A Walk Through the National Museum of the US Air Force - PART 2

so back in the Cold War gallery picking up where I left come over here with a convair f-102 Delta Dagger and overhead is a u2 unfortunately the way it's illuminated it's hard to see anything except the bottom of one wing [Music] and of course there's a sr-71 here [Music] and sitting here rather stealthily is the is it Northrop who built this thing I forget [Music] the stealth-bomber certainly but I don't remember what the manufacturer is well that's right it's northrop grumman anyway the b2 [Music] [Music] and we're sitting here under a b-1 bomber again I'm sure it's showing up as dark on dark one thing I always get a kick out of on these is whether a museum decides to list the original manufacturer of an artifact or if they list the manufacturer that bought out the original manufacturer in this case Boeing b-1b as I recall it was not originally a Boeing product but it got absorbed this is an f15 Eagle and a sigh korsky mh-53 em pave low I said this was an exceptionally neat helicopter an overhead or a number of aerial torpedoes flying missiles and various unmanned aircraft over here is an f1 11 we've already seen this before but in another gallery and here's the Bell cv-22 be Osprey now part of Boeing and over here I'm not sure why it's in the Cold War gallery but a p38 hiding in the darkness and a panavia tornado from Desert Storm and what we have back here another f-111 I think and here's the a 10 Thunderbolt that are known as the Warthog product of Fairchild Republic and sitting over here is the c-130 specifically the ac-130 a Spectre it's a gunship Azrael Angel of Death [Music] here's a mig-29 fulcrum and we've been waltzing around the outside of a c-130 3 hopefully we'll get a better view of that and here's the stealth fighter the f-117 and here's another meg the mig-23 flogger here's several interesting airplanes up overhead but they're in total darkness so I wouldn't be able to get them in the video more of the c-130 three here's a mcdonnell-douglas if our our f-4c phantom two instill the C 133 hanging overhead but ever everything here and here's the mcdonnell douglas f-4 g wild weasel and there's a t37 tweetybird hanging up in the darkness and here's an f-101 voodoo and a lockheed f-104 starfighter i think it's the only one in the collection here and up overhead as a Ryan beat QM 34 fire be [Music] and this is an f-106 delta dart [Music] [Music] and loitering overhead with the signage in the dark [Music] is the Martin our b-57 D [Music] I already mentioned the sr-71 [Music] and here's the front end of the C 133 one of my favorite cargo planes [Music] - few of these are in museums but there are a few around these things were rather rushed into service [Applause] kind of filling the gap between the older cargo planes like the c-124 and then the c5 an interim aircraft went right into production without the prototype stage I had a number of issues fatigue issues some of them just fell out of the sky and semi unexplained circumstances they were apparently exceptionally loud inside and they had issues like this side door on the side the fuselage was not stiff enough and you couldn't always close the side door because of torquing of the fuselage and they would taxi around with the crew pulling on the door until the fuselage finally flexed in the right direction - while the door to close things like that and they put all these strengthening bands around the fuselage especially just forward of the wing which was considered to be a particularly weak area the supersonic vortices thrown off by the tips of the propellers impacted the fuselage as if it was being bombarded by huge ball bearings or something and it was deafeningly loud inside so it was not a pleasant airplane to be in unless you were up in the cockpit area still it did a huge service for many years before being retired the last one had been in civilian service in Alaska and was just a few years ago flown down to Travis Air Force Base where it's in the museum there and there's videos on YouTube of that one flying [Music] [Music] so we're heading out of the Cold War gallery here a couple more planes on the way out [Music] I don't believe I covered the b-47 or in specifically the RB 47 H Stratojet that sits up above us here [Music] once again and I hate to keep complaining but it's really hard to see these the way this place is lit up I sincerely hope they make some renovations in between hangars 3 & 4 is the missile gallery when the museum first started moving into its current set of buildings when there was just hangar 1 all the missiles they had were outdoors in front exposed to the weather and eventually they built this missile gallery and moved the missiles in here and added a few more that weren't there originally there is a mezzanine here for a better view there's a satellite here as a for a Gina here this is a Titan one and this is a Titan to ICBM boys had a lot of interest in this particular missile or rocket and I'd only learned when I read up on it a bit more that what appears to be a twin-engine design is actually a single-engine but it has two bells on it so it's considered a single-engine stage and this is the four let's go upstairs and this is a Minuteman one and a Jupiter [Music] and this is an elevator [Music] [Music] and there's both an upper lower level walkway over to hangar four a lot of experimental aircraft on this side as well as some more rockets and another sr-71 type on that may actually be a yf-12 there I believe that's what it is actually and not a flying Space Shuttle but a mock-up and a few more cargo airplanes over here and then the set of presidential airplanes the various Air Force One types but I'm going to visit this in detail later on and right now I'm gonna go to the cafe it's about 1:00 in the afternoon and walking around all morning need to get some sustenance then there will be another movie and then I'll come back here and do a walk-around of hangar 4 and then out to the outside hangars I think or not the outside hangars the outside display on the ramp and the world war two British airfield buildings the Quonset hasn't so on that are over there there's a small cafe up here but it's not the real cafe [Music] it does save you the walk all the way back to the main cafe though and there is a bit of a mezzanine just for hangar 3 which is accessed from this smaller cafe and you do get to get a better view of the b-36 here than you can possibly get from the floor [Music] and there's better lighting on top of the b2 and they some of the other planes are still in the dark the c-130 fries a little easier to see here [Music] so [Music] I don't mind taking the stairs [Music] [Applause] hand off to the cafe in between hangars 1 & 2 is the Aviation Hall of Fame the National Aviation Hall of Fame rather which we might be able to stop in later on they have an auditorium here called the Kearney auditorium and that used to be where they would show the movies before they got the IMAX theater I guess they just use it for miscellaneous things now but just outside the gift shop on both sides of it heart stairs going up to the cafe the valkyrie cafe [Music] still a beautiful day out there well with a bit of a late lunch over with now and still an hour to go before my second movie and plenty of time to see hangar four I've decided to go to the outdoor ramp first so let's go down there now [Applause] yes sir ma'am can I go out there you can but you know you did Park on the side I know all right then when you come back you had to come back and you go through scared okay so I gotta walk back around that side when I come back in correct but there's no other way to get to that apron then right other than parking on that side correct we tell people get back in the vehicles driving park over there all all we're gonna get ready to leave if not be walking four football fields yeah well I'm a good Walker oops it's a little slow [Music] the weather around here has been amazing in the Midwest probably outside the Midwest too but here is rolling up toward the end of October and this is the kind of weather you'd expect to get in say early September temperatures and they balmy but not hot range I would say somewhere in the mid 70s Fahrenheit which is where they used to have experimental airplanes before they built here some other ones blocked with trees but that is wright-patterson Air Force Base over there and it was always tricky getting over there before before they built hangar for and that was because that's an active Air Force Base and they excluded people from going over there unless they were US citizens so I was here many times before visitors for example or a US driver's license they were prevented and they also had periods where their funding was such that you had to take a bus over there instead of driving over on your own they couldn't handle the security and then they wouldn't have funding for the bus the next time I would come and then you had to go over but yet again special permits and so on to try to bring your own car and it's definitely something that many people are not able to see so this whole apron that I'm walking on here now used to be covered with airplanes the b-52 that we saw used to be out here for many years sitting over there kind of almost on what's the grass now so it seems like they when they get new airplanes or airplanes they're not quite sure what to do with this is where they put them until they can move them somewhere but definitely now it's what one two three five airplanes out here definitely less busy than it was before so this airplane is a Lockheed c60 lodestar I'm sure it's a perfectly good airplane but I always thought these looked a little unwieldy this is why see 125 beam Raider almost looks like it's supposed to set down on the water but not quite [Applause] and here's the Jimmy Durante airplane this is a Boeing excuse me a Boeing ec135 II so called the Aria it's basically uh believe it's a 707 with this big radio on the front mobile tracking and telemetry platform to support the Apollo space program and some other unmanned space programs as well so this is a combination of NASA and Department of Defense and then contracted with McDonnell Douglas and Bendix to modify eight of the Boeing c-135 Strato lifter cargo aircraft into this particular variant I kind of like the engine covers and over here we've got a c-17 these are still active in the earth were very much active and I'm kind of surprised they have one here on display I'm guessing this must be a pretty early one if they've retired and already so what's it say about this one so it's a c-17 Globemaster 3 entered service in 1993 the one on display is the prototype okay that's why it's here this is the prototype built by Douglas which is now Boeing it was the first test article and first flew in 1991 and after it was finished with its flight test program it supported other flight tests and propulsion test programs for the Air Force NASA and others and it appeared in a number of motion pictures according to this it appeared in transformers in 2007 Transformers Revenge of the Fallen in 2009 Ironman in 2008 then Ironman to in 2010 after 20 years of wide ranging flight tests it had reached the end of its flying career and was retired Edwards Air Force Base in 2011 and then it was flown to the museum in 2012 so how about that in the distance so one of these is just restaurants really outwork this is a American Air Forces in England world war two exhibit [Music] alright go over one more time Luigi hop dotasia sir Tiffany group 830 1747 take off that 118 to live with our daughter division over from her lake at full 40 [Music] [Music] [Music] yeah yeah pretty good sound effects and hear the sound of aircraft starting up outside and so on pretty well done not a lot to see here other than a few informational posters on the wall but still [Music] guarding the tower not sure which door lets us in one try them until something opens not that one control tower is dedicated to all eight Air Force veterans of World War two and the 26,000 Airmen killed [Music] [Music] this looks strangely like the room downstairs it's a little bit Spartan in here I think it would have been considerably different during the war I think it'd be great if they could really get this mocked up like a real hangar and have uniformed people going through the motions but I'm sure that would cost a boatload [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] I'm told that this particular facility here this building is very popular with visitors from from England they especially the older ones who remember the airfields [Music] [Applause] I didn't see out here that the parking was pretty much full of cars so it's definitely a lot of people attending it and I should mention that the air force museum is free admission there's no charge to come in at all there is a charge for the food of course or if you go to the movie or the gift shop but pure admission to the museum is free for everybody and now I'm coming back around through the security entrance okay my second movie was about d-day and it's really an excellent production and I think I saw the same one at the National Air and Space Museum hood bar has a facility when I was there last in their IMAX theater I understand by the way that they only actually show IMAX movies here at this museum anymore that they are showing non IMAX films but on a very large screen so this is hangar for did the view of it before from above so this is one of the gondolas from one of the early efforts to get man to extended altitudes [Music] and that's an Excelsior project Excelsior balloon gondola from the nineteen around 1960 and overhead we have I think it's a Titan - or what is it one of the I'm sorry Titan - ridiculous I know that's not right it's a Titan 4 which is the largest rocket the Air Force possesses got solid rocket boosters and all but at its core it's got a Titan I'm presuming this whole front section as payload and then you've got a Titan rocket down at the core which no doubt provides most of the steering and guidance and then you've got a couple solid rocket boosters strapped on each side of it to get the extra propulsion but the Titan itself is in control of the stack one of my favorites here is the Valkyrie which used to be outside and this slowly been moved hangar to hangar they headed over across and wright-patterson and the experimental aircraft hangar for many years and then they moved it back here and it's been moved kind of down to the end hangar as they've added on to them this is a reconnaissance satellite and a film recovery vehicle and another reconnaissance satellite and this looks like a the same engine that's used on the Titan the Aerojet LR 87 as mentioned before this is really one engine but it has two bells over here they have a Fisher p75 Eagle which was a an interceptor from World War two it's experimental in nature that's why it's in this hangar because this half of the hangar is experimental aircraft there's a nice picture of the Valkyrie taking off and there they have the allison twin shaft v.34 20 engine that was used on the well several air force airplanes I forget which ones here's a bell P 59 be air a comet and over here a bell x-1 be and the Lockheed p80 overhead is a northrop x4 and here's a convair xf 92 we're under the wing of the Valkyrie at this point these wings did droop so this whole section from the black line outboard would droop in flight there's a General Electric YJ 93 GE 3 turbojet engine and here's the Douglas x3 stiletto one of the experimental aircraft that would have been operated out of Edwards Air Force Base although I call it as sort of disappointing because the powerplant that was intended for it didn't materialize and it didn't really satisfy all the ambitions of its program and right above us as a bell x5 which is a swing-wing test plane here's a westinghouse j34 engine and one of my favorites is the mcdonnell xf 85 goblin which was intended to be carried in the bomb bay of some of the larger bombers and released in order to provide a transportable fighter plane that could defend the bigger airplanes there's a republic xf 84 which looks like it should be a jet aircraft but actually has a propeller on the front and hiding back around here is the North American x10 physician so you can hardly see it [Music] there's an allison t40 engine and here's a north american f-100 7a I'm never sure whether I think this is a cool-looking airplane or a dumb-looking one this is the forward-swept wing test aircraft I forget its designation oh it's the next 29 and this is one of the ficon aircraft the Republic why rf-84f which was intended to be tagged onto a large aircraft and taken along for the ride and this is the Lockheed d-21b which could be hung under the wing of a b-52 and used for high-speed reconnaissance without being a manned vehicle it was certainly related to the XR the sr-71 type aircraft we're still down here underneath the Y b70 Valkyrie which is a very large aircraft and I can't really get far enough away from it to get a good view there's the sign for it and here's the other aircraft that would be the experimental predecessor of the sr-71 and this is one that was in the experimental hangars for most the time until it got moved here and it's the xf 12a or I'm sorry the yf-12a I don't know if I said XF before they have a 360-degree cockpit app that you can get for your phone or iPad type and it lets you look inside certain select airplanes in the museum as you go by them this is the Bell Helicopter Textron xv-3 this is one of those that was used to get early data on what eventually became the Osprey that the Marines operate today tiltrotor aircraft that could transition from vertical to horizontal flight using the same set of rotors and I hadn't touched on the Republic XF 91 Thunder scepter there's a whole bunch of experimental and production drones and small helicopters up above this guy up here is a fairchild XS x SM 73 bull goose a pilotless decoy missile from the 1950s and this guy here is a Ryan X 13 Verta jet which could take off vertically from a launch trailer that transitioned a vertical just like this and it could take off vertically and then come back and land on it they did it but it was just a purely experimental craft to learn more about that type of flight and here is the Hawker Siddeley x v6 a Kestrel which is something that eventually turned into the Harrier type aircraft in this weird-looking plane that looks like it couldn't have flown as the northrop tacit blue a very secret experimental aircraft and stealth technology and if you don't think the airforce ever had flying saucers here's one of them sort of I don't believe this ever got more than a few feet off the ground but it did fly built by Avro and over here we have a Lockheed t-33 a and this is the convair NC 131 H which is a total in flight simulator so they took a standard convair aircraft and bolted on this extra section in front that would allow the entire aircraft to be flown as if it was a different type of airplane for training the pilots and they used various methods to simulate the handling of the aircraft different from the base convert on which it was built not anywhere this is a NASA slash Boeing x36 over here is a general dynamics in f-16 a and another view of the convair total in flight simulator notice the extra flight controls out on the wings would help it simulate different types of aircraft and this beauty here is the Fairchild c-119 flying boxcar one of my favorites this one was outside for the longest time on the air park before being brought in and restored [Music] over here across the way is an XC 142 another tiltrotor experimental aircraft so it looks like maybe you can go into this one let's see what goes on there this is the cat2 packet everything nicely plexiglass or Lex and off so you can't touch anything [Music] not much to see in here it's very Spartan airplane and there's the hatches to the front including the little here and all there the very limited and sanitary facilities and the cockpit is not visible from here [Music] so not that much to see there but still interesting this is the Boeing x45 a joint unmanned combat air system here's yet another c-130 based airframe this one is the I think this one seems more like the plain vanilla version it's not a gunship and hanging up above us is the Lockheed Martin our q3 darkstar highly advanced stealthy reconnaissance remotely piloted aircraft hard to get a good view of it [Music] and this is I believe the c-141 that's called the Hanoi taxi when I lived at Scott Air Force Base it seemed like there were c-141s taking off about every 10 minutes of course that was quite a long time ago I'm not positive and maybe there will be a sign saying something about it but I seem to recall this was the last c-141 to fly I don't see any signage for it this is of course the heavy lift cargo plane at the air force had before the c5 came out I was told by one of the docents that this hangar has enough room for the 747 Air Force one aircraft when it gets retired that they have already mapped out how to rearrange the planes to fit it in here I don't know what they're gonna do when they have to put a c5 in here huh probably have to build another hangar another flight simulator okay now we're coming around the back of the c-141 and looks like they're letting people inside of here too well here it has the sign it's on a box so the c-141 is clearly a much smaller airplane than the c5 only a fraction of the width but configuration very similar I've got all the fabric crew seats along the walls along with oxygen masks and as demonstrated here they could put in airline type seating at least some of it not sure if that's where the officer sat or how they work that you have your military latrine there a lot of people sign this thing and your cockpit up there at least one observers seat a navigator radio operators seat there's probably a flight engineer on the other side plus the two pilots so now we're out of the experimental hand oddball category and into the presidential aircraft part of the hangar [Music] this is the VC 54c sacred cows chairlift which allowed Franklin D Roosevelt who was bound to his wheelchair to get in out of the plane more ceremoniously than being carried up the stairs I did overlook the c21 a Learjet which was used believe primarily for executive transport I had to be a little bit demeaning for generals and so on to have to scrunch down and fit in there because the learjet was notoriously short on headroom [Applause] and here's the 707 based I forget what they call it and it's military designation we'll find out but used as Air Force One so it's pointed out before this is the sacred cow a VC 54c Skymaster built by Douglas basically a c-54 fuselage fitted with wings from a c-54 cape c-54 beat to get greater fuel capacity and had an unpressurized cabin they have that little Gateway there because that's how narrow it is on board they don't want people to call the way up the stairs and then get stuck in the narrow passageways [Music] [Music] it's like being on a train this was the executive office swan board the plane takes up almost the entire width of the airplane and here's the rear lavatory and so on and a few more seats in the presidential elevator [Music] [Music] [Music] and this is the Douglas VC 118 known as the independence this was Truman's aircraft [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] Wow [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] thank you okay [Music] these are much better presented now than they were when they were in the experimental hangar in there they still had the the plexiglass or lexan panels but they didn't have quite as much lights on and so it was harder to see generally a better view in there now and I think a lot higher traffic going through them as well because they're not in such a restricted area this is a Gulfstream C 20 B that was used for a executive transport for many senior American leaders for a couple of decades this particular aircraft did carry President Clinton and presidents Carter Ford and HW Bush carried presidential spouses several secretaries of state and defense foreign dignitaries numerous high-ranking civilian officials and military personnel when it didn't make sense for one reason to use the the bigger airplanes possibly sometimes because of which airports they were flying into sometimes because the president might be on one of the other ones and they didn't really need to do that for the people who were transporting at the moment [Music] this is another smaller executive transport it's a Lockheed vc-1 40 B Jetstar used the same reasons this particular airplane carried Richard Nixon Gerald Ford President Carter and Ronald Reagan number of times although was never of course a primary primarily presidential aircraft and here's the Lockheed Constellation based presidential aircraft eyes have to avoid calling it here unless he's aboard [Music] it's a Lockheed vc-1 21e Columbine three [Music] [Music] they snot the constellations a beautiful airplane but I don't imagine it was that much fun to fly the that's really tiny for such a big airplane [Music] the gyal back here thinks this is the one she's seen on TV now they're probably before they weren't [Music] I could have probably written a book about what that gal was saying that was wrong now I made my share of mistakes here today - speaking from memory and so on so this is the most modern presidential aircraft there's another one up there the Beechcraft vc6 ladybirds special which often landed at Johnson's ranch if I understand correctly there's a North American t39 a say Berliner served as an executive transport and a testbed for various technologies for many years and the arrow commander you for be also used as executive transport and then finally the Boeing vc-1 37c Sam 26000 this particular aircraft carried eight American presidents Kennedy Johnson Nixon Ford Carter Reagan George HW Bush and Clinton this is the one that President Kennedy flew to Berlin when he declared that he was expand ein Berliner oh this one's nice yeah [Music] got your big communication center here I don't know that looks like a knee banger to me and the fairly nice galley in here and seating for top aides and so on walking through here with these lexan panels you'd get all charged up with static these benches along the wall and of course the aisle jumps over to the side because of the wide executive rooms on the other side here special presidential lavatory couple executive chairs [Music] I suppose a lot of these seats were for journalists that would follow the president around in a pretty good-sized galley here to serve the better meals than normal Airlines would offer and I think we've pretty well covered it here there's an x-15 right here and then they have a couple the lifting body aircraft here the Martin x24 a lifting body and the mmm the Martin x24 be lifting body and house will miss the flown capsule they have here I forget which one it is okay this is the Apollo 15 command model command module Endeavour as it was called this is the one that Dave Scott Jim Irwin and al worden flew on in 71 of course the National Air and Space Museum in DC has another one I believe that one's the Apollo 11 and offhand I forget where the other flown capsules are maybe they're at the various NASA facilities probably are I suppose husband there's a Gemini manned orbiting laboratory spacecraft looks similar to other Gemini vehicles but it has important differences as the sign says here the circular hatch leading from the crew compartment through the heat shield in the rear of the vehicle it led to a tunnel which connected the craft to a 19 foot long manned orbiting laboratory module where the crewmen were supposed to live and control reconnaissance cameras they were just to be up there for about 30 days each time they were supposed to be launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base instead of Cape Canaveral and they pulled the program for budgetary and political reasons and never did fly them so the special hatch there leading out through the heat shield is one of the things that distinguishes this from a regular Gemini and it looks like they've got a mercury over here too which I missed before this is a flight rated production vehicle that was never used it was used to provide parts in support of the final mercury mission in 1963 and that concludes my walk-around of the National Museum of the United States Air Force still a lot of people coming in the door like they just arrived

Channel: youtuuba

Views: 64,389

Keywords: aviation museum, air force museum, US Air Force Museum, National Museum of the US Air Force, National Museum of the United States Air Force, US Air Force, United States Air Force, Air Force One, Bocks Car, B-36, B-52, C-133, B-29, Dayton

Id: 4wvH0S6xKnM

Length: 84min 35sec (5075 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 27 2017