The Northrop C-19 Alpha was a series of three aircraft purchased from Northrop by the

US Army Air Corps The United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) was the aerial warfare service component of the United States Army between 1926 and 1941. After World War I, as early aviation became an increasingly important part of modern warfare, a philosophical ri ...

1931 Events January * January 2 – South Dakota native Ernest Lawrence invents the cyclotron, used to accelerate particles to study nuclear physics. * January 4 – German pilot Elly Beinhorn begins her flight to Africa. * January 22 – Sir I ...

. They were slightly modified versions of the civil

Northrop Alpha The Northrop Alpha was an American single-engine, all-metal, seven-seat, low-wing monoplane fast mail/passenger transport aircraft used in the 1930s. Design work was done at the Avion Corporation, which in 1929, became the Northrop Aircraft Corpo ...

Type 2.

Design and development

The YC-19 aircraft were Northrop Alpha 4s supplied for evaluation to the

USAAC The United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) was the aerial warfare service component of the United States Army between 1926 and 1941. After World War I, as early aviation became an increasingly important part of modern warfare, a philosophical r ...

. No production orders were given. The major difference between the C-19s and the Alphas was that the civilian version carried a pilot and six passengers while the Army version carried a pilot and four passengers.

Operational history

One aircraft, the last of the three purchased, crashed between

Richmond Richmond most often refers to: * Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States * Richmond, London, a part of London * Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England * Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada * Richmond, California, ...

and

Petersburg, Virginia Petersburg is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 33,458. The Bureau of Economic Analysis combines Petersburg (along with the city of Colonial Heights) with Din ...

on Sunday, March 19, 1933, killing its pilot and two passengers. The other aircraft were used for several more years until being sent to training schools as subjects for maintenance and repair classes.

Variants

;YC-19: one aircraft, previously an Alpha 4, serial number 31-516"United States Military Aircraft Since 1909" by F. G. Swanborough & Peter M. Bowers (Putnam New York, ) 1964, 596 pp. ;Y1C-19: two aircraft, serial numbers 31-517 to 31-518,

Pratt & Whitney R-1340 The Pratt & Whitney R-1340 Wasp is an aircraft engine of the reciprocating type that was widely used in American aircraft from the 1920s onward. It was the Pratt & Whitney aircraft company's first engine, and the first of the famed Wasp series ...

-11 engine"U.S. Army Aircraft 1908-1946" by

James C. Fahey James Charles Fahey (1903–1974) was an American writer best remembered as the original compiler and publisher of the popular American reference ''The Ships and Aircraft of the United States Fleet''. ''The Ships and Aircraft of the United State ...

, 1946, 64pp.

Operators

Specifications (Alpha landplane)

References

{{USAF transports

C-19 Alpha The Northrop C-19 Alpha was a series of three aircraft purchased from Northrop by the US Army Air Corps in 1931 in aviation, 1931. They were slightly modified versions of the civil Northrop Alpha Type 2. Design and development The YC-19 aircraft ...