Warbird Information Exchange

I will ship some silver paint shortly!
VL

I suppose some of the rest of you have had this experience. I saw this Mustang in the mid 1960's at Mather AFB outside of Sacto, CA. It was flyable, or nearly flyable at the time. Nobody cared but me. The canopy being glassed over in black dates from this time. It went from being kept inside and brought out for airshows (as static display) to sitting out at the Cal Expo 24/7. At the time, there was one operating Mustang in civil colors at the Sacto Metro airport, and a derelict or semi-derelict Mustang next to it. Comments I heard was "why do they have that junk here?"

In that last pic....... see the dent in the Kingfishers cowling? If we could only make fiberglass replicas.... all the original Kingfishers could come indoors.

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Keep Em' Flying,
Christopher Soltis
Dedicated to the preservation and education of The Sikorsky Memorial Airport

CASC Blog Page: http://ctair-space.blogspot.com/
Warbird Wear: https://www.redbubble.com/people/warbirdwear/shop

Chicks Dig Warbirds.......right?

Not to drag this thread too far off topic, but that Kingfisher was on indoor display when it was damaged. The dinged-up cowl was just one of a number of nasty bumps and bruises..the calling card of Katrina's 15-foot storm surge, which ripped through the hangar (which is itself only a few feet above sea level, and just a few yards from Mobile Bay.) Fortunately, the OS2U fared better than many aircraft in the hangar..it looked like she was structurally sound, and suffered mainly sheet metal damage.

The Battleship Park website used to have some post-Katrina pics. The inside of the display hangar looked like some child had a temper tantrum. The storm surge blew right through the bayside wall, and piled everything against the opposite wall like discarded toys. After seeing those pics, I was stunned at how much the museum had recovered just five years later. Many aircraft that I had assumed would be write-offs look better now than they did before the storm (although the B-25 sitting outdoors is in desperate need of some TLC.)

SN

The USS Alabama Museum is a wonderful place to visit. The ship is well cared for and they have a beautiful aircraft display building. They have some really nice looking aircraft with some big history. Like their RF-8 that flew over the Cuban Missile Crisis.

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Chris Henry
EAA Aviation Museum Manager

it is a great museum, I was there in 1977, they didn't have but a few aircraft on display. Like I said, it is a great museum, but even back then I wondered why, why would anyone would have a museum at near sea level. It would be nice for them to get an aircraft carrier to put their aviation assets in since they are right on the water.

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Kind Regards,
Gary Lewis
J.A.F.O.

The post-Katrina pics are no long on the museum website. I had them saved, but it seems they disappeared in the Great Hard Drive Crash of 2007. Here's one I found after some Googling..that's the Mustang at the bottom of the pile (unfortunately I believe the helo on top had to be scrapped.) Shows just how far they've come!

SN