Subscribe
A group of volunteers with hundreds of years of combined experience are helping to restore a World War II-era fighter aircraft to life at the Selfridge Military Air Museum.
The volunteers are restoring a F4U Corsair, which will eventually be placed on display in the museum’s air park.
“This is what gets me up in the morning,” said Darrell Rohrbeck, a 93-year-old retired engineer who is serving as the superintendent on the project. “Sure, you wake up in the morning and you think about sleeping in, but I get out here to the museum and this just makes my day.”
Corsairs were used extensively by the US Navy and US Marine Corps during World War II and the Korean War. The Corsair held by the museum entered in to service in the closing days of World War II. After the war, it was used as a target dummy at a Marine Corps training facility.
“It was filled with holes,” said Ray Milio, another volunteer. “Large ones, small ones. We brought this aircraft up to museum quality.”
The Corsair had been on display in the museum’s air park for several years. A couple of years ago, the volunteers decided it was time to give it an overhaul.
"This aircraft was built to last. If we wanted to, we could return it to flight status," said Gary Orban, who is working on engine restoration on the Corsair.
Orban knows his way around the aircraft. His father flew Corsairs in World War II and Korea. Orban himself was a pilot in the Hungarian Air Force. Later, he raced motorcycles.
"I cam out here about two years ago and started volunteering. It is a great way to keep a hand in aviation and work with a bunch of guys who have a similar interest," he said.
Bill Andrew has a similar story. As a retired chief warrant officer of the Michigan Army National Guard, he was first drawn to the museum by the UH-1 Huey helicopter on display in the air park. Andrew flew Hueys with the Army Guard. As he was working, he was wearing a cap bearing the markings of the 238th Aviation Battalion, his old unit in the Guard.
"This is part of paying back," Andrew said. "The Guard was good to me and it is good to be back around it."
Andrew was a mechanic for Chrysler and he said he uses the skills he learned in that job to perform restoration work on the museum's aircraft.
"We get a work order and we just get at it," he said.
As the volunteers are working on various parts of the aircraft restoration project, Rohrbeck wanders from work station to work station, checking in on progress. He's been a volunteer at the museum for 24 years. He said he's had a fascination with aviation since he was a young boy. As a young man, he served as an aviation cadet in the Army Air Force at the tail end of World War II. The war ended while he was still in a training status and he was discharged shortly thereafter during the military drawdown after the war.
"But I have never lost the thrill that comes with being around an aircraft. We hope young people will come to our museum and capture some of that same excitement," he said.
| Date Taken: | 06.07.2019 |
| Date Posted: | 06.08.2019 10:12 |
| Story ID: | 326162 |
| Location: | MI, US |
| Web Views: | 101 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
This work, Museum Volunteers Restore WWII-Era Corsair, by SMSgt Daniel Heaton, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
LEAVE A COMMENT