Burgess Model I

Model I
Role	Reconnaissance seaplane
Manufacturer	Burgess Company
First flight	1913
Primary user	Aeronautical Division, U.S. Signal Corps Aviation Section, U.S. Signal Corps
Number built	1

The Burgess Model I, also known as the Burgess I-Scout and the Coast Defense Hydroaeroplane, was a United States reconnaissance seaplane built for the Aeronautical Division, U.S. Signal Corps in 1913. It was of conventional Wright Model B design but with an engine mounted amidships in an enclosed fuselage, driving by chains two large pusher propellers mounted on the interplane struts. The undercarriage consisted of twin pontoons. The single example built, S.C. No. 17, was delivered to the Army in January 1913 at the Burgess Company and Curtis factory in Massachusetts, then transported to Florida to complete the training of two officers. After the assignment, it was disassembled and moved to the Philippines in September 1913, where it was in and out of service several times before crashing into the sea near Corregidor on January 12, 1915. It is notable as the first U.S. Army aircraft to conduct two-way radio communication with the ground in December 1914.

The Burgess Model I was placed into service as Signal Corps Number 17 (S.C. No. 17) in January 1913 to complete the training of Lieutenants Loren H. Call and Eric L. Ellington at Palm Beach, Florida. Following this assignment it was disassembled and shipped by sea to the Philippine Aviation School near Manila, arriving in the first week of September. When it was uncrated for assembly, it was found to have been damaged so severely in transit that both its upper and lower wings needed replacing. 2d Lt. Herbert A. Dargue, a Coast Artillery officer trained as a pilot at the Philippine Aviation School, was detailed October 18 to fly the plane, based on the beach at San Jose on the south side of Corregidor in Manila Bay. After it was placed back into service in November 1913, it was found that center-of-gravity problems with its front-and-back seating arrangement and heavy pontoons made it incapable of taking off with two persons aboard. Dargue continued one-man operations and with a Coast Artillery officer devised a primitive method of signaling with small parachutes and a Very pistol to indicate misses.

...
Wikipedia