REAL STARS OF "THE AVIATOR", THE

Flight Journal, Apr 2005 by Davisson, Budd

DIRECTOR MARTIN SCORSESE is known for his gritty, realistic movies, but when trying to compress Howard Hughes' epic life into a mere movie, "The Aviator," he was faced with a formidable obstacle: he had to film credible aerial scenes that the flying public wouldn't hack to pieces à la their reaction to the recent "Pearl Harbor" computer-generated effects.

In an effort at realism, it was decided to use flying model aircraft that were so large that they blurred the line between models and real aircraft. Even Howard would have been impressed!

Special effects director Rob Legato turned to Joe Bock and his company, Aero Telemetry (Aero F/X), whose primary business is building UAVs and satellite telemetry systems for the government and defense contractors. They were given only three months to complete three aircraft. The final fruits of their labor were spectacular and included:

H-1B Hughes Racer. Constructed of composites and using a 360cc, two-stroke, two-cylinder, 50hp engine, the 450-pound movie racer was half scale and flew at 160mph! It actually spanned 18 feet, and its first time aloft was in front of the cameras because the filming schedule couldn't afford to have it crash during testing and miss the chance to film it.

H-4 Spruce Goose. Two hundred batteries were needed to provide 15 minutes of flight time for the electricpowered Spruce Goose. The aircraft was flown at Long Beach Harbor, which gave Scorsese an accurate background to play it against. At 375 pounds and with a 26-foot wingspan, the huge model had its own barge for tending and changing battery packs.

XF-11 Reconnaissance plane. The 24-foot span, 650pound model, like the H-1B model, was flown in formation with a helicopter for eerily realistic air-to-air photography. Aero Telemetry equipped it with state-of-the-art downlink telemetry systems that let them monitor the aircraft's position and the health of the 275cc drone engines.

-Budd Davisson