laststandonzombieisland

26 April 1918. Original Caption: “Naval hydroaeroplanes visit Nantucket. One of the four naval hydroaeroplanes which visited Nantucket to assist in the third Liberty Loan campaign carried on there by the Naval Reserves. One of the hydroaeroplanes was wrecked on landing. It was the first time many of the inhabitants of the famous island had seen a plane, this being the first flight so far out to sea.”

The floatplane is A919, a Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Corporation Model 2As (Curtiss R-6L). As detailed by Swanborough the Navy ordered 40 (A162-A197 and A873-A994) of these aircraft in 1917-18 fitted with big 400 HP Liberty 12 engines rather than the anemic Curtiss 200 hp V-X-X.

Capable of an impressive (for the time) 565nm range and 100-knot airspeed, the Navy’s R-6Ls were the first U.S.-built aircraft to serve overseas during the Great War with American forces, as the Navy deployed a squadron– the First Marine Aeronautic Company— to Ponta Delgada in the Azores for ASW patrols in January 1918.

Postwar, the above photographed Nantucket R-6L was one of a dozen aircraft (A919, A920, A925, A943, A956, A958. A963/A966, A970, A976, A991, and A994) converted to Liberty Torpedo Carriers, one of the Navy’s first torpedo strike planes.