Seeking information on Vultee BT-13A

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laura10576

Recruit
9
5
Aug 13, 2025
My uncle was an aviation cadet during WWII based in Georgia. The planes he flew were the BT-13A. Were ALL of the BT-13A dual control or did the pilot seated in the front cockpit control the plane. Would both pilots have control of the flight path - or the one seated in the front cockpit? If the pilot in the front cockpit froze, would the pilot in the back cockpit be able to control the BT-13A?

What does the role of the safety observer mean?

Can an aviation cadet be an instructor? Was it typical for two aviation cadets to be flying - or did one of the pilots need to be an instructor.
 
The BT-13 was a basic trainer (the "BT" part) and had dual controls. That is, the pilot in either seat could control and fly the airplane. Usually, the instructor was in back.

If the student was practicing instrument flying, with a hood on that lets him see the instruments but not outside the cockpit, the second pilot acted as a safety observer, ready to take over if the student was getting into trouble.

A cadet cannot be an instructor until he or shee graduates and becomes a certified military pilot. He or she will need an additional rating as an instructor before teaching others to fly. Very few, relatively speaking, did that. Some, yes.
 
You said a cadet cannot be an instructor. According to the report, my uncle was an aviation cadet. He was sitting in the back of a hooded cockpit. The front pilot was the safety control.
You also said "very few did that". Did you mean very few aviation cadets were instructors?

I am trying to discern if my uncle was the instructor. Are you saying it is possible that he was an instructor? Or did you mean that very few aviation cadets became instructors. They were being trained solely for aviation combat.
 
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If I may .. the cadet was a pupil ( student ). So not an instructor. The instrument flying was taught at the Basic Training 70-hours course. As GregP wrote the instructor was in the back cockpit usually. The way of teaching and controlling of the students is used up to today. I'm not sure of the BT-13 had the "drapes" installed for the blind flights. But if not , it is not too strange the pupil was sitting in the back cockpit where the view , especially forward , was limited rather. Because the goal was to teach flying without the view of the outside he didn't had it at all. Contrary to that the instructor ( safety observer ) sitting in the front cockpit could control all around. IIRC the initail IFR training was running with the instrument flight device ( the Link machine) and later with an aircraft.

Here below is a picture of the Polish pre-war PWS-26 bi-plane ( two-seater ) used for training of cadets. The variant was called "Ślepak" because it was for the training at the instrument/blind flights. As you may notice the back cockpit is covered with non-translucent hood limiting the view for the student while the front cockpit is still open.

 
AAh. According to an US Army Air Forces report, two aviation cadets were flying a BT-13A on "a scheduled student instrument team flight." So my family translated that to mean that my uncle was an instructor, teaching a student (and they assumed the student froze in the middle of a snap roll). But from what I understand now, if they were both aviation cadets, then they were both student pilots. And the safety observer was simply the pilot in the front cockpit. It is not possible one of the students to freeze, without the other student taking control, because of the dual controls. Either pilot, front or back could maneuver the plane - though the pilot in the back had limited viewing. Per the report, my uncle was in the rear cockpit. So the safety observer could have froze in the middle of a snap roll; however, unless there was an equipment malfunction, the pilot in the rear cockpit could have taken over. Is this the correct interpretation? Is there another way to understand the report?
 
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The BT-13 was primarily for gaining experience in basic flight practice.

The student (cadet) typically sat in the foreward position as this would be where an actual pilot would be seated in a single-seat aircraft.

Basic Trainers covered VFR (Visual Flight Rules) while IFR (Instrument Flight Rules) and more complicated flight instruction were most often taught later in Advanced Trainers, like the AT-6 (SNJ was the Navy's designation for the AT-6).
 
One more note to add, that I didn't understand. The report said that the my uncle was "instructed to occupy the rear cockpit and fly a hooded instrument navigational flight. The weather was CAVU". Does that mean that the rear cockpit pilot was not able to view what was going on? They could only read the instruments? What does it mean to fly a hooded instrument navigational flight?
 


The "CAVU" stands for the Ceiling And Visibility Unlimited. So the hooded instrument navigational flight may mean just the navigation flight with hidden navigation guages. All that sounds like the training in the dead reckoning.
 
Wurger said:
The "CAVU" stands for the Ceiling And Visibility Unlimited. So the hooded instrument navigational flight may mean just the navigation flight with hidden navigation guages. All that sounds like the training in the dead reckoning.
Click to expand...
Yes, so the hooded instrument navigational flight means that the aviation cadet in the rear cockpit could control the plane, but could not see in front of him. And if their altitude was too low, the student pilot in the rear could navigate the plane as was deemed appropriate and safe. The student pilot in the front cockpit, the safety observer could also navigate the plane as was deemed appropriate and safe. The mission was "a scheduled student instrument team flight". Not familiar with the terms, and am simply trying to understand who was teaching who - in this case both students, but it seems there needs to be one pilot in control of the navigation. Therefore, the rear pilot was in control of the plane (and reading the instruments), while the front pilot could technically take over at any point if someone "froze"
 
If it was the air navigation flight or the dead reckoning one, the cadet in the rear cockpit was the learner while the one in the front one was the safety observer/instructor. The guy in the back couldn't control all during the flight because he couldn't see the outer airspace all around tha plane or just the navigation indicatorts. The cadet in the front cockpit could because he had the full view at all the flight indicators and the airspace around. So it was easy to keep the control over the student in the back cockpit. If the pupil would fail at the control the instructor could regain the control quickly. Certainly the guy at the back also could but he had to stop his task and move to the flight folowing the VFR rules for instance. But it could have taken some of time. You said that both of them were the cadets. And both of them were flying the plane together. It means that both were allowed to fly independently (on their own) and they didn't need the instructor because of their training level. However their experience could have been not enough especially at a low altitude flight.
 
For instrument work, the rear cockpit has a fabric hood that covers from behind the seat to forward of the instrument panel. It effectively prevented the student in the rear cockpit from seeing outside the aircraft. The pilot in the front seat, as soon as the student went "under the hood", had the responsibility to make sure that the instrument student didn't run into another aircraft, if there was one operating nearby, and to be ready to take over control should the back seater place the aircraft in an unsafe position or attitude. Both cockpits had the capability of using an emergency release to cut the hood loose from the mounts and allow the rear pilot to get it out of the way without needed to fold it up.

I suspect that in the case of two students in the aircraft, a more senior student, very close to graduation was gaining extra flight time as the safety pilot and freeing up an instructor to work with lower time students. He would not be an instructor, but simply a safety pilot and preforming the same duties as an instructor would, but without preforming actual instruction.
 
Based on some of your comments the day of the accident was CAVU (Clear and Visibility Unlimited), a beautiful clear sunny day.

By the time your Uncle was flying the BT-13A he had the ability to fly the aircraft Solo or by himself. As did all of the other Cadets/Students. Every flight did not need to be with an Instructor.

It sounds like two Cadets/Students were out flying and practicing Instrument navigation with your Uncle in the rear seat with the hood pulled up so he had to navigate by instruments only. The front seat pilot (Cadet/Student) was basically the "lookout" so they didn't fly into someone or something. Your uncle could remove the hood at any time that he wanted to see what was outside. The front seat pilot is who would typically do the takeoff and landing. Your Uncle most likely got under the hood once airborne.

Perhaps the Front pilot put the aircraft into a spin or snap roll to see if the Rear pilot could recover the aircraft using instruments only or your Uncle was trying to do a maneuver using the instruments only and at some point something went wrong and they did not recover.

The front and rear controls of the BT-13 are linked together which means when you move the stick or rudder in the front cockpit the stick and rudder in the rear cockpit moves at the same time. If either pilot (front or rear) "froze" with the controls the only way to recover the aircraft would be for the other pilot to out muscle what the frozen pilot was doing.

Example - if you and I were flying and I pushed full left rudder and held it the aircraft would go into an uncontrollable spin. The only way for you to recover the aircraft would be to push full right rudder and over power my left leg to get the rudder back to the neutral position.

It sounds like they did a snap roll or spin and weren't able to recover. Perhaps inadvertently fighting each other with the controls while trying to do so.

If you type in BT-13 and GA in the appropriate boxes you fill see that there were 450 BT-13 accidents in Georgia (GA) alone.

Search USAF Accident Reports 1911-1955

AAIR, Aviation Archaeological Investigation & Research, is a source of U. S. military aircraft accident reports, pictures of aircraft crash sites, MACRs (Missing Air Crew Reports) and individual aircraft history cards and historical research. Historic aircraft crash site surveys, search and...
www.aviationarchaeology.com

Long shot - are you a Miller?

This is a photo of an AT-6 where you can see the hood in the rear cockpit in the retracted position.

 
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What amazing collective knowledge. I am most grateful.

Yes, it was a snap roll, at a low altitude, they could not recover.

Now I understand how it works my family thought that my uncle was the instructor, possibly because, as you stated, he could fly solo, and did not need an instructor at all times.

Apparently, because of what happened, changes were made that prevented this from occurring again. It was in September, 1943.

Not a Miller. Neither pilot was a Miller, though it is a small world. Especially in this world of WW2 aviation craft.

Thank you! I have no further questions. Hopefully something good came of this event, such as a better design of the BT13a dual control.
 
Dear MJFur : I did as you suggested, and typed in type in BT-13 and GA in the appropriate boxes". Many aviation cadets/pilots died. I was not aware of the large number of pilots/cadets who gave their lives while flying these combat training aircrafts . Even in the location where my uncle flew out of, Bush Field. My uncle's accident was in that list of 450 names, and his name was listed as the pilot. While I already had the full accident report - I now have a better understanding of not only what happened but the scope of the number of accidents. I have deep gratitude for your illuminating words and kindness to take the time to more fully explain this tragic event. There is an amazing amount of knowledge being offered in this forum. I have gratitude for your knowledge and also your collective service to this country. (And It is no wonder that they discontinued the use of BT-13/BT-13A after the war effort.)
 
There is nothing inherently wrong with the BT-13/15 aircraft. Some still fly to this day as restored WWII aircraft. It was an unfortunate accident most likely caused by one of the pilots that day. It may also have been some type of mechanical problem that started this chain of events but there really wasn't a way to determine that cause back then like we have today. In short, sometimes accidents happen.

The reason they were discontinued after WWII was that they were just out dated for the needs of the Service.
 
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To MJFur: I understand that you are saying that many aviation cadets/pilots died during training, not due to this particular type of plane.

That is good to know Thank you for clarifying I was under the assumption that if one of the pilots froze, it might be difficult for the second pilot to take control of the navigation device/rudder.

Thank you!
 
laura10576 said:
To MLflyer; Are these photos of a BT-13A
Click to expand...
Yes they are. His photos are of a restored BT currently flying. The owners added a propeller spinner which would not have been there during WWII.

FYI - the BT-13 and BT-15 are the same aircraft just with different engines installed.

Vultee BT-13 Valiant - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Here are a couple WWII images.





 
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