I went to the Commemerative Air Force (?) Museum in Mesa Az this weekend.
Some highlights:

An inside tour of "Sentimental Journey", a later model B-17 rescued from
fire fighting duty and restored. Looking down from the crawlway between the rear section and the cockpit with the bomb bay doors open at altitude would
be more than I could take, with or without FLAK. Manning the ball turret, ditto.

Hearing one engine on the B-17 starting up.

An F-4 Phantom II - man, that thing is huge!

A TBM Avenger. see Above.

A B-25 Mitchell bomber

2 Mig-21s

a Mig-15

A Cessna 180 barely big enough for 2 people with 4 seats and 3 ashtrays!

My son is 2 1/2 and had a blast - he was running from plane to plane yelling excitedly "Mom, Dad! Look what I found!"


When did the Confederate Air Force change their name? I hope this isn't politically correct people freaking out over a misguided civil war reference...



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Re: CAF Air Museum in Mesa, A
By: Poindexter Fortran to dove.hobbies on Tue Apr 25 2006 12:33:00

I went to the Commemerative Air Force (?) Museum in Mesa Az this weekend. Some highlights:

I spent a day at Wright Pat. a few years ago. An unforgettable
experience.

An inside tour of "Sentimental Journey", a later model B-17 rescued from fire fighting duty and restored. Looking down from the crawlway between the rear section and the cockpit with the bomb bay doors open at altitude would be more than I could take, with or without FLAK. Manning the ball turret, ditto.

I'm not really familiar with the crawl-way of the Fortress, but there are
a couple others I've looked into that had a narrow enclosed tube to allow passage over the wing-root. I always thought that to be in there while
the aircraft was taking evasive action (or worse, spinning) would have
been particularly terrifying, because you'd be pinned inside the tube by G-forces and I doubt you'd be able to get out.

a Mig-15

Now *that's* a classic old bird! Should have been an F86 Sabre nearby.
The two of them were rivals.


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