Southern Museum Of Flight
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Southern Museum Of Flight
The Southern Museum of Flight is a civilian aviation museum Birmingham, Alabama. The facility features nearly 100 aircraft, as well as engines, models, artifacts, photographs, and paintings. In addition, the Southern Museum of Flight is home to the Alabama Aviation Hall of Fame, which presents Alabama Aviation History through collective biography. Overview The Lake Murray B-25C Mitchell bomber crashed in South Carolina during a 1943 training exercise. The right engine was torn off during the crash but the crew was able to escape unharmed before it sank to a depth of 150 feet (46m). The aircraft became a dive site for local technical divers until it was raised from the depths of the lake in September 2005. Dr. Bob Seigler who spearheaded the project, John Hodge and Dr. Bill Vartorella, formed the Lake Murray B-25 Rescue Project to salvage the aircraft from the bottom of Lake Murray. After recovery the remains of the aircraft were moved to the Southern Museum of Flight in Birm ...
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Birmingham, Alabama
Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Jefferson County, Alabama, Jefferson County. The population was 200,733 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List of municipalities in Alabama, second-most populous city in Alabama, and estimated at 196,357 in 2024. The Birmingham metropolitan area, Alabama, Birmingham metropolitan area had a population of 1.19 million in 2020 and is the largest metropolitan area in Alabama and List of metropolitan statistical areas, 47th-most populous in the US. Birmingham serves as a major regional economic, medical, and educational hub of the Deep South, Piedmont Atlantic Megaregion, Piedmont, and Appalachian regions. Founded in 1871 during the Reconstruction Era of the United States, Reconstruction era, Birmingham was formed through the merger of three smaller communities, most notably Elyton, Alabama, Elyton. It quickly grew into an industrial and transportation ...
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Lockheed T-33
The Lockheed T-33 Shooting Star (or T-Bird) is an American subsonic jet trainer. It was produced by Lockheed and made its first flight in 1948. The T-33 was developed from the Lockheed P-80/F-80 starting as TP-80C/TF-80C in development, then designated T-33A. It was used by the U.S. Navy initially as TO-2, then TV-2, and after 1962, T-33B. The last operator of the T-33, the Bolivian Air Force, retired the type in July 2017, after 44 years of service. Design and development The T-33 was developed from the Lockheed P-80/F-80 by lengthening the fuselage by slightly more than 3 feet (1 m) and adding a second seat, instrumentation, and flight controls. It was initially designated as a variant of the P-80/F-80, the TP-80C/TF-80C. Design work on the Lockheed P-80 began in 1943, with the first flight on 8 January 1944. Following on the Bell P-59, the P-80 became the first jet fighter to enter full squadron service in the United States Army Air Forces. As more advanced je ...
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Beagle B
The Beagle is a small Dog breed, breed of scent hound, similar in appearance to the much larger foxhound. The beagle was developed primarily for Tracking (hunting), hunting rabbit or hare, known as beagling. Possessing a great sense of smell and superior tracking instincts, the beagle is the primary breed used as a detection dog for prohibited agricultural imports and foodstuffs in quarantine around the world. The beagle is a popular Companion dog, pet due to its size and amiable temperament. The modern breed was developed in Great Britain around the 1830s from several breeds, including the Talbot (dog), Talbot Hound, the North Country Beagle, the Southern Hound, and possibly the Harrier (dog), Harrier. Beagles have been depicted in popular culture since Elizabethan era, Elizabethan times in literature and paintings and more recently in film, television, and comic books. History The origin of the Beagle is uncertain. In the 11th century, William I of England, William the ...
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Bede BD-5
The Bede BD-5 Micro is a series of small, single-seat homebuilt aircraft created in the late 1960s by US aircraft designer Jim Bede and introduced to the market primarily in kit form by the now-defunct Bede Aircraft, Bede Aircraft Corporation in the early 1970s. The BD-5 has a small, streamlined fuselage holding its semi-reclined pilot under a large canopy, with the engine installed in a compartment in the middle of the fuselage, and a propeller-driving engine – or jet engine in the BD-5J variant – mounted immediately to the rear of the cockpit. The combination of fighter-like looks and relatively low cost led to the BD-5 selling over 5,000 kits or plans, with approximately 12,000 orders being taken for a proposed factory-built, Federal Aviation Administration, FAA-certified version.Winchester 2005, p. 28. However, few of the kit versions were actually completed due to the company's bankruptcy in the mid-1970s, and none of the factory built "D" models were produced, as a res ...
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Bede BD-4
The Bede BD-4 is an American light aircraft, designed by Jim Bede for homebuilding and available since 1968. It was one of the first homebuilt aircraft to be offered in kit form. It remains one of the world's most popular homebuilts with thousands of plans sold and hundreds of examples completed to date. Design and development Based on his previous work with innovative light aircraft, the BD-1 (eventually developed into the American Aviation AA-1 Yankee) and BD-2, Jim Bede designed the BD-4 to be one of the first real "kitplanes" in the world. (AOPA has credited the design of the BD-4 to aeronautical inventor Dave Blanton."AOPA members in the news,"
in "Pilot Briefing," August 5, 1997, ''AOPA Pilot.''

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Aeronca Sedan
The Aeronca 15AC Sedan is a four-seat, fixed conventional gear light airplane which was produced by Aeronca Aircraft between 1948 and 1951. Designed for personal use, the Sedan also found applications in utility roles including bush flying. The Sedan was the last design that Aeronca put into production and was the largest aircraft produced by the company. Design and development Like those of other Aeronca designs, the Sedan's fuselage and tail surfaces are constructed of welded metal tubing. The outer shape of the fuselage is created by a combination of wooden formers and longerons, covered with fabric. The cross-section of the metal fuselage truss is triangular, a design feature which can be traced back to the earliest Aeronca C-2 design of the late 1920s. In a significant design departure from previous Aeronca aircraft, the strut-braced wings of the Sedan are all-metal assemblies. Such combinations of construction types were not common. While the Sedan mated a fabric-cov ...
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Aeronca K
The Aeronca Model K Scout is an American light airplane first marketed in 1937, and was the true successor to the popular Aeronca C-2, C-2/Aeronca C-3, C-3 line. Design In January 1937, Aeronca unveiled the Model K, a replacement for the company's popular Aeronca C-3, C-3. While it was powered by the same Aeronca E-113 two-cylinder Piston engine, engine as the C-3, the Model K Scout was of more conventional appearance, eliminating the C-3's distinctive fuselage "bathtub", replacing the wire-braced wings used by the earlier aircraft with strut-braced wings and providing a fully enclosed cockpit seating two side-by-side. The fuselage had a welded steel-tube structure with fabric covering, while the wings had spruce Spar (aeronautics), spars and spruce and plywood Rib (aeronautics), ribs, which were fabric covered. The aircraft had a fixed Conventional landing gear, tailwheel undercarriage, where the wheels could be replaced with skis for winter operation, while there was also a floa ...
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Aero Commander 680
The Aero Commander 500 family is a series of light twin piston-engined and turboprop aircraft originally built by the Aero Design and Engineering Company in the late 1940s, renamed the Aero Commander company in 1950, and later a division of Rockwell International in 1965. Final production occurred in 1986 under the Gulfstream Aerospace name. The initial production version was the , seven-seat Aero Commander 520. An improved version, the 500S, manufactured after 1967, is known as the Shrike Commander. Larger variants are known by numerous model names and designations, ranging up to the , 11-seat Model 695B/Jetprop 1000B turboprop. As of recent, the Aero Commander is known as the Twin Commander. Design and development The idea for the Commander light business twin was conceived by Ted Smith, a project engineer at the Douglas Aircraft Company. Working part-time after hours throughout 1944, a group of A-20 engineers formed the Aero Design and Engineering Company to design an ...
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Vultee BT-13 Valiant
The Vultee BT-13 Valiant is an American World War II-era basic (a category between primary and advanced) trainer aircraft built by Vultee Aircraft for the United States Army Air Corps, and later US Army Air Forces. A subsequent variant of the BT-13 in USAAC/USAAF service was known as the BT-15 Valiant, while an identical version for the US Navy was known as the SNV and was used to train naval aviators for the US Navy and its sister services, the US Marine Corps and US Coast Guard.Davisson, Budd"Vultee's BT-13 Pilot Maker: Good vibrations from the Vultee Vibrator"(aircraft review and pilot report), August 1972, ''Air Progress,'' retrieved 11 January 2023 from Airbum.com Design and development According to Jonathan Thompson, "The three trainer designs that shared their basic engineering with the Vanguard fighter were all promoted under the same name, Valiant. The prototypes had consectutive serial numbers 139, 140 and 141 and made their first flights in the Spring and Summ ...
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Republic F-84F Thunderstreak
The Republic F-84F Thunderstreak is an American swept-wing turbojet-powered fighter-bomber. The RF-84F Thunderflash is variant of the F-84F that was designed for photo reconnaissance. The design was originally intended to be a relatively simple upgrade to the F-84 Thunderjet to make it more competitive with the F-86 Sabre, differing largely in the use of a swept-wing and tail. Given the small number of changes, it was assigned the next model letter in the F-84 series, F. The prototypes demonstrated a number of performance and handling issues, which resulted in marginal improvement over the previous versions. Production was repeatedly delayed and another run of the straight-wing Thunderjets were completed as the G models. Looking for a clear performance edge compared to the G models, the engine was upgraded to the much more powerful British Armstrong Siddeley Sapphire built in the United States as the Wright J65. The larger engine required the fuselage to be stretched into a ...
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North American T-6 Texan
The North American Aviation T-6 Texan is an American single-engined advanced trainer aircraft, which was used to train pilots of the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF), United States Air Force (USAF), United States Navy, Royal Air Force, Royal Canadian Air Force and other air forces of the British Commonwealth during World War II and into the 1970s. Designed by North American Aviation, the T-6 is known by a variety of designations depending on the model and operating air force. The United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) and USAAF designated it as the AT-6, the United States Navy the SNJ, and British Commonwealth air forces the Harvard, the name by which it is best known outside the US. Starting in 1948, the new United States Air Force (USAF) designated it the T-6, with the USN following in 1962. The T-6 Texan remains a popular warbird used for airshow demonstrations and static displays. It has also been used many times to simulate various historical aircraft, including t ...
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North American F-86 Sabre
The North American F-86 Sabre, sometimes called the Sabrejet, is a transonic jet fighter aircraft. Produced by North American Aviation, the Sabre is best known as the United States' first swept-wing fighter that could counter the swept-wing Soviet MiG-15 in high-speed dogfights in the skies of the Korean War (1950–1953), fighting some of the earliest jet-to-jet battles in history. Considered one of the best and most important fighter aircraft in that war, the F-86 is also rated highly in comparison with fighters of other eras. Although it was developed in the late 1940s and was outdated by the end of the 1950s, the Sabre proved versatile and adaptable and continued as a front-line fighter in numerous air forces. Its success led to an extended production run of more than 7,800 aircraft between 1949 and 1956, in the United States, Japan, and Italy. In addition, 738 carrier-modified versions were purchased by the US Navy as FJ-2s and -3s. Variants were built in Canada and Austr ...
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