American Airpower Museum, C-47 Flight Experience

Description

The C-47 Flight Experience takes places at the American Airpower Museum in Farmingdale. Find the details about the museum itself at our page "American Airpower Museum."

Checklist

Attraction Type:  museum
Surface of lot:  paved
Distance to venue:  close
Transportation to venue offered:  na
Terrain:  flat
Places to rest:  not until you are inside the museum
Paths and walkways:  concrete underfoot
Doors:  gates
Number of floors:  1
Elevators:  na
Ramps:  na
Steps and staircases:  na
Width of aisles:  plenty of space to navigate
Places to sit:  benches in front of "canteen"
Location of restrooms:  in the hangar
Type of restroom:  large, accessible, single occupancy
Ease of entry and exit:  ok
Baby changing station:  no
Available food services:  none
Friendliness of staff:  extremely friendly and knowledgeable
Notes:  * Unfortunately there is no accessible parking in the paved lot. People park along the road adjacent to the entrance.

Read More

On a perfect morning for flying. my “better half” and I headed to the American Airpower Museum in Farmingdale, for his “birthday present,” an AAM Flight Experience. The C-47 Flight Experience is in a WWII Douglas C47 Skytrain Troop Transporter. This “Living History Flight” is really a complete experience, combining professional re-enactors, artifacts, a history lesson, and a flight in an historic plane. It is somewhat costly, but it may be worth it for you or someone you know.

The Museum’s website says, “AAM’s Flight Experience is a one-of-a-kind immersive educational program, where reenacts take you up in our original WWII C-47 to give a sense of what U.S. 101st and 82nd Airborne Division Paratroopers experienced on their incredible 1,200-plane D-Day assault. Reenactors are led by Robert Scarabino, noted WWII Living Historian…This unique experience includes: a mission briefing in the ready room; a chance to wear authentic military field jackets, helmets and gear; the actual sights and sounds as the C-47’s engines fire up and you’re off into the blue; see, hear and feel the crew operating their C-47 and paratroopers getting ready for battle; plus, you’ll actually one up and attach your hook to the overhead static line. But don’t worry, no jumping is allowed! “ 

Each attendee is allowed to bring a guest. Guests are allowed to watch and listen to everything. The only exception, of course, is the actual flight, when we were the photographers. The “soldiers” were checked in. They were given a history of the event with many artifacts to see and learn about. After their uniforms were distributed and put on, the soldiers had a “briefing” in the briefing room. From there, they headed to the tarmac and their flight. All of the reenacts are dedicated volunteers with a vast amount of historical knowledge As a guest, it was interesting to think about what had happened so many years ago, and what the soldiers and their families must have thought. Scary!

The entire experience lasted about 1.5 hours, with the actual flight taking about 30 minutes. As part of the experience you are able to visit the museum for as long as you like . My “better half” thought that the experience was special. Even for those of us that did not “fly” it was a really good history lesson.  Although “pricey,” it was a great gift. Unfortunately, the flight is not accessible for anyone who cannot do the steps, but we think it is something many might like.

For more information on the American Airpower Museum itself, go to our entry about the museum.

As always, we at Destination:Accessible, advise you to visit a venue’s website, http://www.americanairpowermuseum.com">www.americanairpowermuseum.com, when planning a visit, to “know before you go,” 

Location

Nearby