@ San Carlos, CA
July 2007
Reworked an old photo of this Duchess departing San Carlos Airport. The Model 76 was designed as an low-cost twin-engine trainer for the Beech Aero Centers (Beechcraft’s flight school network), and to compete with the Cessna 310. Some claim the Duchess has been used to train more multi-engine pilots than any other twin. The use of a T-tail configuration places the horizontal stabilizer above the propeller slipstream for better stability and handling. First flown in 1974, only 437 were delivered before production ended in 1983.