Recalling The Lone Eagle
Off
we go, into the wild blue main deck of a B747 freighter as a replica
of the “Spirit of St Louis”—one of several created
for the movie of the same name—flew to Paris on June 29 to celebrate
the 100th anniversary of Paris-Le Bourget Airport.
There the Air and Space Museum will exhibit the “Spirit
of St Louis” single-seat aircraft, flown solo by Charles Lindbergh
on the first nonstop flight between New York and Paris in May 1927.
It took Air France-KLM-Martinair Cargo around eight
hours to fly the famous monoplane from Atlanta to Paris Charles de Gaulle
aboard an Air France B747 Freighter. The “Spirit of St Louis”
travelled in two parts on a 20-foot pallet with significant overhang,
which meant it could only be carried by a nose-loading freighter.
We asked FlyingTypers Senior Contributing
Editor Richard Malkin about the Lindbergh flight.
Richard, who turned 101 years of age on June 27, was
a mere teenager of 14 years when the original 33 flight took place.
“It was big news then and still is inspiring
to think about in 2014,” he said.
“Sometimes you must go it alone—that’s
the message I took from that flight,” Richard smiled.
Air France-KLM-Martinair Cargo said that it is “proud
to have been associated with this event, where tradition met expertise.”
We asked Malkin what he remembers about Le Bourget
opening 100 years ago and the “Centurion Gentleman” that
we are so blessed to have in our lives laughed out loud.
Richard’s next column of new writings will appear
in FlyingTypers next Wednesday, around the same time as The
Lone Eagle’s Ryan monoplane is unpacked and put on display in
Paris.
Thanks for the memories . . .
Geoffrey
