Convair
American aircraft builders.
1943 Formed by the merger of Consolidated Aircraft and Vultee Aircraft, and went on to produce a number of pioneering aircraft such as the Convair B-36 bomber, the F-102 Delta Dagger and the F-106 Delta Dart. It also manufactured the first Atlas rockets, including the rockets that were used for the pioneering manned orbital flights of Project Mercury. [1]
B-36 Bomber
The massive Convair B-36 "Peacemaker" was a strategic bomber operated by the USAF from 1949 to 1959. Initially powered by six 28-cylinder Pratt and Whitney R-4360 Wasp Major radial engines in pusher configuration. On the B-36D, two pairs of General Electric J47-19 jet engines supplemented the piston engines; these were also retrofitted to all extant B-36Bs. Thus the final B-36 had ten engines - six radial propeller engines and four jet engines.[2]
On 6 Feb 1953 a B-36 H flying from Texas to RAF Fairford crashed near Lacock, Wiltshire, with no fatalities, the crew having bailed out.[3]
A USAF RB-36 Peacemaker bomber suffered engine fires on 5 August 1954, while en route from California to RAF Lakenheath, Suffolk. The crew of 23 were ordered to bail out 450 miles west of Ireland. The SS Manchester Shipper, inbound from Montreal, and the outbound SS Manchester Pioneer, diverted to the scene and despite bad weather were able to rescue the four surviving crew.[4]