office of Air Force History titled, “ The Air Force and Herbicides in Southeast Asia: 1961-1971 ”, the United States Air Force wanted a spray plane anyway starting in 1959 because the US Air Force provided spray planes for insecticide missions within the Continental United States (CONUS). The decision to send C-123s to South Vietnam was a Kennedy Administration decision on November 30, 1961, to help remove “jungle cover”, covered in some secrecy at the time. Once the authorization was given, an initial batch of six C-123s was sent westward from California’s Travis Air Force Base to Hawaii’s Hickam Air Force Base in 16 hours and 30 minutes, with an eventual destination of South Vietnam.
The long cross-Pacific transits were flown without autopilot. Once on scene, the C-123s would soon go from spraying jungle to also crops to deny the Communist commandos food. As Buckingham, Jr described an initial 1962 attack, “Both American and Vietnamese evaluators rated the results of this first crop destruction operation as generally successful.
Within five hours of the first spray runs, a US observer on the ground noticed that plants were wilted and discolored around the edges. Less than ten hours after spraying, another group of Americans saw that bean, peanut, potato, and manioc plants had all turned black. Two days later, aerial observation by General Harkins and others found that all the sprayed crops, including rice, were brown.
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A report on the operation prepared by a team headed by General Delmore estimated that the herbicide had destroyed 745,000 pounds of food, enough to feed 1,000 Viet Cong for more than a year.” The C-123 spraying herbicides was combat effective. But as per the historical film below, was controversial while employed: Additionally, the C-123 example in the National Museum of the United States Air Force was one of the first spray planes sent over in 1961.
The C-123 example eventually became a C-123K, which means the aircraft had been retrofitted in 1968 to have added on two General Electric J85-GE-17 turbojets of 2,850 lbs. thrust each to work with the radials, as pictured below, to reduce take-off distances. But the C-123 would not just discharge defoliants but also bullets in Southeast Asian combat.
The few C-123s converted to gunships would help pioneer the concept of flying gunships. 2 Gunship Two C-123s were modified to carry thousands of cluster bomblets and sensors. As the key component of Project Black Spot, a project to give the United States Air Force a night strike capability to interdict the Ho Chi Minh Trail supplying Communist guerillas in Southeast Asia, two C-123s were modified with additional sensors and the ability to pack cluster bomb units (CBUs).
According to TheAviationZone.com , these two C-123s would pack between 2,664 and 6,372 one-pound bomblets that dropped through holes cut in the cargo floor. These two C-123s also gained in 1967 and 1968 these sensors: An AN/ASD-5 Black Crow direction finder set (engine ignition sensor).
A turret with Forward-Looking Infrared Radar (FLIR) Low-Level Light Television (LLLTV) A laser range-finder/illuminator Low-level Doppler navigation radar X-band forward-looking radar Weapons release computer One can watch a historical film below: Again, according to TheAviationZone.com , “From November 1968 to May 1969, these “gunships” flew 186 missions, destroyed 415 trucks and damaged 273 more. While operating as armed night surveillance units in the Mekong Delta, the two aircraft destroyed 151 boats/vehicles, damaging another 108 and noted secondary explosions on 161 targets.
Both aircraft completed 70 percent of all missions and had an in-commission rate of 84 percent; not bad for an aircraft that was developed as a testbed and never intended to be used operationally!” However, C-123 Providers would find a final use as more than a means of transporting items. Try a transport of living history. 1 Warbird Yes, Pennsylvania’s Air Heritage Aviation Museum has a flying C-123 Provider.
Yes, a flying Fairchild C-123 Provider exists in the C-123K “Thunder Pig”. The C-123K is in the care of Pennsylvania’s Beaver County Airport’s (KBVI’s) Air Heritage Aviation Museum. The C-123K goes to many airshows, taking aviation history on the move.
One can watch an Experimental Aircraft Association YouTube all about the “Thunder Pig” below: However, according to an EAA article dated July 30, 2016, the C-123K was rescued from the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base aircraft boneyard in Arizona in 1994 with a coyote den cleaned out during the 60-day restoration. However, the C-123K flies only on her two primary piston engines, consuming 200 gallons per hour. Keep up with the latest Simple Flying coverage of military aviation here .
Why keep a C-123 flying as a warbird? The C-123 is a vehicle for the Air Heritage Aviation Museum’s mission to, “Advancing the understanding and appreciation of our aeronautical history.” Having a flying aircraft on hand helps increase educational opportunities..
