Wishing a Final Farewell to the Yankee Lady

I found out yesterday that the Yankee Lady would be leaving for California at Noon today.  I figured that I would head over to Willow Run to see her off.  I will have more thoughts on that after the pictures.

I arrived a little early at the airport.  I wanted to make sure I had a decent spot and it turned out to be fairly decent.  I was able to catch this RV-8 as it was doing touch and goes at the airport.

The RV-8 is a homebuilt aircraft that can be used for stunt flying.  It was first introduced in 1995 and a little over 1600 have been built.

I think this particular one comes out of Monroe.

This is a 737 but I'm not sure who it belongs to.  I'm pretty sure it is used for hauling freight.

The RV-8 again.

This is a Piper Archer that belongs to flight school that operates out of Willow Run.  I think it is the school that now handles the Eastern Michigan flight program.

As I was looking at Flight Radar to see if the Yankee Lady had a flight plan, I saw that this plane would be taking off around the same time.

It is a 727 belonging to USA Jet.  It was heading down to Laredo, TX.  I presume it is delivering parts.

A Diamond DA-20.

The Piper Archer again.

The moment that I was waiting for, the Yankee Lady taking off from Willow Run for the last time.  It was a pretty nice day for it.

The Yankee Air Force bought her in 1985 for $250,000.  After some test hops, she was brought from Mesa, Arizona to Ypsilanti, MI.

When the museum got her to Ypsilanti, they found that they need to do alot of work to restore her to her condition in World War II.

It took nine years to do that and her first post-restoration flight took place in 1995.

She has been in a movie and took part in the dedication of the Memphis Belle at the US Air Force museum.

Last year, there was a directive from the FAA that kept her grounded.  The Yankee Air Museum had to some work on her wing spar to make her compliant.

They had to do some other work on her this year.

In June, they announced that she was sold to a person in California.

It was announced kind of clumsily and caused a bit of uproar.

So now she is on her way to California where she will be taken apart and shipped to New Zealand where she will be completely restored.  Her purchase price was 15 million.

As I said, they kind of fumbled the announcement of her sale.  Initially reading between the lines, it sounded like the museum could be in some financial trouble.  There were other people that explained it better.  Namely, that she was getting expensive to maintain and it would come down to saving her or doing other things.  They decided on other things.

To put it in perspective, I believe the cost of spar thing was close to a million dollars.  It costs close to 300,000 to replace her engines.  I'm not sure on costs of other parts but I imagine they are not cheap.  I would hate to see them keep her and then have to scrap her later because of lack of funding.  Of the planes in their collection, the B-17 was probably the most valuable.

So I hope she has a good home and may come around some time in the future.
 

One More Chance to Catch the Yankee Lady

 I heard the B-17 flying around after work, so I decided to head to Willow Run again to catch her again.  I am hoping that I will be able to catch her as she takes her final flight out of Ypsilanti tomorrow but we will see.

I was barely able to catch her, she was in her approach as I was nearing the airport.  I didn't have time to change lens but it seems that worked out fine for me, as I am pretty happy with this shot.

I waited around a little bit to see if she was going to do another circuit, but that turned out not to be.  I saw this citation coming in.

And a Hawk

 As I was heading back home, I saw this guy.

Just a hawk sitting in a tree.

Farewell to the Yankee Lady

 As I was perusing Facebook, I saw a post the Yankee Lady was going up.  In this post, it was mentioned that she would be on her way to her new home tomorrow.  Not being sure if I would be able to catch her tomorrow, I headed over to Willow Run to catch her.

Fortunately, she circled around the field again because I was able to catch her.  Unfortunately, my pictures are the greatest.  Hopefully I can get better pictures tomorrow.

Earlier in the summer, I found out that they sold her to a group in California.  I didn't see her go up much over the summer and I found out that they were doing some work on her.

I think this was a check ride before she has to make her hop to California.

When I found out that they were selling her, I was upset but then I read about the financial realities they are facing.  I think her last maintenance was over a million dollars.  I don't think it's going to get any cheaper to keep her flying.  They were able to get a fairly generous offer her for.  So I can understand why they took it.  I'm just not happy that I wont see a B-17 flying around anymore.

Trying My Hand at Forced Perspective

 A couple months ago, I got a model of a B-24 Liberator that had the markings of a plane that was built at the Willow Run Assembly Plant.  I posted pictures of it before but I wanted to do some pictures of it with some landmarks behind it.  With little river traffic today and it being a somewhat miserable day, I figured I would try my hand at some forced perspective.

Willow Run is about 5 miles or so away from Ypsilanti proper.  Henry Ford decided to build his B-24 plant there so that it would be in Washtenaw instead of Wayne County (better taxes at the time).  In 1940, it was determined that the United States would have to switch its production so that it would be on more of a war footing.

The aircraft manufacturers at the time did not have the capacity to increase production to what was needed.  It was also determined that using mass production techniques would increase construction several fold.  As a result, Henry Ford was one of the people asked if his company was up to the task.

Ford had some experience with producing airplanes in the 1930s with the Ford Tri-Motor but Ford really wanted to focus on cars but he said he would look into it.

Ford was selected to produce the B-24 Liberator.  It was not the most famous bomber of the war, but it was probably the workhorse of the war.  It was designed and developed by Consolidated out of San Diego.  Henry Ford visited to the Consolidated plant with his chief engineer to see if it was possible.  They determined it was possible, but some of the parts had to be redesigned to be more mass production friendly.  For instance, the number of parts in the landing gear was reduced from 29 to around 16.  Other changes were made to make the bomber more mass production friendly.

Ford was awarded the contract in 1940 and ground was broken on the Willow Run site later in the same year.  Production was started in 1941, but that was only for B-24 kits that would be assembled elsewhere.  Ford got final approval to assemble bombers later in 1941.

Initially, Ford had a number of issues starting production.  One of them was finding enough workers to work at Willow Run.  He also had some union issues once he got those workers.  He also had issues with the Army Air Force changing requirements as he built the bombers.

Eventually, he solved the labor issues.  He also solved the issues with changing requirements by building standard bombers and if the Army Air Force wanted something different, he would set bombers aside that could be reworked later.  By 1943, the factory was humming.  Eventually, one B-24 would roll off the line per hour.

This particular model is "Libra" and has a serial number of 42-52508, meaning that it was ordered by the US Government in 1942.  It was transferred to the 833rd Bombing Group in July of 1944.  This bombing group operated out of England.  The nose art was developed by a corporal out of Chicago.  He did nose art with other Zodiac signs.  This bomber would serve through the war and was scrapped sometime after.

It's a shame that the Yankee Air Museum couldn't get its hands on the real one.  Oh well.

I would have liked this picture more if it didn't start raining earnest.  But this means I will have to try some other day.

A Partial Eclipse of the Heart

 I found out there was a lunar eclipse last night.  Fortunately, it wasn't cloudy.  Typically when there is a sky event in Michigan, it is cloudy.

But it was only a partial eclipse.  I didn't realize that was going to be the case but that was still cool.  I could tell that something was happening.

The shadow moving over the top of the moon.

I think this was at the peak.

One more picture because I wasn't sure.  I was fairly happy with these pictures but I was thinking that it would turn red.

Two Somethings You Don't See Every Day

 As I was sitting around deciding what I wanted to do, I heard the distinctive sound of a propellored aircraft.  So I looked in FlightRadar and I saw that the B-25 from Willow Run was wandering around.  I decided to head over to Willow Run to catch some pictures of her.

They were also taking their Huey out for wandering around.

I like the sound of these but they should have a loudspeaker that plays "Fortunate Son" when they are flying it around.

The B-25 came in from about the spot I expected it to.

It was pretty cool to catch.  With the sale of the B-17, I guess this will have to do.

I hope they don't see this one.

I still wish they would have kept the B-17 though.

It was a nice enough day though.

Then the Huey appeared.

She wasn't going over the same runway.

If I had known that, I would have went over to their hangar to try and catch her there.  But if I did that, I would have missed the B-25.

B-24 Liberator - "Libra" - Tail Number 42-52508

I got back into building models in a big way.  One of the things that I discovered is that there are after market decals you can buy that will let you build a certain model.  As a result, I started to look for kits that had relevance to Michigan.

This isn't one of the first kits I built recently but it is one that didn't need to find after market decals.

In 1940, President Roosevelt realized that we would probably be at war sooner than later.  He also realized that the United States would have to greatly increase it's production capacity if it was going to win the war.  To that end, he reached out to various industrialists to see if they could start producing military equipment.

Henry Ford was one of the industrialists that Roosevelt looked to.   Since Ford had some experience building Tri-Motors, he was asked if he could produce B-24 bombers.  Ford visited the Consolidated factory in San Diego and determined that he could do it.

Construction was started at Willow Run in 1940 and production was started in 1941 but that was only for B-24 components.  In October 1941, Ford received permission produce complete bombers.  It would be another year before completed B-24s would leave the factory.  Ford had a number of issues producing the bombers but one of them was the Air Force itself.

After solving many of these problems, one bomber per hour would roll off the Willow Run line.

This particular model has a serial number of 42-52508 meaning that it was ordered by the Government in 1942.  It was transferred to 833rd Bombing Squadron in July of 1944.  The nose art was one of a series painted by a Corporal from Chicago.  The plane would serve through the end of the war. 

 

The Moon Tonight

 I looked out my window tonight and I saw the moon.  I thought it looked pretty cool so I went out and took a picture of it.   Since I didn't take any other pictures today, I was more inclined.

Tonight is a waxing crescent moon, which means we are going to the moon.  If you look to the left of the moon, you might be able to see a dot.  That is the star Spica.

The End of an Era

 As I was going out and about today, I passed by Jones Hall.  I saw that they were starting to tear it down, so I went on the other side to see if the same was happening to Goddard.

And yes it was.  Goddard Hall is the hall that I stayed for three years of my time at Eastern Michigan University.  At the time, it was the Honors Dorm.  I also spent some other time there as it was the computing center.

Goddard Hall was constructed in 1955.  It was the same design as Jones Hall, King and Goodison Halls.  The architect was R.S. Gerganoff of Ypsilanti, Michigan.  Goddard Hall was named after Mary A. Goddard who was a botany professor at Eastern Michigan (then Michigan State Normal College) from 1900 to 1939.  Most of the rooms in the buildings were suites with a central living area and sleeping areas on either side.  Some of the rooms were just bedrooms but they were a pretty decent size.  Jones and Goddard held a total of 1,200 students.  In 1964, the computing center was opened in the basement of Goddard.  In the 1980s, both Jones and Goddard were made the honors dorms.

Due to the declining number of students living on campus and other issues, Goddard was closed in 2005.  It was decided fairly recently that they would be torn down.  I imagine the cost to update and mitigate asbestos would be too much.  This will become a green space for now.

While I'm sad that they are tearing Goddard down, I understand that time marches on.