Thursday, March 27, 2008

The Dayton Air Force Museum (sorry I'm a bit behind, this post is for a couple weeks ago, more air force pictures at the bottom!)

Before I start telling about the museum let me just say that I've wanted to be in the air force for a while now so this was a really exciting trip for me.  There were about 15 airplanes outside of the museum but we didn't go to see any of them.  It was set up where it went through the airplanes from older ones, such as planes from WWI and WWII and then got into the more modern planes such as the Raptor and the B2 Spirit.  It was awesome watching how they progressed through the years from biplanes with a tiny engine and the pilot would sit in seat directly in front of it to using metal and having big engines.  The whole thing was in a few huge hangers.  The trip wasn't only about looking at how planes progressed or anything but also about history.  They had an exhibit on the Cold War, the Holocaust, and even the story of the Berlin Wall.  They even had a couple chunks of it.  In every exhibit, they had real artifacts from the time such as a uniform that someone in a concentration camp wore, part of the wall of Berlin, and multiple things used in the Cold War.  They got as modern as the unmanned plane, the Predator and the newest fighter called the Raptor.  My favorite plane was the stealth fighter in which I want to fly when I'm older.  They also had the B-2 as I said before which is a stealth bomber which was also really cool up close.  They had an open plane that you could sit in and dad knew about almost all of the controls.  There was also a section with rockets that included the nuclear weapons that are being used right now.  They were huge!  There were two floors so you could get a bit closer to the top.  We also watched and IMAX movie about the space station, not the one that's being built on the moon but the one in space.  It was pretty amazing watching them assemble everything.  It looked like tons of fun to float around in the station.  I thought it was really cool how they could squirt water and it would float and they could just eat it.  They also showed how they trained in a simulator what they would do if they got disconnected from the ship and were just on their own in space.  They have a rocket that they would attach to their backs and just maneuver back to the ship.  It didn't look easy at all because it's really hard to maneuver.  It was even cooler because it was being showed on the huge screen.  We were planning on going to another hanger where we'd actually be able to walk through an Air Force 1 which is the 747 that the president flies in when going to other countries.  I watched a movie on it a while back and they completely shut down the airport when the president's about to land.  Dad says that he's been stuck in the airport when it happens and it's really annoying.  I was sad to leave because there was still a section that I wanted to see but we didn't have time to.  They also have a real air force base right beside the museum so there were a bunch of planes going of and when they did it was really loud outside.

1 comment:

schnauzer said...

Loved your airplanes and explanations. Reminds me of your dad at your age. You're a good writer. So is your dad. Maybe you can write and fly together some day. Love you, Number 1.