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New England Air Museum


maddmaxx

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For those who thought the first manned flight in the US was the Wright Bros........The first manned flight was actually a balloon.

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We're very close to Springfield here, the home of the Granville brothers.  This is a replica, not an original.

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This is also a replica, originally built for Cole Palen's Flying Circus in Rhinebeck NY.  It was flown once and Cole declared the workmanship unsafe for further flying.

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The protagonists of the Korean War parked nose to nose

The Mig 15 20190624_105408.thumb.jpg.4c79164cf43013cf370c96f31ca4b10e.jpg 

and the sabrejet 20190624_105426.thumb.jpg.2997deb4bece5c4f64216dca715e8747.jpg

The volunteers who man the museum and who provide labor time to the restoration of these aircraft told me that it took almost 3 years of volunteer polishing to restore this DC3 to it's original owners colors.

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40 minutes ago, Airehead said:

thanks-- I ahve always wanted to go there.  Is there still a runway for transient traffic?

The museum is just off the northern edge of Bradley Field (BDL) or Bradley International Airport as they like to call it these days.  I cannot tell you what it would take to file a flight plan into there or what charges would apply to land and park the plane.  You would still probably need a cab to get to the museum.  It's actually on the outside of the perimeter road just west of the Fire Fighting School. Shrink the map below two clicks and you will find it to the north.

 

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Thanks for the photos.  We are working on planning out our summer vacation and we might end up in New England (if I'm lucky).  My son would love this - we have been to several similar museums.

He and his Civil Air Patrol squadron just saw the B-29 "Fifi" up close at the Trenton airport on Saturday, and then we saw (and heard) it flying low out of town Sunday morning - very cool.  He also got to sit in a North American T-6 "Texan" (which admittedly means a lot more to him than it does to me).

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15 minutes ago, TrentonMakes said:

Thanks for the photos.  We are working on planning out our summer vacation and we might end up in New England (if I'm lucky).  My son would love this - we have been to several similar museums.

He and his Civil Air Patrol squadron just saw the B-29 "Fifi" up close at the Trenton airport on Saturday, and then we saw (and heard) it flying low out of town Sunday morning - very cool.  He also got to sit in a North American T-6 "Texan" (which admittedly means a lot more to him than it does to me).

You would drive north on I-91 to the Bradley Field connector and then take 75 north along the east side of the airport till you got to the northern side.  Then you have to find the smallest sign in the state and turn left through a rusty old gate that looks out of bounds at first. Follow the perimeter road (full on homeland security don't stop and don't park) till you get there on the right side of the road.  It's summer tourist time here but there were only about 12 non staff cars in the parking lot the whole time I was there.  It's an underappreciated museum.  Special displays center around Sikorsky, Kaman, Pratt and Whitney etc all CT state companies.

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2 hours ago, maddmaxx said:

For those who thought the first manned flight in the US was the Wright Bros........The first manned flight was actually a balloon.

20190624_110803.thumb.jpg.588b73987c77c34eeb926ca4da2cc6ae.jpg 20190624_110812.thumb.jpg.fd3bfbd0d74759b59815ed9532cf690d.jpg

We're very close to Springfield here, the home of the Granville brothers.  This is a replica, not an original.

20190624_111014.thumb.jpg.d90d181f4603731202ab907cddcaa60e.jpg

This is also a replica, originally built for Cole Palen's Flying Circus in Rhinebeck NY.  It was flown once and Cole declared the workmanship unsafe for further flying.

20190624_103812.thumb.jpg.50705d425523f66c279606cecd3227f1.jpg

imageproxy.php?img=&key=2c8703aa0a096573imageproxy.php?img=&key=2c8703aa0a096573

I like how your 1st picture is a bike.  I went to the Lyon Air Museum a few months ago and posted this one.

 

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34 minutes ago, Tizeye said:

Looks like they cleared some planes out as seem to have a lot more floor space. 

They routinely move exhibits back and forth between the 3 display buildings and the "garage" where some restorations are taking place.  Sometimes it's to clean them up (the bare metal F-100A was in camo last time I was there) and sometimes it's just to present a special month.  This month was propeller month and a couple of very large jet fighters were in the garage (F-14 and F-105)  One of the good things about living close is the ability to wander in to see what's new.  I should visit more often.

There is also an outdoor display that I didn't photograph as many of the planes out there have some anti sun covering over canopies etc.  There is a lot out back with another 25 or so aircraft that need some serious restoration work.  Among the are two of my favorites, which unfortunately may never get that restoration because of the cost and parts involved.  There are 2 F-102's that were torn up when a tornado struck the museum several years ago.  They are painted in the special livery of the CT Air Guard with the stylized eagles on the tail.  They are really junk piles that might not even have enough parts between the two to make one complete plane.

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51 minutes ago, maddmaxx said:

They routinely move exhibits back and forth between the 3 display buildings and the "garage" where some restorations are taking place.  Sometimes it's to clean them up (the bare metal F-100A was in camo last time I was there) and sometimes it's just to present a special month.  This month was propeller month and a couple of very large jet fighters were in the garage (F-14 and F-105)  One of the good things about living close is the ability to wander in to see what's new.  I should visit more often.

There is also an outdoor display that I didn't photograph as many of the planes out there have some anti sun covering over canopies etc.  There is a lot out back with another 25 or so aircraft that need some serious restoration work.  Among the are two of my favorites, which unfortunately may never get that restoration because of the cost and parts involved.  There are 2 F-102's that were torn up when a tornado struck the museum several years ago.  They are painted in the special livery of the CT Air Guard with the stylized eagles on the tail.  They are really junk piles that might not even have enough parts between the two to make one complete plane.

I would add a couple of pictures from 4/6/2015 but don't know where the jpg folder is and all files I see are in RAW. No folder in the Lightroom catalog and when I try to import, can't as recognizes was previously in Lightroom. Have to do individually with Photoshop. Got one of the Goodyear airship that took up the second room.

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46 minutes ago, ChrisL said:

The second picture cracks me up! You can’t even see the person those legs belong to as he is buried in kids.

The kids adore their daddy and when he arrived home after their first weekend where neither parent was home with the kids they swarmed over them. Mom got a lot of snuggles too but I didn’t get a picture. The two year old twin dudes were napping when they got home. My wife heard them talking in their room so my son and his wife went back to get them up. I should have recorded their reaction. They were excited.

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4 hours ago, Tizeye said:

I would add a couple of pictures from 4/6/2015 but don't know where the jpg folder is and all files I see are in RAW. No folder in the Lightroom catalog and when I try to import, can't as recognizes was previously in Lightroom. Have to do individually with Photoshop. Got one of the Goodyear airship that took up the second room.

Ah.  If you've been there before then it's true that the recent expansions have cleaned up the floor display space considerably.  I've been going there since there was only one display building and a whole bunch of disreputable aircraft parked outside.  They've also changed their concepts of attempting to show everything at once.  The shuffling of the displays to and from "the garage" sort of keeps the place fresh so one can revisit often.

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