The Fulton Skyhook

During the 1950's, the Coldwar between the US and the Soviets was well underway. Much of the "battle" was taking place in the Arctic, with both countries monitoring the area for activity of each others planes and submarines. Operating in the Arctic posed unique problems for the US when it came to moving soldiers in and out. Ships could not be depended on to break through the ice, aircraft runways were hard to maintain, and the area was beyond the range of helicopters. The CIA enlisted the help of a creative inventor, who had a strangely unique solution: the skyhook.

Robert Edison Fulton Jr. was a man with a privileged upbringing and a taste for adventure. Fulton's father was the president of Mack Trucks, and Fulton himself was named after a friend of the family, Thomas Edison. Since his teens, Fulton literally travelled around the world funded by his father. Along the way he stopped in some places temporarily for schooling, and eventually made a 25,000 mile motorcycle trip and shot 40,000 feet of film along the way.

Fulton eventually turned his interest away from adventure and turned to inventing. Amongst his first inventions was a ground based aerial fighter simulator for the military, who turned out to unimpressed by the device. He then modified it to be a trainer for airplane gunners, and had modest success selling it to the Air Force during World War II. With the war over, he turned his interest to consumers and developed a plane that could be turned into a car. Fulton eventually persuaded Charles Lindbergh to fly it, but even a big name wasn't enough to make it a commercial success.

The Skyhook was Born

After the failure of the flying car Fulton came up with another airborne idea. Modeled after the way British trains picked up mailbags from the side of the track, Fulton designed a method for airplanes to pick up people on the ground without ever landing. It was called the Fulton surface-to-air recovery system or STARS for short. The system worked by attaching a modified weather balloon to a 500 foot nylon cable, and the other end to the person or cargo to be picked up. The pickup plane was modified to have a 30 foot "V" protruding from its nose that the pilot would attempt to capture the nylon cable with by flying into it.

The first tests of the pickup only used weights attached to the other end of the line, but this was enough to secure a contract from the Office of Naval Research after being referred there by an interested CIA agent. Futon continued the development, eventually finding a stronger cable, and moving from using simple weights to dummies, and eventually a pig. The pig survived the test, even after it began to spin out of control while it flew through the air at 125 mph. Once the pig had its feet on the ground and regained its orientation, it began to attack the crew.

Further development led to more modifications to the plane. The capture mechanism on the nose was changed to detach the balloon once the cable was securely captured. Guards were put over the propeller blades to prevent the line from getting tangled or sheared off. A winch was installed in the planes bay so that once the cable as caught by the crew using long J-hooks, the person or cargo could be winched all the way into the plane. The whole ballon and cable unit was also packaged so that it could be dropped to someone already on the ground.

Real-World Use

In 1952, the CIA secretly trained a select number of its agents and pilots to use the Skyhook system, and its first military mission was scheduled for November 29, 1952. The mission was to pickup a courier who was in contact with anti-communist sympathizers in China. The mission failed though when the plane was shot down by the Chinese military and the agents were captured.

The first actual human pickup didn't take place until 1958 when Marine Staff Sergeant Levi W. Woods was successfully hoisted in during a test of the system. The process took only 6 minutes and Wood's avoided the spinning the pig endured simply by extending his arms and legs. More tests were conducted over the coming few years eventually moving to the Arctic, where both people and cargo were picked up without incident.

In 1962 a Soviet base in the Arctic had to be abandoned after cracks formed in its runway and supplies could not be delivered. The US believed the base was being used to monitor submarine movements and the Skyhook was authorized for its first military mission: Operation Coldfeet. Getting a better look at the equipment used to monitor US submarines was a big priority for the military. A Navy reservist trained in geoscience and an airfare paratrooper with Russian linguistic skills were selected for the operation. After months of training at the Naval Test Center in Maryland the two men were ready.

Using a CIA converted B-17 Flying Fortress the two men were dropped at the Soviet base for 72 hours. Picking the men up actually involved three pickups, one for each man, and another for the equipment. Due to deteriorating weather the pickups were less than smooth. A strong wind blew the balloons, and thus the men, across the ice. The plane also had trouble hooking the cable due to the balloon blowing around. Eventually, the men and the cargo were picked up and the Skyhook had it's first successful mission under its belt. The intelligence collected during the operation proved to be invaluable. The Soviet technology was much more advanced than the American's, and the US became aware of the Soviets true sub-tracking capabilities.

The Skyhook was in operation for until 1996 and even with its risky nature only one fatality was ever reported. However, with advances in helicopter ranges and the ability for mid air-refuels, the Skyhook became obsolete. Skyhook did have it's place in popular culture, appearing in several movies including the James bond flick, Thunderball, and the more recent film, The Dark Knight. Robert E. Fulton Jr. died in 2004 at the age of 95.

For the ever-skeptical, check out the video below for the Skyhook in action:

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