Jan 2nd
Happy New Year everyone. Hope everyone had a happy and safe time. To ring in a new year I posted some photos from my recent visit to Kitty Hawk, North Carolina; the home of the Wright Brother's museum. The first photo shows the Visitor Center welcome sign. You notice in the upper right corner the Wright flyer, light house and a pirate boat. North Carolina is proud to be the birthplace of aviation and other landmarks. The famous photo showing the two brothers and their Wright flyer is seen next. The next two photos show the two brothers; Wilbur and Orville. The next photo shows how the area looked in 1903 with some local people attending. Fast forwarding to today you can see the momument that stands today and how the area looks. Sand dunes are now covered with grass and sidewalks. Actually, sand dunes were erected on the nearby beach to protect this site as well as grass was laid to help with erosion control. A closer look at the momument dedicated to the brothers which was built back in 1928, the 25th anniversary. Quite impressive. The next photo gives you a view from the momument looking down onto the musuem and the area where the actual first flight took place. They flew the gliders off the sand dunes although, they had to fly off level ground and return to level ground under engine power to qualify as the first powered flight. They visited this site in 1901 and 1902 with different gliders shown in the next two photos. At this point they had hundreds of glider flights completed which helped them with their upcoming power flight. The next three photos show the dunes and the famous first 1903 flight. The musuem placed a large granite rock with this metal plate locating the spot the plane took to the air which is seen in this next photo. The musuem marked all four flight landing locations with granite rocks engraved with information about each flight. The first flight marker is shown next and the following photo shows the first flight distance between the two markers. The following three photos show each marker. The next photo shows the distance from the fourth marker 852 feet away from the spot the plane took to the air which is shown by the red arrow. Seen in the next photo is the data on the plane. Not sure how many of us would fly a twelve horsepower plane. The next two photos show the replica Wright flyer in the musuem. It is a wonderful place to visit if you are in the area, a lot to see. The last two photos show the famous Cape Hatteras lighthouse which is about an hour south of Kitty Hawk. It stands 205 feet and took over one million bricks to complete. The beacon can be seen twenty miles out to sea. Pretty impressive. As always, any comments or questions just visit my contact page.
- Glenn