I saw on the news that a WW2 bird crashed in Texas yesterday, killing the 2 crew on board. Any info on this?

A Fairchild PT-19 Cornell crashed in Corsicana, Texas, on Saturday. It was taking off when it lost engine power. The pilot survived, but the passenger was killed.

The report I read stated it was a 1943 Fairchild
PT 26 belonging to the Commemorative Air Force.
It apparently lost power shortly after take off.
The Passenger died on impact & the Pilot died at the hosipital.

Mikee57,

The report I initially saw was on a warbird website. The Corsicana newspaper report was apparently more accurate, and was the same as your info.
Sorry for the mis-info.

Walt

Weren't the Fairchild PT-26 and the PT-19 pretty much the same except one had a canopy and the other was open cockpit? A friend of mine years and years ago had one or the other which had the canopy. I just can't remember which was which.

Doug

Doug,

The photo's I seen on the Commemorative Air Force Web site showed the PT 26 with the Canopy & the PT 19 with out. Other then that both planes looked identical.

Thanks Mikee. It was so long ago that I could not remember the differneces...but now you have refreshed my memory. By the way, my friend who owned the PT-26 was Bob Meyers, a fairly well known pilot in the Southern California area. Unfortunately about 20 years ago he ran his antique Cessna into powerlines while over the southland desert. He and his woman passenger were killed in the fiery crash.

Doug

The PT26 was built for use in Canada principally for the WW2 Empire Flying School program, hence the closed canopy. (Too cold in winter time, for open cockpit flying.)

Other than that, it was pretty well identical to the PT 19. There may have been some engine differences as well.

Wasn't the PT23 a radial engined PT19?

Good Question. The only PT I remember having a radial engine other than the Ryans, Waco and Boeing/Stearmans was the Timm which looked a little like the Fairchild. I don't recall Fairchild having a radial engine in the primary trainers. Seem's to me they were always powered by Ranger engines but that was a long time ago...and these days my memory is on half to quarter speed.

Doug

Yes, the PT-23 had a Continental R670 radial due to a shortage of the original (PT-19) Ranger engines. The PT-26 reverted to the Ranger.

Thanks Brian,

As I said it has been so long ago I just could not remember, and I don't have any references on the Fairchilds. Did you get your information off the internet or do you have book references....or, third question, do you have a stainless steel trap of a memory? :-)

Thanks again,
Doug

At one time Doug, I looked into acquiring a PT-23 but nothing came of it (money and cold feet mostly )

A good site for arcane airplane details is www.aerofiles.com , stuff in there even my steel trap had never heard of

Brian,

Thanks a lot for the tip on AeroFiles. A fantastic resource. I spent 45 minutes just in part of the Consolidated section. I thought I was pretty much up on Consolidated history. No way! As you said, they have stuff there I never heard if...and sub models I never knew existed. This site has gone on my book mark list. Thanks.

As to the PT, I think your just as well off for side stepping that temptation. Basically, as I recall the aircraft was a great trainer during the war...but on the surplus side it could be a serious problem what with the wood spar or spars. They had a tendancy to go to rot after a while. A lot of pilots owned them though...for a while. Back in the fourties and fifties they were all over the place. Edgar Bergen of Charley McCarthy fame even had one.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Doug Vernon,