Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center

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We visited one of the holy grails of aviation buffs; the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center.  It is a large hangar at the Dulles International Airport.  It is the place where the bigger things that can’t fit in and the things that don’t have a place in the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum on the capital mall get put on displace.
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Upside down plane is upside down.

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An SR-71 Blackbird.  You can get much more up close and personal with the SR-70 at the Evergreen Air and Space Museum.

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This place is HUGE!  I hope that they start cramming more planes into this place in the near future.  The Smithsonian has to have quite a few additional planes in storage.


IMG_3904On the military aircraft side of the hangar.


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IMG_3911 This is an incredible piece of technology.  It is a jet engine and turbofan assembly from a STOVL test aircraft that was the forerunner of the Joint Strike Fighter that will be used by the Navy.

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I love the looks of this old Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star.

IMG_3927 IMG_3928A MiG-15.


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Space suit concepts.

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A Loon Missile derived from a V-1 Vergeltungswaffe.

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A Messerschmitt Me 163 B-1a Komet in its original unrestored state.


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The Space Shuttle Discovery.  It was just recently moved into the spot that the Enterprise used to occupy.

IMG_3961A wooden rocket!


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Engines on display.

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Me standing under the port wing of the Discovery.

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The business end of the Space Shuttle Discovery.

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Wheels and very expensive tiles.

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Each one is unique and went into space.

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Space-themed telephone booth and R2-D2 post office box.

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A TDRSS mock-up hanging over the Discovery along with a few other satellites.

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Heather and me on the raised platform behind Discovery.

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Lots of little satellites!

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Closeup of the TDRSS.

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The restoration hangar.

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A Saturn 5 instrumentation and guidance ring.

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Discovery in her final resting place.


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A space suit floating above the shuttle.

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Space capsule.

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If only any country in the world had something to replace and surpass the shuttle program.  Someday…

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Hang glider concept for a space capsule return.  For those astronauts afraid of water?

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Apollo capsule setup for a water landing.

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My what a big nose you have!


IMG_4053It was absolutely incredible how few people there were at this museum.  We nearly had the entire place to ourselves!



IMG_4065 The Mobile Quarantine Facility built out of an Airstream to keep space germs from infecting Planet Earth.

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An early prototype of Commander Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation?


IMG_4088Biplanes from the early days of flight.

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Langley’s attempt at an airplane.

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IMG_4153A fully little flying wing.


IMG_4155The only J1N1-S Gekkou in existence.

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The Kugisho MXY7 Ohka Model 22, a suicide rocket plane meant to disrupt shipping.


IMG_4164 IMG_4165The Smithsonian is like a who’s who of extremely rare Japanese and German aircraft from World War II.


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Pieces waiting for something to happen.

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A Nazi glider.

IMG_4192Lots of hang gliders in this part of the hangar.


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That little plane doesn’t look particularly safe.

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A predecessor to the V-22 Osprey.  The Concorde is hiding in the background.


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A plane car.

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Nose of the Concorde.


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Helicopters and autogyros.

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This place is very big!

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The Virgin Atlantic Global Flier.

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An old Pan Am plane.

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Bud Light was well-represented in the hangar.

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The Enola Gay, the first plane to drop an atomic bomb in war.

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The Enola Gay from another angle.


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The Boeing 367-80, prototype to the 707.

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Old school jet engines.

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The Clipper Flying Cloud.

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A helicopter that flew around the world.  I saw another helicopter that flew around the world in Australia a few years ago.

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The interesting thing is that there is a helicopter in Australia that makes the same claim.  Dick Smith flew it in 1982.  The difference is he did it solo where this helicopter had a couple people in it.  I think I will celebrate Dick Smith rather than Ross Perot Junior.


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A very old and very historic blimp cockpit.

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Mementos from the ballooning days.

IMG_4416There was even a banjo from the early days of airplanes! I do believe Zach should be made aware of this…


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Pepsi had a nice product placement, too.


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Another banjo.  Zach, do you have your DC-3 certification yet?


STA_4249-STE_4253This place sure is amazing!

 

 

X-29 NASA Test Plane Outside the Air and Space Museum

What is this I see?  Is that an X-29 replica on the back of a flatbed trailer on the National Mall?

YES IT IS!

 

 

The two real ones are in other museums.  This is the Air and Space Museum’s replica freshly out of storage.  The wings are removed.

A sweet plaque showing a Saturn 5 rocket outside the Air and Space Museum.

 

Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum

 

The Smithsonian National Air and Space museum is hallowed ground for air and space enthusiasts such as myself.  It took great effort to keep from drooling all over the place.  The North American X-15 was the first aircraft to break Mach 6 and bridged the gap between aircraft and spaceflight.  It must have been one hell of a ride to be on that rocket plane.

 

Yes, that’s SpaceShipOne and Bell X-1.  The first private passenger-carrying craft to break the Kármán line and the first aircraft to break the sound barrier.  Amazing.  And to the left is the Spirit of Saint Louis, the first plane to complete a solo, non-stop flight between New York City and Paris.

 

A replica of Sputnik, the first man-made satellite in space, and Pioneer 10, the first spacecraft to go past Jupiter.

 

The Mercury 7 capsule that John Glenn rode to become the first American to orbit the earth.  The Soviets beat the Americans but this is still a very important craft.

 

Soviet SS-20 and American Pershing II missiles.  These were medium range ballistic missiles tipped with nuclear warheads.  The Soviet one had multiple reentry units. Once they were pointed at each other, ready to annihilate everything.  Now they live together in harmony at the Air and Space Museum.

 

Two Goddard rockets.

 

One of the original liquid-fueled rockets that Goddard made so many years ago.  This rocket effectively started space exploration.

 

The Apollo 11 command module.  Yes, THE Apollo 11 command module.  Brady, Joe, and I were all drooling looking at this amazing craft.  How three people managed to not go crazy being cooped up in that thing is beyond me.

 

Right here, in one room, is the very best of human achievement.

 

A V-1 “Buzz Bomb” rocket, a V-2 rocket, and a whole pile of other rockets and important spacecraft.  Amazing!

 

An Apollo module linked up with a Soviet craft.  Truly a milestone of technology and peace.

 

A mock-up of Hubble.  The thing is larger than a school bus!

 

An Apollo command module that was used to go to Skylab.

 

The door hatch from Apollo 11.

 

 

A small part of the business end of a Saturn 5 rocket.

 

 

A cruise missile and a canceled space plane.

 

A mock-up of the Lunar Lander.

 

Some of the early reconnaissance craft sent to the moon.

 

 

A Ford Trimotor.

 

A Douglas DC-3.  I would love to own and fly one of these.

 

An unmanned aerial vehicle.  An X-45A, I believe.

 

Another drone.

 

That’s a Predator with another drone above it.

 

That human-powered plane crossed the English Channel.

 

A replica of the Mars Rovers.

 

Awkward display still being setup.

 

The Polar Star.  It flew across Antarctica.

 

This plane held the record for most days aloft without landing.

 

 

 

 

A sleep plane with recessed rivets.