Kaman Huskies

Last month marked the passing of iconoclastic rotorcraft designer Charles Kaman (1919-2011), who achieved a modest degree of success with his radical helicopter designs and pioneered the jet-powered helicopter that now dominates this area of aeronautics.

Kaman's most successful design was the H-43 Huskie, used by the U.S. military services as a short-range rescue machine. The H-43 exemplifies Kaman's characteristic design of having two separate side-by-side main rotors whose arcs closely intermesh.

Dick shot these pics of two H-43s on the ramp at Cam Rahn Bay, Vietnam, in 1968. Probably, they each had quite a few rescues of downed pilots to their credit.