Transcontinental & Western Air Lockheed Orion 9E
NC12277 (c/n 192)
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TWA operated three Lockheed Orions, primarily on mail
carrying duties. Two of them had been
built for Air Express, a
sort of 1930s transcontinental UPS/Fedex operation, as purely freight
carriers.
. TWA modified them to carry passengers
. NC12277 was put into service in May of 1933 but unfortun-
ately crashed into the
Missouri River very shortly after. The second machine did
go on to serve the air-
line for several
years, as did the third, (seen below) a purpose-built model 9E, the
fuselage of which was
used to make up the
ill-fated "Orion-Explorer" in which Wiley Post and Will Rogers were
killed in Alaska
in 1935.
Lockheed Orion
9E NC 12283 (c/n 195)
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