Warbird Information Exchange

Hello all,

I have always had an interest in the B-57 Canberra - my friend Bob Mikesh flew these for many years (the airplane that he had set aside for the Smithsonian has now been deaccessed to Warner-Robins).

Three of these are still flying, used by NASA for various taks, including storm research. According to Wikipedia these have registrations about to end (one has already ended). These are (again thanks to Wik):

N926NA (NASA 926), AF s/n 63-13503 (Rivet Slice 2), registry expires 31 August 2022
N927NA (NASA 927), AF s/n 63-13295 (Rivet Chip , registry expires 31 July 2022
N928NA (NASA 928), AF s/n 63-13298 (Rivet Chip 11), registry expires 30 June 2021

Anyone know what the status of these might be? Are these continuing in NASA service for yet some more years, or due to go back to Davis-Manthan (as an aside, 927 holds the record for most years at D-M prior to being put back in service).

I think one of these should go to NASM, but would like to see that accession pushed back due to additional service. Such an interesting, with straight and long wings, designed as a successor to the DH Mosquito...

Kevin

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Kevin McCartney

I asked someone I know at Ellington about this and he confirmed they're getting the needed work to re-cert them. That last one hasn't been out of rebuild all that long when you think about it.
They used these 57s a lot more than I'd thought when I heard about them. Their crews are quiet proprietary, too. Retired chief Astronaut "Hoot" Gibson once told me of a flight he got in one of them (he called himself "ballast" on that flight) and I got the impression from Hoot that their crews were generally unimpressed by other NASA bona fides (this, coming from a man who'd flown darned near anything that was flyable within his lifetime).

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Life member, 91st BG Memorial Association
Owner, 1944 Willys MB #366014
Former REMF (US Army, O3)

https://airbornescience.nasa.gov/aircraft_status

https://airbornescience.nasa.gov/aircraft_detailed_cal

If you're interested in what NASA is doing, these 2 links are invaluable. First shows the status of the various Airborne Sciences aircraft (T-38s not included), second shows their schedule.

AFAIK, there's no plan in the near future to do anything to the WB-57s since Sierra Nevada Corp just got done doing complete rebuilds of 926 and 927, and 928 is in process. 926 and 927 are fully operational and all updates have been complete for a while now. Registrations are just registrations. The FAA has been horrible about processing renewals in a timely manner, so having "soon to expire" registrations doesn't really signify anything. 928 will renewed when it's ready to go again (once the budget to finish the rebuild is allocated).

926 has been flying science missions and 927 has been the camera chase for all Commercial Crew flights and has also supported SpaceX's Starship test flights. Presumably, if anyone else wants to "man rate" their orbital launchers, the 927 will be made available to those as well.

I know that the WB-57 only really bears a passing resemblance to the original English Electric Canberra, but it's still quite staggering to think that the first flight was 73 years ago last month.

One of the more interesting lectures I've ever sat through at Oshkosh was an hour long session by an RB-57 pilot. Talked about mounting the pod mounted jets if the mission required max altitude. Talked about only flying the prescribed legs and never really knowing what the backseater was up to. It sounded like he particularly didn't know what the backseater was doing when they cruised up and down South/Central American coast, barely staying in international airspace.

When the one came out of the boneyard recently (5-10 years ago), it visited Oshkosh and I spoke at some length with the pilot. They hadn't done much with the airplane yet.

It has been at least 5 years since i last flew into Ellington, but it was interesting to just walk by 'em out on the ramp.

Saw one of them appear on ADSB over Western England a few years ago - it was out of Mildenhall and already at some altitude well above the civvy traffic.

Great to see the B-57s still in service and I hadn't realised NASA still flies a DC-8 - shame the Starlifter was retired though...

(When the Panavia Tornado was still known as MRCA - Multi Role Combat Aircraft - in the 1970s, wags said it actually stood for Must Refurbish Canberra Again...)