Very funny, robkamm.
However the aircraft would've even
more been avoided by the firefighters if it's had bombs and ammunition as well as fuel aboard!
whistlingdeathcorsairs wrote:
it's still a sad loss. so much work went into her and now she's gone. Much like that b-29 they tried to fly off that frozen lake. Very upsetting to watch
No one's arguing that. But I'm trying to think about the issue, and measure it, rather than just emoting.
Certainly sad, but there's an element of proportion that often is lost; most often seen when we talk about the post-war boneyard photos on WIX - sure they're hard to look at, but that misses the point that in 1945 we
needed the drinks cans - postwar life was hard, and the munitions
had to become ploughshares.
Secondly, if we'd somehow been able to keep all those aircraft, the one we now have wouldn't be as rare, and would not be as valuable and worth investing cash in. There's an economic rationalism behind warbirds although it usually doesn't seem like it. Of course we can just emote, instead.
We also regularly get the "we must preserve them all" drivel here. No we can't and shouldn't. The flightline of Cessna 172s at the flightschool are worth keeping while they're doing their job. Afterwards, crush 'em, except enough for those who want to use them, and we preserve
one in a national museum.
Again, once we get past the irrational attempt to keep all our childhood's toys aspect, then the hard,
thinking, work begins - what's worth preserving, and why? How do we make the choices (that the more idealistic WIX posters never consider, let alone address)? What is historical? What's going to be important historical material for 'tomorrow' that we don't even see 'today'? Which leads to:
TriangleP wrote:
One thing I might add to jdk's discussion is that, although Liberty Belle didn't have an historical prevenance, it seemed to gain one over time as the veterans signed the interior of the fuselage. Its my contention that in of itself was of great value to our society and future generations as a personal testament left by the veterans, now lost.
And that's an excellent point. The history of preservation and commemoration is, itself, history, and there are some stirrings recognising that as well as the original warbird preservation impulse. The loss of the de Havilland Mosquito RR299 (tragically with two crew) was the end of an aircraft that was historic by virtue of decades of display flying, and historic by virtue of being the only flying Mosquito in the world. It was, in a measure, a greater loss to the world than that of the
Liberty Belle, both in the loss of life, and in the historic rarity and
modern history of the airframe. That said,
Liberty Belle's history was an important and interesting one, and if rebuilt would enter another phase that would be unique to that machine*. So don't misunderstand that I'm dismissing the
Belle's own importance. However museums and historians have always to choose what's important, and those choices are
hard. Meanwhile
most active warbird preservation is harder technically, but usually predicated on an easier choice of airframe - one that's available, rather than going and getting something rare and needed to fill a gap. (An exception would be MAAM's P-61.)
Some things to think about, perhaps.
(N.B. This isn't intended as an attack on anyone, nor to ignore the terrible position the Liberty Belle folks are in, but certainly an attack on any tendency towards thoughtless romantic emoting.)Regards
[* It
could be rebuilt. We do have the technology. And if it cost 6 million dollars, it'd
probably be a bargain.]
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