News from Carolinas Aviation Museum

From the Carolinas Aviation Museum

The CAM News. A changing newsletter for a museum on the move

Carolinas Aviation Museum gets EC-130E as a permanent display.

The last EC-130E that participated in Operation Eagle Claw - the attempt to rescue hostages held by Iran during the Iran Hostage Crisis in 1980 - is coming to CAM! This historic aircraft will be flying into Charlotte in early July to become a permanent exhibit at Carolinas Aviation Museum. It has an extremely interesting history and here is an excerpt from Col. James Kyle's book on the mission that describes how the aircraft narrowly avoided disaster as it made a harrowing takeoff from the desert. His book is called "The Guts To Try":

"As Tharps aircraft accelerated down the runway, we were watching through night vision goggles. The blown fuel truck at the far end had pretty well burned itself out - there were only stars and moonlight.

Then, as the C-130 reached the 3,000-foot point, my heart leaped into my throat. The aircraft hit the sand piled up along the shoulder of the road. There was a giant shower of dust and sand.

My God! We've lost 'em!

Then, out of the other side of the billowing mass, the struggling Hercules appeared, straining to recapture its lost airspeed. Another 1,000 feet and the big bird staggered into the air".

Read the entire history on our website or click here for a direct link.

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Education Programs Expanding at CAM

Education continues to be a major focus at CAM!

We recently redesigned our exhibit to create an experience that will inspire and educate visitors about aviation by telling the stories of the people behind the planes. Since the redesign, our education department has been working to develop programs that complement our new space. Our goal it so insure that visitors of all ages, whether here on their own, with family, school or various groups and organizations have a memorable experience that will inspire a return visit. We have revamped our program by developing new tours, new tour scripts, and we're working to train our volunteers to lead and participate in these programs.

Some of the different tour experiences include

education stations
classroom craft activities
more interactive cockpit tours

Staff member Chris Sandel explains how airplanes fly.

The Cessna 150 in particular has become a great educational tool for teaching basic principles of flight. We've enhanced that with scavenger hunt activities that challenge our youth to read our exhibit labels and learn more during their visit.

We are continuing our partnership with Discovery
Place by offering our Pilots Academy this month and we
are excited about our new partnership with the Carolinas Raptor Center in July. For this we will offer a First in Flight Camp where campers will spend time at both facilities learning about what makes birds and planes fly.

Preflight includes checking the oil.

It was also exciting to launch our recent Boy Scouts Aviation Merit Badge Camp.

This summer we will participate in a STEMersion program. STEMersion is a program offered through partnerships of local Charlotte businesses. Science teachers from the area will spend time at various sites including Duke Energy, Siemens, CPCC and our museum just to name a few. Teachers will learn how STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) principles are applied in the workplace. At the museum they will see how they can use our facility as a resource when teaching about STEM.

Pilot and volunteer instructor Carl Klaiber explains how flight

instruments work.

We are actively seeking education interns to help develop our education page on the website as a resource for teachers. Interns are working to create lesson plans and supplement materials for teachers that they can use in the classroom prior to visiting the museum.

And---stay tuned for the exciting introduction of our first interactive iPad stations. Although a multimedia component was introduced as part of the redesigned exhibit budget, we are still working to raise all of the necessary funds. Thanks to grants from US Airways and the Arts and Science Council, this project is now underway. The first station is scheduled for completion by September! More to come on this!!

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Museum Founders Letter

Dear Members

High lights of the years gone by.

Looking back at May and June , 1993

Col. Quincy Collins, was our May, guest speaker. On September 2, 1965, United States Air Force Colonel J. Quincy Collins, '53, was on a mission to destroy a bridge 80 miles southwest of Hanoi when he was shot down. Collins ejected but suffered head and back injuries, along with a severe leg injury, which left his femur broken in three places.

He was captured and, after having his leg operated on, was sent to the "Hanoi Hilton," where he stayed several weeks. He was then transferred to "The Zoo," where he spent the next five years of his captivity. There he endured torture, despicable food and little medical treatment.

Col. Dolph Overton, has offered to donate his library of over 5,000 books and documents pertaining to aviation to the museum. The collection will be housed in the Old Terminal Building, This was the beginning of our Aviation Library.

I purchased a 1941 Plymouth 4 door

sedan, and had it restored as a military staff car. This Staff car was used for several years at airshows and other aviation events to promote the museum.

Carlos Steffey and Joe Kennelly

We completed our move into the hangar and established Tuesday each week as a work day in the Southern Airways hangar.

CHAC, participated
in three airshows.

We adopted the name CONTACT for our monthly newsletter. Our membership had grown to over 700 members.

Sincerely

Floyd S. Wilson

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101 Years Ago This Month

From the CAM Library. More ads from the early years of aviation. This one is from June 1912!

Zoom in on your computer for some of the fine print.

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Plane Spotter!

Can you name this aircraft?

We'll print the answer in next month's CAM News.

The aircraft in our Plane Spotter for last month was:

Aero Commander 520 serial number 520-75 tail number N4169B. The factory retained s/n 520-75 and under an Experimental R&D category Certificate of Airworthiness dated May 18, 1953, it was used to test nose wheel steering and revised hydraulics.

Be sure to check out our website at:
www.carolinasaviation.org

June 2013