Manufacturer: Douglas

Model: unknown

Name: Twin Raider

Type: Attack

Date: 1949

Status: Experimental

Country: United States

Service: U.S. Navy/Marines

Designation: YA6D-1

The Douglas YA6D-1 Twin Raider was a proposed twin-fuselage Skyraider for Viet-Nam. The reasoning was that reconditioning successful combat aircraft as twin fuselage ones was already a proven concept with the North American Twin Mustang, and that it would double up the volume of ordnance being carried onto the battlefield. The second cockpit could be used by a navigator which would increase the pilot's chances to return to base safely.

Although the concept seemed good on paper, what really killed the Twin Raider was the overall width of the aircraft, which would have made operation a lot more difficult from most of the South East Asian airfields.

The sole YA6D-1 was scrapped and remained but a footnote in history, regularly overlooked by most historians...

I love twin fuselage re-creations... I just wait until an aircraft truly inspires me, and of course some will work much better than others...

As usual with twin-fuselage aircraft, I took a picture of the basic aircraft (here an AD-4 Skyraider), doubled it up and redrew the joining parts. I also had to remove all markings from the furthermost aircraft, as there would be no need for markings on the inside flanks. I didn't make any effort to invent believable and distinct markings for this one. The original photo can be seen below right.

Believable, the concept certainly is. Feasible is another story, and I guess the synopsis pretty much sums up my idea on the project: too wide for most airfield operations.

• "That Twin Skyraider appears to have been designed with Tophe in mind, not that there's anything wrong with that." (Jschmus)
• "I do LOVE this Twin-Skyraider... I appreciate the good work and huge amount of details you performed on the linking parts anf the internal side of fuselage, congratulations..." (Tophe)
• "That Twin Raider is great, Stargazer. Nice job! Looks quite natural." (Logan Hartke)
• "I'm gonna have to get two Skyraider kits and build that thing." (bluesman)
• Love it, a good pair with the Twin Mustang. (ONI-Defense)
• Some siamese planes make sense. This one has a great psychosis to it. Sort of like the He 111-Z. You take my love for the Skyraider and double it. I bow to your genius. (DonDeCerveza)