Boeing GA-1

The Boeing GA-1, company Model 10, was an armored triplane designed in 1919 and powered by a pair of modified Liberty engines driving pusher propellers. It was the first of the US Army Engineering Division's heavily armored GAX ground-attack experimental aircraft, a pet project of General Billy Mitchell, meant to strafe ground troops while staying immune to fire from the ground and from enemy aircraft. Isaac Laddon's GAX design first flew at McCook Field on 26 May 1920, and Boeing won a contract in June 1920 that was cut from twenty aircraft to ten. About 2,200 lb of armor plate and eight machine guns plus a 37 mm cannon made it ponderous, and service tests at Kelly Field in 1923 found it unacceptable; all were scrapped in April 1926.