Las Sabinas, Volume 28, Number 4, 2002 Page: 67
95 p. : ill. ; 28 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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The White Sands range, through a contract with Lockheed Martin, uses the drones in its
target test program, both on site and around the world.
The Orleck acquired its DASH after volunteers contacted the U.S. Army Strike Command
office in Alabama based on advice from Peter Papadakos of Reno, Nevada, son of the founder of the
Gyrodyne Company that made all the helicopters.
The USS Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. in Massachusetts and the USS Radford in Ohio also got
permission to acquire a DASH and picked up their helicopters last week too.
"We weren't aware until you all contacted us that there was anybody out there who would
be interested in this stuff," said Phil Davis, a contractor working as support for the target office.
"When we found out about the interest, the immediate response by management was if they
want some of it they can have it. It will create more floor space for us."
White Sands currently has about six drones that are flyable and another in a rebuild program.
The goal is to rebuild three or four more to have a ready fleet of about 10, Davis said. The drones
the museums acquired are not flyable.
Papadakos said saving the helicopters is important to him because the history of the aircraft
is the history of his family.
"To be able to save something from a potential demise of being shot down by a missile versus
being displayed in the accurate environment in which it flew in the 1960s is invaluable," he said.
Papadakos said the cost to acquire a D model in 1965 was about $157,000 but that figure had
risen to $4.4 million by 1986 because of the demise of the 800 horsepower Boeing engine and the
increase in overall production cost. Today a production run of 12 helicopters would cost from $6
to $7 million per aircraft, he said.
"The value of the QH-50 from a historical standpoint is the fact that the helicopter is the only
coaxial helicopter design of American manufacture that ever went into production," Papadakos said.
The Orleck's helicopter is a QH-50C model, which carried the torpedoes, but the foundation
plans to also acquire a QH-50D model at White Sands which carried the "Snoopy" cameras.
Former Orleck executive officer Phil King was instrumental in helping convert the DASH into
a Snoopy while he served as weapons officer on the USS Blue from 1966-1968.
The Snoopy drones were then placed on other destroyers, including the Orleck, which King
transferred to after leaving the Blue.67
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Orange County Historical Society (Tex.). Las Sabinas, Volume 28, Number 4, 2002, periodical, 2002; Orange, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth312922/m1/71/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Orange County Historical Society.