The Flying Heritage Collection

On the southeast corner of Paine field, you will find the newly opened Flying Heritage Collection. I went today with my son and I was very impressed! They have detailed descriptions of all of their planes and video presentations about the time they were developed. Almost all of these planes fly, and to prove it, today they flew their Thunderbold and their Mustang. They will have will aditional flying demonstrations throughout the summer.

I was impressed by their restored Messerschimdt Komet, a German rocket plane that killed many pilots (both allied and German). I had also never seen a fully restored V-1 rocket plane before (I sure this is one of the few planes that doesn't fly).

My favorite restoration was the Polikarpov U-2, a very simple looking open cockpit bi-plane. This Russian plane was "manned" by woman pilots, who wore thick fur coats to avoid the cold. The plane only carried two bombs so sometimes they had to fly eight sorties a night. They also turned off their engines during their bombing runs to avoid detection! The Germans called them the "Night Witches." They have a video presentation where they interview some of them.