Warbird Information Exchange

News copter footage of the storm damage at Meacham Field last evening (microburst) shows a bunch of building debris on top a group of planes. The only warbird I could see was an Aero Delfin. It looks intact with a pile of junk on top of it. Here's a photo found via Google News:

http://www.dallasnews.com/incoming/2012 ... -power.ece

I saw photos of the Delfin buried in a pile of hangar debris in the Texas Jet compound. The tail feathers and left wing are obviously damaged, but the aircraft is probably repairable. Looks like it was a nice, well-kept jet, wearing vintage Soviet markings and a polished skin. The damage could have been a lot worse. The hangar was totally demolished and literally blown away. The highest measured wind gust at the airport was 67 MPH, but it appears to have been a much stronger microburst that blew the Texas Jet hangar apart. The aircraft that were in the hangar are standing naked on the floor slab, with some debris piled on them. Several biz-jets were damaged, along with a few piston singles. The insurance companies are not going to be happy.

We had some damage at the VFM compound also. One hangar door was blown off the tracks on the east side of the hangar, and there was some damage to the west side of the hangar as well. The fuselage of Pacific combat veteran C-47 "Billie" that was under restoration (stored temporarily outside) was totally destroyed. Jim Reynolds posted a few pics of the damage on the "Special K" resto thread. I don't have any other info yet, but I'll make some calls this evening and post what I can when I can. Maybe CrewDawg can add some info. No word on the fate of the collection of aircraft down the street at the Veterans' Memorial Airpark. They are all exposed outdoors.

A small crew of folks were at the Museum all day yesterday. Chuckie and I both left just after 5:00 PM. The weather during the day was just hot, sunny, and windy. The temp 106 deg F with south winds gusting to 25 MPH, so it felt like standing in front of a giant hair dryer every time I walked outside. Since our hangar doors are 90 degrees to the prevailing wind, inside the hangar it felt like being in an oven. When I left, the sky to the north was dark and menacing. I figured there would be storms rolling in soon, but I never imagined it would be that rough. There was a lot of general damage around the metro Fort Worth area. News reports say 50,000 people were without electricity due to the downing of a cross-country high tension transmission tower.

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Dean Hemphill, K5DH
Port Charlotte, Florida

Re: Veterans Memorial Air Park.... was told they lost their flag pole and several tree branches but everything else appears to be OK. The pictures of hangars down and damage around Texas Jet are pretty bad

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Thanks for the info Karen and Dean. I was just wondering how the VFM and the FAC/VMAP museums faired after just seeing photos of the storm damage on the Dallas News. Sorry to hear about the damage at VFM

-Derek