This is from an email the Flying Heritage Museum sent me (not because I'm special, but because I signed up for their emails) and I am sharing it with you because I am fairly certain I am one of the few nerds that does that and also that you probably don't.
The rare Ilyushin Il-2M “Shturmovik” attack plane recently completed in Russia is headed to the Flying Heritage Collection (FHC) in Everett, Wash. Expect it sometime next year. The aircraft is the only flying example of its type left in the world.
You may know that the Il-2 Shturmovik was a ground attack aircraft that the Germans feared in WWII. It had particularly thick skin. It carried particularly heavy weaponry intended for ground attack, the targets mainly being tanks. Think of the German Junker Ju-87 with a few more things on it to make it survive. All in all, it's a cool aircraft. You can learn more about it here.
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| This image from Wikipedia |
The second interesting item is that the US has dismantled it's most powerful bomb. The B-53 was 12 feet long and a little more than 4 feet in diameter and could detonate with a power of 9 megatons of TNT! Now these behemoths are gone. You can read more about them here. If you want to read about the dismantlement of them you can read about it here and here.
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1 comment:
I passed this aircraft on its trailer as it was being towed north towards Bellingham about a month ago. Didn't know what it was, but boy, was it interesting! Nice blog.
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