"The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter." —Mark Twain
Aviation-related posts
Time for another Air-Minded diary? Sure it is. This time let’s take a look at a Century Series fighter from the 1950s, the McDonnell F-101 Voodoo. There were three distinct variations of the Voodoo — a fighter-bomber, a tactical reconnaissance aircraft, and an air defense interceptor — but I’m going to concentrate on the interceptor, […]
In my day, the only video cameras we could use to film our own air-to-air flying were hand-held devices. USAF pilots weren’t (and aren’t, AFAIK) allowed, for safety reasons, to use cameras or video recorders in single-seat cockpits. If you were flying a two-seater, which you might do once a month or so, and you […]
After my post about the Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star, I asked some friends if they wanted me to blog about any aircraft in particular. My niece Rebecca voted for a floatplane, I imagine because she lives in Seattle and sees them all the time … also, of course, floatplanes being so cool. It happens that […]
Walking around the outdoor displays at the Pima Air & Space Museum (PASM) the other day, I stopped in front of a dusty relic, a Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star, America’s first operational jet fighter. I always think of the P-80 (later redesignated the F-80) as a Korean War-era fighter. It’s true that the P-80 first […]
Project Boneyard is now on display at the Pima Air & Space Museum, where I volunteer as a tour guide. It’s an art project using old aircraft and aircraft parts as canvases. When I wrote about it last week, the exhibit hadn’t officially opened and just a few outdoor aircraft were on display. I thought […]
The aircraft boneyard at Davis-Monthan AFB turned local artists loose on some old aircraft. The results are soon to go on display at the Pima Air & Space Museum. I watched them tow a few out into the yard this week and took some photos: There are more to come, and the exhibit, called The […]
I love the jet fighters of the 1950s. Built for speed, sleek and swept-back, they were the embodiment of the fantasy planes of comic book superheroes. The North American F-107, an orphan fighter-bomber abandoned by the USAF, embodies the go-fast exuberance of the period. The F-107 began life in 1953 at North American Aviation as a drawing-board […]
When I started conducting walking tours at the Pima Air & Space Museum a few months ago, I quickly realized I’d talk myself hoarse if I didn’t overcome a certain egotistical reluctance to use a portable voice amplifier and speaker. The museum had two but they were big heavy things, each one powered by eight […]