After the second world war, the need for a large cargo aircraft appeared. In Britain, the solution was the Bristol, with its opening fuselage nose. In France and in the USA, it was the twin boom solution and an opening from the tail. The USA produced the Fairchild C-82 and the French, the Nord Noratlas.

Then, in 1949, Fairchild released the C-119, nicknamed the Flying Boxcar, because the cargo room was designed to hold a standard container. It was equipped with two Pratt & Whitney engines of 3,500 HP, which were probably the strongest piston engines ever produced at that time. To boost the take-off power, water was injected into the cylinders as an anti-detonant.

In October 1952, my father was the first Belgian pilot to be certified on the first Belgian C-119, the CP3 with call sign OT-CAC. This is the aircraft I have reproduced in the flight simulator, X-Plane (C-119_BOXCAR.ZIP).

The aircraft was mostly used for paratroops and for transport of various goods to the former Belgian Congo in Africa. At the time, navigation was a challenge. My father was often asked to fly at 120 knots when dropping parachutes because it was easier for the navigator to calculate the time needed for the drop over a military field.

Flying to Africa meant installing frequency crystals in the RDF radio, one for the Marseille NDB and one for Kamina, the Belgian military base in the Congo. Between the south of France and the Congo, it was mostly done at night, using a bubble sextant (hung from the dome) and a three-stars sight, to find a position. The almanac tables gave the nearest position.

The instrument was aimed at it and the star was identified as the one to measure with the sextant. Once positioned in the middle of the bubble indicating the horizon, the elevation was noted and that would mean, a LOP (Line of Position) on the chart. With two more such elevations, a triangle of position was found.

Otherwise, it was by dead-reckoning navigation and the use of the drift-meter, to estimate the drift caused by the wind. The navigator would then ask the pilot to follow something more or less straight, such as a road or similar. Looking through the sight, he would then rotate it until objects appeared to move parallel to the lines of the dial. That was the angle of the relative wind.

When the aircraft was crossing the equator, the tradition was to baptize those who were crossing it for the first time, just like seafarers do. One of the practical jokes played on first-time passengers was to invite them into the cockpit, and ask if they wanted to see a flock of elephants in the jungle through the drift-meter. Unknown to them, my father had smeared the eye-sight of the instrument with black shoe polish and when that person moved away from the instrument, he had ... a black eye!

Sometimes, the route went over Greece, Egypt and Sudan. But many times, to Tripoli, in Tunisia, then Kano in Nigeria and then, Leopoldville or Kamina in the Congo.

Apart from military material and troops, the aircraft also carried various things like members of the government, missionaries and even coffins of Belgians who had died in the Congo. My father often came back from Africa with various things, such as avocado fruits and bananas. Once he brought back a chameleon which we tried to feed at home with dead flies. On another occasion he even came back with a Mangabe small ape. It stayed with us for a while at home, but then sadly, we had to give it away.

The aircraft is rather interesting, with its cockpit above the cargo room, plus it's very noisy. I know this, because once I was allowed to sit in the cockpit at Melsbroek, the military base opposite the airport of Brussels-Zaventem EBBR. We didn't fly but instead made a long tour of the taxiways. I was six years old and we were celebrating Saint Nicholas, as the Dutch do (by plane in the air force).

Looking down from the navigator's seat which I had occupied, I saw, in the cargo hold, the military chaplain of the 15th Wing Squadron. He was busy changing his clothes into those worn by Saint Nicolas. A little later, he got out and greeted the children of the air force, with his donkey and helper...Zwarte Piet. That was the day I learnt that Saint Nicholas and Father Christmas were not real.

In November 1958, my father had another interesting journey, as he came back from Lisbon, Portugal, with the Belgian football team. When back at home, my mother asked how his trip was, and he replied that it was just fine. The following day, she found out in the newspaper that they had actually landed with the engine in fire! Of course, he didn't say anything because he didn't want to worry either of us. But there were Belgian journalists who had been following the football players in the plane, who wrote about it.

The C-119 was extensively used in the Vietnam war but needed JATO (Jet Assisted Take-Off) equipment on the very short landing fields of the jungle. This was also sadly experienced by my father. In May 1959, he took off from Leopoldville, in the Congo, when, at the end of the runway, with the wheels already in, the aircraft hit an air hole and landed on its belly. Luckily, with the high wings and the flat belly, there was little damage, but still, it was the last time it flew.

Eventually, many Belgian C-119's went to the Norwegian Air Force, at Gardermoen, which is now the Oslo International airport of ENGM. I thought that the OT-CAC ended up there in 1956 but after a visit at that air base, they couldn't find any trace of it. One theory is that the plane was sold later on to the Italians, as both the Belgian and Norwegian Air Forces decided to replace them with the larger C-130 Hercules. A four engined aircraft that was far more capable than the venerable C-119, and is still very much in use today.

To the loving memory of the Major Aviator Joseph Verheughe, my father.

Michel Verheughe
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