CAF Museum Tour

[Harlan (Deceased)]

I took several indoor photos of the CAF museum at the HQ of the CAF a few years ago. They had just opened a new display of 'Nose Art' and had the panels displayed in their own area. Sometime in the early existence of the CAF a man donated these panels. He said that shortly after WWII he worked for a company that was scrapping WWII aircraft. Occasionally he was able to crudely cut out the nose art from some aircraft going to the smelter and sneak them home. In the early 60's he donated the panels to the CAF. I went to the main CAF museum when I was a little kid and they had these panels leaning across a wall in the the old main CAF hanger that was then located in Harlingen TX. (FAR south Texas)

Another reason I flew to Midland that day with my family was to check on our WWII Navy R4D (C-47) from our local group in Dallas. It was on display in the main CAF hangar that's located along with the CAF museum in Midland, TX. The CAF requires our groups (Wings) to loan our aircraft to them every other year for three months to be on display at HQ.

I brought along a tripod so that I could use a long exposure setting so the camera can take indoor photos without having to use a 'flash'. I've never shown these photos and hope you aviation guys enjoy.

Regards,
~ Harlan








































INSIDE CAF HQ HANGAR











OUTSIDE CAF HANGAR ON RAMP

Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.

[Peter Laidler]

BRILLIANT........... The star of the show, that lovely Dakota!

[Vincent]

Nice pictures. Thank you for sharing them.

Is the Shackleton still in flying condition?

[Bob Womack]

That's a pretty amazing collection of nose art! When my dad was at the University of Tennessee, they had a DC-3 and a C-47 parked out at Cherokee Aviation on the apron at MCghee Tyson Airport. My dad was heading the "Remote Sensing" project. That was a little job where they were developing the techniques to isolate and identify plant thermal signatures from the air using infrared imaging techniques, starting with film and moving into video. My dad developed the techniques by flying his camera system in the belly of the C-47 with his feet dangling out a port in the floor. He was asked by the anonymous but lucrative client to find ways to identify by signature a particular target specie that was never specified. The targets would be set out in fields and he and his crews were tasked with flying over vague areas and trying to find these unspecified targets. When they had developed the techniques to reliably identify the targets the program was terminated and he never heard any more of it until...

A few years later a black hangar was built over on the other side of the field at the National Guard Base (home of the 134th Refueling Wing). Inside that hangar was a black twin engine tuboprop plane that no-one could quite identify. It had wide, long wings, shrouded engines, and huge paddle props. That plane never came out during the day and its mission was a huge secret. Eventually someone contacted my dad and said, "You know that bird is the result of your work, don't you?" He admitted that he didn't and the person filled him in.

That plane is a thermal imaging platform. Being that some areas are classified as rain forest, rural, mountainous East Tennessee is a hotbed of marijuana farms. The target my father had been identifying was marijuana plants. The plane only flies at night. The crew lines it up for a sensing run, throttles back the engines to where they are virtually silent, and flies over the countryside searching for pot farms with only the air flow noise and their black shape against the stars to give them away. My father's client had been the CIA.

The program took him to Cape Canaveral for the Apollo 13 launch. His plane with its gear orbited during the launch as a means to find the debris, should the rocket explode or abort during launch.

Bob

[browningautorifle]

Love that Shackleton...looks about mint. Last one I saw was a firefighters training platform out on old Nicosia airfield. Matter of fact, it's still there if you look at Google earth.

[Vincent]

Love that Shackleton...

I remember seeing it there soon after it arrived. That was many years ago. Probably not long after they moved there from Harlingen.

The Wings Over Houston airshow is this coming weekend. Home The CAF always puts on a good show at Ellington. The kids love the pyro’s and it's just a few miles from the house.

[Aussie48]

What a great collection, thanks for showing.

[muffett.2008]

Good one Harlan, the boys here in Scone have been flying a few Warbirds around lately, must be an air show coming up.
Every time I here one I make a dive for the camera, trouble is, by the time I get it, there gone.. Might have to take a trip out to the Airfield and have a look, I get the lads out there to do my crack testing on the odd occasion.

[CINDERS]

Astounding of course you know the nose art was to confuse the German fighter pilots so they would look at the nose art whist forgetting to hit the trigger giving the gunners that vital pause to open up with the fifty's - If you guys want a good read about the Dc - 2 - 3's and the C-47 get a copy of "Fate is the Hunter" By Ernest K Gahn at the end you will be truly amazed at what this man did and survived (Nearly cleaned up the Taj Mahal) some of the hair raising stuff will honestly have you glued to the book.
He flew over the Hump and was in the Berlin airlift with one plane landing every 30 seconds from memory, there is another stunt where he circles is it Mare Isl going down and just makes the strip after just taking off from it with another plane taking off towards them as he is semi crashing on the same runway? He also unknowingly solved an unporting problem that killed other crews by sheer luck otherwise allot more crews and passengers would have perished before the problem would have been found.
Anyway he was pre war air mail, then air transport and post war an airline pilot I have read the book twice and am due to have another

[henry r]

wow, i had no idea that a collection of nose art like that even existed! wow!

muffett there is a small? airshow up here in armidale on the 14th? of next month.