Vietnam-era 'Ponderous Polly' featured in air show May 8, 2005

By Corey Friedman
Sun Journal 5/14/2005

"Ponderous Polly," a Fairchild C-123K Provider used extensively in Vietnam, attracted plenty of attention as part of the vintage airplane display at the 2005 Air Show.

Owner and pilot John Curran, a retired U.S. Army captain, said the C-123s were a precursor to the more prevalent C-130 aircraft, and their primary use was to access short runways in remote locations.

"It is a short takeoff and landing aircraft designed to get in and out of unimproved airstrips or hastily constructed jungle strips," explained Curran, a River Bend resident who owns the aircraft with his wife, Sandra, through New Bern-based Northeast Aviation Group.

Curran said only about 300 of the airplanes were manufactured and just five C-123s in working order remain in the United States today.

Curran's plane shuttled supplies to U.S. troops and provided Vietnamese citizens with humanitarian aid gifts of rice and pigs during its many Vietnam war missions.

"This particular airplane was also the last C-123 to make it out of Vietnam into Thailand in 1975," he said. "There are lots of bullet holes in this thing. There are patches all over the place, mostly on the bottom."

Since the C-130 was the favored aircraft, Curran explained, C-123s were flown into some of the most dangerous missions.

They called in the C-123s right after the first C-130 landed and got mortared," he said. "They didn't want to lose any C-130s, so they brought in 123s."

Old bruisers like "Ponderous Polly" evoke nostalgia in some aviators who long for the raspy rumble of a strong engine.

"There's no jet whine on this thing," Curran said. "Each one of these engines has got 18 cylinders and the sound of those 36 cylinders firing is just music to most people's ears."

With a 110-foot wingspan and a capacity of 70 passengers in addition to its regular three-man crew, the C-123 is too large for most hangars. When Curran purchased the airplane in 1998, it had been exposed to the elements for 13 years and needed some renovations.

"This airplane was derelict in the desert when I got it in 1998. It had been there since '85," Curran said. "As you might imagine, it took a little work to get it airworthy again, and when we did get it airworthy in June of '98, we flew it 2,000 miles to Schenectady, N.Y., where it has been based up until this past November."

Curran paid just $1 for his C-123, but even routine maintenance on such an aircraft requires a substantial investment.

"Ponderous Polly" burns 200 gallons of fuel and eight gallons of oil per hour, he explained. The craft's cavernous fuel tank holds 2,600 gallons, and with jet fuel currently averaging $3.50 per gallon, that makes for a $9,000 fill-up.

The retired Army special forces officer and corporate pilot credits the air show community with keeping his plane - and dozens of other vintage aircraft - in the sky.

Shows such as the 2005 Cherry Point Air Show pay airplane owners an appearance fee and reimburse them for the cost of oil and fuel, enabling the owners to tour the air show circuit.

"If it wasn't for the air show community, these airplanes wouldn't even exist anymore," he said. "(This plane) would be in a museum someplace just sitting if there weren't air shows. We bring the museum to the people."