Airline History Museum, Kansas City, MO PIREP

Are you kidding? If you have met Jay, you *know* Mary is a Saint! Bfg

Amen, brother!

I'm the luckiest guy around, for sure.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

From a hopeful future student who will park and plane watch at MKC
dreaming of the day his wife will let him learn to fly.

Matt, do not, under any circumstances, wait one more minute. Call a CFI
and set up a "Discovery Flight" -- it won't cost much. Then take your wife
to the airport, and let HER fly in the right seat with the instructor.

You sit in the back. Watch her have fun.

That's what I did when I needed to convince Mary that flying was worth
emptying our bank account. And, as you probably know, it worked!

Just be careful -- if it works as well as it did for me, you'll end up
splitting left-seat time for the rest of your life!

:-)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Great story, Jay. It's funny how many ways there are to meet interesting
people. Last year I was on ebay bidding on a sextant for celestial
navigation. I used to navigate a ship that way while in the navy 35 years
ago and wanted to see if I could still do it. I lost the bid to a retired
TWA captain in Kansas City. I emailed him to find out what he intended to
do with the sextant. It was then that he told me he was a prominent member
of that museum restoring old TWA airplanes. Turns out he flew many LA to
London flights back in the 70s and I was on quite a few of those flights.
TWA was the best way to go in those days.

Rod

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:CP_Id.25749$IV5.23830@attbi_s54...
http://www.airlinehistorymuseum.com/

So we used our own webpage today, trying to find something new to do with
the kids.

My first plan had been to fly to Rantoul, IL (the old Chanute Air Force
Base), which has an outstanding aviation museum on the field -- but my
kids
whined so much about having been there too many times that I dug around
the
webpage, looking for other fly-in destinations nearby.

Flying south seemed better than east, given Saturday's gigantic snowstorm,
and Kansas City's connection to the new movie about Howard Hughes ("The
Aviator") that the kids had just seen made Kansas City Downtown Airport
sound a lot more exciting than Rantoul. It turned out to be a delightful
place to visit!

Kansas City was the home to TWA, owned by Hughes, and there were once many
Lockheed Constellations based on the field. TWA's old world headquarters
building is still on the field, right across from the museum, and Howard
Hughes' office is now prominently pointed out during the tour.

Flying into the museum is very simple. Downtown (MKC) is under the Class
Bravo veil of Kansas City International, so by using Flight Following all
the way we naturally ended up talking with Kansas City Approach. Traffic
was light, and after being handed over to Downtown Tower by KC approach,
we
were cleared for a sort-of straight-in to Rwy 19. The whole, incredibly
smooth flight took just a shade over 1.6 hours, bucking a moderate
headwind.

With progressive instructions we were able to easily find the museum
(which
is not clearly labeled from a distance -- just look for the big number "9"
on the hangar) in short order, and were pleased to find that we could park
right outside the museum entrance! Now THAT is an aviation museum!

The museum itself consists of an exhibit area, a gift shop, and a very
large
hangar (which was World War II surplus, and brought here from Texas after
the war!) that houses their three prop-liners -- a Douglas DC-3, a Martin
404, and a Lockheed Super G Constellation . The DC-3 is undergoing a
ground-up restoration, while the 404 is currently grounded with tail spar
corrosion that will likely mean the end of its flying days. (It's made of
magnesium, and no one knows how to work on them anymore.)

The centerpiece of the museum is the "Save-A-Connie" Constellation that is
a
regular on the airshow circuit. Purchased from a desert graveyard in the
1980s for the unbelievable sum of just $4000 (its scrap value alone was
four
times that amount!), it has been lovingly restored by former TWA employees
and hundreds of volunteers to pristine condition.

We were lucky enough to visit during the Connie's certification checks
(basically an annual inspection on a grand scale), so every access panel
was
open or removed. Talk about an unusual tour! We were able to see many
fascinating internal structures and systems that are usually hidden from
view when the Connie is on tour. You're allowed inside the Connie and
the
404, and it's just amazing to see the luxurious passenger livery --
imagine,
real silverware, and real food!

Admission is reasonable, at just $7 per person, and a personal tour guide
was assigned to my family. He gave us a terrific tour, literally taking
as
long as we wanted at each exhibit . The tour guides are all volunteers,
too, and giving tours is clearly a labor of love for them.

We arrived right after noon, and were famished. To our disappointment, we
found no restaurant anywhere on the field, but after some consultation
with
the museum folks we were able to call a Pizza Hut that would deliver lunch
to the museum! The kids were ecstatic, and our tour guide kindly
interrupted our tour when the pizzas arrived, giving us a chance to eat
while the food was hot.

Our visit lasted around 3 hours, which allowed us time to see everything
(although I would have liked to spend more time perusing the exhibits),
and
made for a great day trip. Why in the world we've never flown to Kansas
City before is beyond me -- at just 1.5 hours, it's closer than many of
our
"regular" flights. (I suppose it's because it's off our "home"
sectional...)

Reluctantly saying goodbye to our friends in the museum, I went out to
pre-flight and take some pictures of Atlas against the city backdrop. The
airport really IS "downtown", and the big buildings are quite close-by,
visually. It makes for an almost "Meigs-like" panorama, which we really
enjoyed.

Upon departure on Rwy 19, I was cleared for a northeast departure. When I
inquired as to whether they wanted me to do a right- or left-hand
departure,
the controller replied (to my surprise) "Your choice."

Upon hearing this, the kids begged me to do a left-hand departure, as this
would take us literally right over (at?) the big downtown buildings -- so
I
announced my intention to do so. It was AWESOME!

However, with many giant towers and buildings all around, I was glad it
was
cold, we were light on fuel, and we had 235 horses pulling, cuz those
buildings looked MIGHTY close. I know one thing's for sure -- I wouldn't
try that on a hot summer day!

All in all, I highly recommend this museum. It's small, but intimate, and
if you're at all interested in TWA, Howard Hughes, and the pre-jet airline
days, this is *the* place to visit.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Matt, do not, under any circumstances, wait one more minute. Call a CFI
and set up a "Discovery Flight" -- it won't cost much. Then take your
wife to the airport, and let HER fly in the right seat with the
instructor.

You sit in the back. Watch her have fun.

Trust me I've had those thoughts, I just have to wait untill the grad school
bills quit coming in. It get's pretty tough to justiy flight training on top
of that. But that ends very soon and I'm already planning (scheming) to make
all this happen.


Just be careful -- if it works as well as it did for me, you'll end up
splitting left-seat time for the rest of your life!

I would be thrilled to do nothing more!

Matt

Great story, Jay. It's funny how many ways there are to meet interesting
people. Last year I was on ebay bidding on a sextant for celestial
navigation. I used to navigate a ship that way while in the navy 35 years
ago and wanted to see if I could still do it. I lost the bid to a retired
TWA captain in Kansas City.

They have a very interesting collection of sextants at the museum, all used
for navigating the Connies across the Atlantic.

Apparently there was one very bad accident when the astrodome they used for
taking sightings shattered in flight, and the navigator was sucked out of
the plane while using his sextant. After that, they changed the design so
that you inserted a tube on the sextant up into the astrodome from inside
the cabin.

It's amazing how far we've come in so short a time.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"