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Lympa Log - Leica R lenses on Olympus E-330 DSLR

Photos and Text © Gary Todoroff  2006 All Rights Reserved

May 3, 2006

National Air and Space Museum Udvar-Hazy Center

One of the most recent additions to the Washington D.C. Smithsonian treeasure of museums is the Udvar-Hazy center near the Capitol's Dulles Airport. I traveled with Colonel Richard Taylor to the new air museum where he became an honored guest during a full-day tour.

The entrance to the musuem is dominated by the Space Shuttle Enterprise

 

Early morning at outside the museum. The structure is BIG, so the 7-14mm lens was helpful to take in the whole perspective without having to back up a mile!

The new Lowepro bag did a great job of carrying over 17 pounds of gear. After a full day on my feet and toting all the camera gear, my shoulders were still in fine shape.

 

Col Taylor flew over 40 different aircraft during his flying career. Here are three "Pursuits", fighter planes that he flew into combat during World War II, acquiring many stories, near-disasters and the Distinguished Flying Cross along the way.

P-40 Warhawk
P-38 Lightning
P-47 Thunderboldt

For the afternoon, Col Buz Carpenter escorted us with a unique personal touch. During his thousands of military flying hours, he spent 65 of those hours in the SR-71 Blackbird on display as a center piece of the musuem.

The main hanger of the Udvar-Hazy Air and Space Museum is big! Plans are to fill the place with many more aircraft and displays. The balconies and walkways provide for viewing exhibts from different elevations, often very closeup. SR71 pilot, Buzz Carpenter, and WWII pilot, Richard Taylor, from two different generations of flying history, apprecated the aircraft on display which they had flown.

One of the elevated walkways looks down on the cockpit of the Enola Gay that dropped the atom bomb on Hiroshima. As young lieutenants, the pilot, Paul Tibbets and Col Taylor were roomates. A Japanese visitor at the dedication of the restored bomber said that the early end to the war saved an estimated two to three milion Japanese lives, and a milion allied troops - as well as his own life. He was scheduled to be a Kamikazi pilot on August 17, 1945, two days after the surrender!

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