For the Lockheed Constellation fans

[FourWheelDrift]

Lockheed EC-121T Warning Star Super Constellation (Connie) , AF Serial No. 53-0548. After 15+ years on the ground and a 7 year restoration Effort this Cold War Era United States Air Force airborne early warning radar surveillance (AWACS) aircraft was cleared by the FAA for a Ferry flight to The Yanks Air Museum Chino, California on January 14th.

This is the video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedd...

Photos on here - http://air-and-space.com/Lockheed%20Super%20Conste...

[Eric Mc]

Lovely stuff.

I love big props.

[miniman]

Awesome

[tog]

If this was just one flight, are there any other Constellations flying anywhere else? There is one in Swindon I think, at the Science Museum in Wroughton, though not flying obviously.

[Richjam]

There is an example in Holland used to be funded by KLM now part of the recently closed Avidrome museum not sure what will happen to it now? http://www.sim-outhouse.com/sohforums/showthread.p...

[anonymous-user]

Beautiful!

[Eric Mc]

tog said:

If this was just one flight, are there any other Constellations flying anywhere else? There is one in Swindon I think, at the Science Museum in Wroughton, though not flying obviously.

There are a couple still flying. Red Bull have one based in Europe and there is one in Australia. There may be more.

The one at Wroughton (N7777G) has a very interesting history. It was originally a KLM machine and then flew with a number of different third level operators before ending its days as a freighter. It was abandoned at Dublin in March 1974 after its last operator went bust. It languished there until 1983 when it was bought by Aces High Ltd to be used in a second set of the Yorkshire TV series "Airline". In the end, the second series was not made and Aces High donated the airframe to the Science Museum. It was dismantled on Dublin and taken in pieces on a low loader to the Dublin Ferry Terminal and shipped to Liverpool.

It was then reassembled at Wroughton and repainted in 1940s TWA colours - although it never flew with that airline.

[tog]

Fascinating, Eric. I thought I could remember seeing the Constellation there as a child, when Wroughton had regular open days, but if it only arrived in 1983 clearly I must have been a slightly older child than I recall. It's a shame they haven't had public open days there for some time. I went to a classic car show there about 5 or 6 years ago, but I don't think they repeated it sadly.

[Eric Mc]

I went to a Great Warbirds Air Display there in 1993. The hangars were open to the public. I thought they still had selected days in the year when the hangars were open to the public.

Here is a shot of N7777G at Dublin in 1983 just before she was dismantled for shipment to Wroughton. If you look carefully at the nose, you might just be able to make out Mick Jagger's lips. She had been used in 1973 as an equipment carrier for a Rolling Stones tour of Australia. Although the lips had been overpainted, after 10 years of sitting in the blistering sun of Dublin (I am joking), the lips began to reappear as the top coat of paint faded and eroded away.

N7777G is an L749 Constellation i.e. a stanard short fuselage aircraft, rather than the stretched L1049 Super Constellation.

[Fat Albert]

Lovely to see one fly again, shame about the boil on its @rse though!

[kiteless]

Lovely things, Connies.

They remind me very much of Bristol Britannias.

[Eric Mc]

Apart from having four engines and propellors, there isn't much similarity.

[Eric Mc]

On the subject of the Britannia, I like them too. In the 1970s they became a familiar sight in Dublin due to their use as freighters by Aer Turas.





The Canadian derivative, the Canadair CL-44 was also nice -



Even this aircraft had its roots in the Britannia design -

[Henry-F]

I was fortunate a few years ago to be flown out to a small airfield in Switzerland by watchmaker Breitling. As well as flying in formation in one of their Aero L-39 Albatros jets, and actually flying it briefly I also enjoyed a somewhat more sedate trip over lake Geneva in their Super Constallation. A rather fantastic weekend given there were only 50 of us there !!!

Henry

[Eric Mc]

As Rod Stewart once said, "Some Guys Have all the Luck".

[JW911]

Henry-F said:

I was fortunate a few years ago to be flown out to a small airfield in Switzerland by watchmaker Breitling. As well as flying in formation in one of their Aero L-39 Albatros jets, and actually flying it briefly I also enjoyed a somewhat more sedate trip over lake Geneva in their Super Constallation. A rather fantastic weekend given there were only 50 of us there !!!

Henry

You lucky, lucky b......

I think I read an article about that in one of the flying mags. The Breitling sponsored Constellation is here -> www.superconstellation.org. I remember seeing it depart from Basel a couple of years ago.

[FourWheelDrift]

The National Airline History Musuem in the USA has an airworthy 1049H Super Constellation in TWA colours but it is undergoing maintenance and hasn't flow for a few years but it will again.

http://www.airliners.net/photo/Trans-World-Airline...
http://www.airliners.net/photo/Trans-World-Airline...
http://www.airliners.net/photo/Trans-World-Airline...
http://www.airliners.net/photo/485031/L/
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9d...

Note it is an H model but is painted up as a TWA G model.

[JuniorD]

Fantastic video. My favourite aircraft.