C-130 Hercules
ICAO C130The original Hercules, still flying seventy years after its first flight. Live C-130 positions, separate from the newer C-130J.
Flying right now
Live · 30sAirframe
- Manufacturer
- Lockheed
- Role
- Tactical airlift
- Class
- L4T — Landplane, 4 turboprop engines
- Crew
- 5 — two pilots, a navigator, a flight engineer and a loadmaster
- First flight
- 23 August 1954
- In service
- 1956
Operators airborne
About the C-130 Hercules
This page covers the earlier marks — the C-130E, H and their many special-mission derivatives — which report under a different designator from the C-130J. Seventy years after the prototype flew, dozens of air forces are still operating them, and the type has been in continuous production longer than any other military aircraft.
What appears here is more varied than the airlift role suggests. The Hercules airframe has been turned into a gunship, a weather reconnaissance aircraft, an aerial firefighter, a special forces transport, a search and rescue tanker and an electronic warfare platform, and most of those variants report as plain C130.
Smaller air forces make up much of the traffic. Austria, Chile, Indonesia, Pakistan, Tunisia and many others fly a handful each, and for several of them it is the only large transport they have.
Callsign prefixes
- RCH
- Reach — US Air Mobility Command
- HERKY
- A recurring Hercules training block
- CTM
- Cotam — French Air and Space Force
How to recognise it
- —Four turboprops with four straight blades each. Six curved blades means the newer C-130J instead.
- —A flight engineer's window above and behind the cockpit, which the J model does not have.
- —High wing, squared-off rear ramp, and a cruise speed around 290 knots.
Common questions
+ What is the difference between the C-130 and the C-130J?
Engines, propellers and crew. The older marks have four-bladed propellers and carry a navigator and flight engineer; the J has six-bladed composite propellers, a glass cockpit and a crew of three. They report as separate ADS-B designators, so each has its own page here.
+ How old are the C-130s still flying?
Many date from the 1960s and 1970s. Some air forces operate airframes older than the crews flying them, which is why re-winging and avionics upgrade programmes are common.
+ Is the AC-130 gunship on this page?
It can be. Most Hercules special-mission variants share the C130 designator, so gunships, weather reconnaissance aircraft and firefighting tankers all appear here when they transmit — which the gunships usually do not.