. . . but it looks like a random collection of bits to me:
It may not look like much to the untrained eye, but to those of us who are Warbird afficionados, it is incredibly complete. There have been rebuilds to fly from wrecks recently dragged out of the Russian wilderness which were found in worse condition that this.
I’ve been onboard several retired battleships, but so far I’ve not managed to get onto an aircraft carrier. This will have to do for the time being:
The USS Hornet was on hand 40 years ago to pick up the Apollo 11 astronauts after their Columbia Command Module splashed down in the Pacific Ocean on July 24, 1969.
Today, the aircraft carrier is preserved as a museum in Alameda, California. Its main deck is littered with historic warplanes and space artifacts including an Apollo command module and Mobile Quarantine Facility from subsequent missions, pictured below. The first footsteps the Apollo 11 crew took on Earth after walking on the moon are traced on the deck.
USS Hornet CIC
Above: The USS Hornet’s Crisis Information Center is pictured. While engaged in active warfare, crewmembers would stand behind transparent, hanging boards and write information backwards to keep from getting in the way of the officers who needed to read it.
I think it was actually the “Combat” Information Center, but I could be mistaken. Lots of cool images, but I’d like to see more . . .
An interesting article in the Ottawa Citizen about a recently discovered wreck near Kingston, which may be the remains of HMS Wolfe:
A team of divers is set to plunge into Lake Ontario near Kingston, Ont., next week in a bid to confirm the discovery of a legendary Canadian-built ship from the War of 1812, the HMS Wolfe.
In collaboration with marine archeologists from Parks Canada, the divers plan to take detailed measurements, drawings and photographs of a sunken wooden sailing vessel that appears to match the size and last known location of the famous 32-metre sloop: the flagship of British naval commander James Yeo and star of a dramatic 1813 battle west of Toronto that helped thwart the U.S. invasion of Canada.
The suspected discovery comes just three years before the 200th anniversary of the war, adding urgency to the efforts to identify a possible new showcase relic for bi-national commemoration activities.
(Cross-posted to the old blog: http://bolditalic.com/quotulatiousness_archive/005570.html.)
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