Smithsonian Air & Space Museum scores display of unique a/c

[Odie]

Yesterday, for one day only, the Smithsonian was able to get on loan, from Paradise Island, Wonder Woman's Invisible Plane. They released a
picture of it, in flight formation, beside the Bell X-1.

Link to official release:
http://blog.nasm.si.edu/behind-the-scenes/wonder-womans-invisible-jet/

[normb]

Nicely put.... BTW: Is the Spirit now displayed on the floor instead of hung overhead? Or is that part of the day too?

Norm

[glh]

She and I were the ORIGINAL founders of the 100-mile High Club.

[Bushpounder]

We did this in our museum 2 years ago. I still have the display board in my office. Had lots of tilted heads! Duh.

Don

[Bomber_12th]

Nicely put.... BTW: Is the Spirit now displayed on the floor instead of hung overhead? Or is that part of the day too?

Norm

The Spirit was lowered to the floor back in January, so that some conservation work can be done on the aircraft. One of the tasks is to see if they can remove the yellowed varnish off of the cowl panels, and return them to their former silver appearance again, something the Smithsonian conservators have been eying for many years (the varnish was applied way back shortly after the aircraft was retired, in order to preserve all of the flag markings on the cowl panels). Note that they put modern wheels/tires on it before letting it rest on the floor.

Here are some articles about it:
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/wheels-down-charles-lindberghs-spirit-st-louis-has-landed-180953911/?no-ist
http://www.wusa9.com/story/news/features/2015/01/15/spirit-of-st-louis-plane-comes-down-at-air-and-space-museum/21810771/
http://news.stlpublicradio.org/post/spirit-st-louis-grounded-preservation-work-air-and-space-museum

A lot of nice photos of it, up-close:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/spirit-of-st-louis-touches-down-again/2015/01/15/252072ec-9cfb-11e4-a7ee-526210d665b4_gallery.html

[glh]

What is the object on the floor at about the Spirit's 7-8 o'clock position and underneath the Bell X-1 ??

It looks like a bullet with short wings and one tail-end of a Grumman Panther attached to the end of each wing.

Is this an aircraft ??

[normb]

Thank you for the info on the Spirit and the links. I've only seen it hanging in the gallery.

When I first got into aviation fulltime in the seventies one of the older pilots I met used to say that he was the only man to have fallen out of the Spirit. Seems that when the plane was returned to the US after the big flight he was a young enlisted man in the Army (Air Service?). He drew guard duty in the hangar but couldn't resist the opportunity to climb inside and look it over. (He was an aircraft mecanic.) Anyway, the Sargent of the Guard or OD suddenly came into the hangar. In his haste to get out of the ship my friend fell face first at the feet of the man in charge. He got to practice a lot of additional marching.

Thanks again.
norm

[Wayland]

What is the object on the floor at about the Spirit's 7-8 o'clock position and underneath the Bell X-1 ??

It looks like a bullet with short wings and one tail-end of a Grumman Panther attached to the end of each wing.

Is this an aircraft ??


I think that's Spaceship One.

Steve

[glh]

I think that's Spaceship One.

Steve

You're right, Steve. This is an aircraft whose accomplishments I just completely missed !! My bad.

Thanks again. I have included a link to read about it.

http://airandspace.si.edu/collections/artifact.cfm?object=nasm_A20050459000