COMMON
CL4G
Aero Spacelines Super Guppy
The Guppy
“Built to swallow rockets whole.”
Aero Spacelines · cargo
NO PHOTO
Length
143 ft 10 in
Wingspan
156 ft 3 in
Max speed
220 kts
Range
1,734 nmi
Ceiling
25,000 ft
Engines
4x Allison 501-D22C turboprops
Crew
4
Payload
52,500 lb
Built
5
A 1950s Stratocruiser stretched into a flying whale so Apollo's Saturn V stages could travel by air instead of by barge. Five were built. One still flies, for NASA, hauling spacecraft parts no other aircraft can fit.
Fun fact
Its hold is 25 feet across and 111 feet long. A complete Saturn V third stage rode inside it to the Cape during Apollo.
How to spot one
Impossible to mistake: a bulbous whale of a fuselage with the cockpit tucked low under the bulge, NASA blue trim. It lives at El Paso and only leaves to deliver spacecraft hardware.
Crews call it
The Guppy
Sounds like
Four Allison turboprops. The same family as a C-130's, so the same steady drone, from an airplane that looks like it should not fly.
One might be overhead right now.
Bogey turns the The Guppy from a dot in the sky into a card in your logbook. Coming to iOS and Android.
Get Bogey