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Restoration of Historic YO-3A Aircraft Under Way
Posted in Skagit Regional Airport on February 3, 2012
Workers at the Museum of Flight Restoration Center have completed most of the work on the fuselage of Lockheed YO-3A s/n 69-18005.
Burlington – A historic aircraft that spent many years in storage at Skagit Regional Airport is getting a new lease on life. Lockheed YO-3A s/n 69-18005 currently is undergoing a total cosmetic restoration at the Museum of Flight Restoration Center at Paine Field, Everett.
Only eleven YO-3As were built, and nine of the aircraft were deployed to Vietnam for an operational period lasting about 18 months. After the war, YO-3As were operated by the Louisiana Fish and Wildlife agency to locate illegal shrimp poachers, and also by the FBI to covertly observe various criminal activities. Seven of the original 11 aircraft remain in existence today.
La Conner resident Bruce Elliot gifted this YO-3A to the museum last year, supplemented with a Night Vision Aerial Periscope (NVAP) mission equipment package (now installed in the airframe) and a large collection of spare parts. Among those parts was a new old stock (never been used) ocular component that is stowed in the front cockpit. The NVAP is an electro-optical system that amplifies low level ambient light (e.g., stars, moon) to a visible level of illumination. The equipment was produced by a division of the Xerox Corp., and the optics, which included what is believed to be the largest single piece optical glass prism ever made, were provided by Carl Zeiss Germany. Records show that only 18 NVAP units were produced. The NVAP in some YO-3As housed a laser target designator used to guide homing ordnance -- the first ever application of such a system in a combat environment.
The goal, when the restoration is completed sometime this year, is to display the airplane in the museum's Great Gallery at Boeing Field in Seattle, suspended above the Lockheed Blackbird D-21 variant. This will provide the visitor a contrast of extremes: Lockheed's fastest -- and arguably noisiest – airplane, the Blackbird, in close proximity to (likely) its slowest -- and definitely quietest – airplane, the YO-3A, which was unofficially called the "Quiet Star".