S M I T H S O N I A N   I N S T I T U T I O N
N A T I O N A L   A I R   &   S P A C E   M U S E U M

Washington D.C.

I've exhaused all there is to see in the Milestones of Flight Gallery, time to move on.

The Air Transportation Gallery is where you'll find aviation traced back to its formative years. From exclusively carrying mail to the transport of people, this era saw great changes in aircraft technology and innovation. In due time, air travel played a large part in making the world a smaller, more accessable place.

A placard describing the gallery.

Ahhh, the fun of being a kid. I can't count the number of balsa wood airplanes I either lost in the trees or broke in horrific crashes during my early years.

In order to fly, a plane has to have some sort of propulsion system. This exhibit covers a broad section of powerplants, from new to old. The most prominent is the GE CF6 Turbofan Engine. There's an interesting model of the engine with cutouts, so you can see all the inner workings at play.