News

on July 8th, warbirds from CAFSoCal wing in Camarillo made the two hour flight up to the Truckee Airport for the 2016 Truckee Airfestival.

Making the flight were the wing’s SNJ “290”, Bearcat, Spitfire, and the Zero along with the P51D “Bunny” from the Palm Springs Museum which flew escort on the PBJ’s wing.

It was an exciting event for the PBJ’s flight crew and the lucky few ground crew and museum personnel who had the privilege to make the flight and witness the grand lady’s first airshow after the 23 year long restoration project.

The flight to Truckee went smoothly and the crew arrived at a beautiful and friendly airport setting in moderately strong winds. Winds that unfortunately got stronger as the event progressed.

The fighter aircraft and pilots performed beautifully to the thrill of the crowd and the PBJ was the Belle of the Ball. Constantly surrounded by the interested crowd who had many questions and stories of their own to tell. “Why is this B25 blue?” was the frequently heard conversation starter.

Mixed in with their marshalling and maintenance duties, the crew delighted in educating the public about our wonderful PBJ and it’s long journey from “Old Brew” to “SemperFi”

Added to the excitement of the airshow was the high winds and a mild case of aircraft gremlins. The strong winds only got stronger as the show went on and decided to carry away the PX pop-up awning, which effected our sales potential, and prevented us from offering warbird rides on the SNJ. And the PBJ’s port engine starter decided it would not allow the PBJ to fly during the airshow at Truckee. Many mitigation procedures were considered, but ultimately the crew awaited delivery of a replacement starter from our friends, the American Aeronautical Foundation’s spares for “Executive Sweet”, delivered via personal courier in the persons of Gary Barber and Dan Newcomb. Mike, Marc and Russ worked late into the night to replace the starter and the crew was able to fly back home the following day as planned.

The show was a complete success and we left the organizers with the promise that CAFSoCal would be back next year, and for many more years to come – no doubt.

This Accomplishment of the PBJ’s airshow would not have been possible were it not for the meticulous work done by all involved during the restoration process of this warbird as well as the careful planning prior to the show by Mike Hohls, Marc Russell and the crew.

We are happy to take a moment to enjoy the success of this airshow and then to carry the experience gained to future events.

Until then, be sure to attend Wings Over Camarillo, our home base airshow, on August 20th and 21st.

Below are perhaps too many pictures from the airshow, mostly of our aircraft, and the transit flights.

Thanks to all who contributed image files and/or made themselves available to be included in the photos.

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A short video with snippets of views from the event

Cockpit Camera footage from the Zero fighter of the B25-PBJ during it’s flight to the Truckee/Tahoe Airshow, July 8, 2016
Shaky footage is due to poor camera mount hard-point.

Yesterday, two of our pilots, Jason Somes and Mike Hohls received their type rating on the PBJ.  CONGRATULATIONS GUYS!

This engine has been feathered, representing an engine failure.  This  is one of the many different situations required to be handled by the pilots prior to them being type rated.

Hellcat Day at CAF SoCal on June 19th (Father’s day) 2016 was a well attended success.

Rob Hertberg did a great job of organizing and running the event.

Ron Fleishman made a very nice presentation on the history background of our F6F Hellcat.

Tom Cleaver delivered a very informative presentation on the Hellcat in general and it’s involvement in the Battle of the Philippine Sea.

Below are a few images of the event and a playlist of videos of the event on our YouTube channel.

Our museum will be closed Monday July 4th.

Our Museum will be closing early, 2:30 pm on Saturday June 18th, as we are hosting a private party.

On Thursday we were honored to have Mrs Safran’s A.P. European History Class visit our museum. After their visit, Mrs Safran wrote in part “All of the docents were kind, knowledgeable and passionate. We are fortunate to have an amazing facility so close.”
Mrs Safran, We look forward to another visit from you and your class next year.

Museum will be closed all day June 11th.  We are hosing a private party.  We will resume normal operations Sunday June 12th

Visitors to CAF SoCal may have noticed a curious addition to our aircraft collection.

On a trailer tucked in the corner of one of the hangars lives a 1942 vintage training glider, in beautiful albeit a little dusty yellow and blue USAF plumage,  patiently waiting for a more prominent display and a chance to take to the skies once again.

On May 28th, the TG-2 gilder, a Schweizer SGS2-8, got it’s chance to do just that during the Western Classic Glider Regatta in Tehachapi, CA.

It was a beautiful sight to behold, and left one wondering how many fledgling pilots got their Air Force career started (or perhaps terminated) at its controls.

We hope to see it flying more often. In the meanwhile here is a compilation video of the flight and some photos from the event.

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The presentation by Thomas McKelvey Cleaver on his recent book “The Bridgebusters” on Sunday, May 29, 2016 was well attended and very interesting.

Unruffled by A/V problems with the photo slide portion of the presentation, Mr. Cleaver discussed the real story behind Joseph Heller’s “Catch 22” novel, based on the heroic Wing stationed on the island of Corsica and spoke about his new book, The Bridgebusters.

The session was concluded with a book signing and World War II veteran of the Corsica campaign, George Underwood, was present for the discussion and book signing as well.

The following playlist contains two videos, an informal chat with George Underwood about his experiences in the war, and a video of the presentation by Tom Cleaver.