First flying on 14 February 1942, the Douglas DC-4 is a long-range airliner powered by four Pratt & Whitney Twin-Wasp piston engines. It was the second most popular aircraft built by the California based company, with 1,241 built between 1942 and 1947.
Used throughout World War II by the Americans, it later played a large role in the Berlin Airlift. Many major airlines used the DC-4 on services around the world, some for quite a long time. Let’s have a look at some videos about this popular plane.
Douglas DC-4 Video
Following on from the last video about the Douglas DC-1, we stay in California and look at the fourth Douglas Commercial. Running for a little over two minutes, this colour film shows a flight on board an American Airlines DC-4. It has no sound but is a lesson in efficiency as it shows everything you’d want to see in a short period of time.
I must say the AA cabin for the time looks pretty comfortable. Notable is the meal service, which appears to come out on some kind of stable table type thing and is placed on the knees. Happily there is also a close up shot of the food, showing buns, what looks like a ramekin of peas, a salad and perhaps a piece of chicken. I think we have it a little better today!
Incognito Douglas DC-4s
The DC-4 was licence produced in Canada as the Canadair North Star, and 71 were eventually built. British people might know the aircraft as the Argonaut as that is what BOAC called them. Canadian Pacific referred to theirs as the Canadair Four. This version featured Rolls-Royce Merlin engines which were apparently very noisy.
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- A poster showing inside the BOAC Argonaut
Trans-Canada Airlines noted they modified the engine exhaust to reduce the noise to 102 decibels at the window. For those not up on their decibels, that is as loud as an outboard motor, power lawn mower, motorcycle, farm tractor, jackhammer, or garbage truck. A long flight would have been trying with all that noise, to say the least!
The Original Douglas DC-4
Planned to seat 42 in day configuration or 30 in a sleeper configuration, the original Douglas DC-4 looks nothing like the aircraft we associate with that name. There is a short silent two minute black and white video showing it here.
United Airlines evaluated the plane during 1939, but found the complex systems were expensive to maintain and performance was below expectations. The prototype was eventually sold to Imperial Japanese Airways and a new version was designed.
Overall Thoughts
While major airline service has ended for the Douglas DC-4, there are still some around. The South African Airways Museum Society has two operational which are available for charters. Buffalo Airways in Canada also operates a number of them in a cargo role and a few others also exist.
Australia’s Qantas operated the Douglas DC-4 right through to 1977. This page shows the history of one aircraft, including a cabin shot showing a rather interesting overhead bin configuration.
Have you ever flown on board a Douglas DC-4? What did you think of the videos? Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.
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Featured image by R.N. Smith (1125-076) via the excellent AussieAirliners.org
BOAC Argonaut poster via Christie’s.
First flew a DC-4 in 1956 and took a last flight on this A/C in 1966. Flew Mackey Airlines from both West Palm Beach and Ft. Lauderdale/Hollywood to both West End and Freeport on Grand Bahama Island. This was a step up from the DC-3 although both A/C were unpressurized. Mackey bought 3 DC-4’s from the then Capital Airlines in 1955 (Capital merged with United in 1960. A.C was noisy with lots of vibration. A good A/C for the era
I remember reading about Capital Airlines as they had some of the British aircraft in service such as the Viscount. Excellent that you also flew on the DC-4. Makes sense it was a step up from the DC-3, but both were still very early aircraft when you think about it. Good to hear about Mackey again! Thanks for the comment!
I was blessed to be able to fly one of the last commercial DC4’s from Windhoek Namibia to the Etosha Pan back in 2010. This was part of a Rovos Rail annual trip from Swakumpond to Johannesburg. My first ever flight back in ’53 was on a TCA DC3 so it was a little bit of old home. Tried to append a picture but can.t seem to do so.
That is amazing that you got to fly on a DC-4 in 2010. An excellent experience that must have brought back some great memories. Thanks for sharing that!
In 1953 I flew on a DC-4 from Dallas Love Field to LaGuardia airport in NYC. We flew on a nonscheduled airline called North American. Because the DC-4 was not pressurized the trip was flown at 8,000 ft. and took most of the day at about 180 MPH. Non scheduled airlines operated using surplus WWII aircraft with low fares. The major airlines quickly got congress to put them out of business quickly insuring high airfares and a closed club until the Airline Deregulation Act of 1979 put the Civil Aeronautics Board out of business. We bought box lunches at the… Read more »
That is great that you got to fly on the Douglas DC-4! You also reminded me that it wasn’t pressurised, which I meant to mention in the article. Apparently the original triple tail DC-4 wasn’t either, but it was planned to be added for the production version. Turns out it was just an option and no-one took it up. Those old aircraft were definitely a lot slower than the jets of today. Great to hear your experience of the lunches and food service, not to mention visiting the flight deck. Sounds like an amazing first flight! It’s such a shame… Read more »
First airplane flight 1953
Excellent!