This previously classified film tells the launch story of the Lockheed C130 Hercules. Back in 1955, a new model of troop and transport plane was first flown and put under flight testing, built by Lockheed Marietta, and it was the famous Lockheed Hercules.
By January of 1955, six early production A models of the C130 were under manufacture. On April 7, 1955, the first production Charlie 130 Hercules departed on its first ever flight. The test flight lasted one hour and seven minutes and only 800 feet of runway were required for the empty Hercules to get airborne. In the following months the first six Hercules off the production line logged some 94 hours of flight test work during the remainder of 1955. The rest, as the saying goes, is history!
