A surprise from the sky, today!

You first have to understand, that where I live, northeastern Iowa, general aviation aircraft flying over make people stop and look.

As you just don’t get many fly overs out here in the sticks, but as I was at my folks today, talking to them on the back porch, we heard the distinct sound of a multi-engined radial powered plane approaching, and it was LOW, like 500 FT, maybe, flying southeast that would be following the railroad.

It was an HU-16 Grumman Albatross, and was bare metal with no visable markings, and looked alot like this one I found on the web.

Needless to say, the sight and sound of this bird was a wonderful treat for this aviation buff who is so far removed from this sort of thing.

Just thought I’d share.

Leon.

I wondered what that was! All i got to see was the back end of it, I thought it might have been a Catalina, all I saw was the tail as it went over. Glad you saw it and knew what it was.[:)]

It has a somewhat distinctive sound and for a fairly good size aircraft it could be somewhat graceful in the air. We had two of them based at my first overseas assignment and occasionally they would send one up to check shipping traffic.

That is an awsome suprise! The albatross is a great looking aircraft.

Ill never forget several years ago I was at a small airshow in NJ. While other planes were doing their act overhead I spotted something out in the distance. I thought “wow that looks like an albatross”. I picked up my binoculars and sure enough it was an albatross in full USN markings on its way to the show. It landed a few minutes later. That was a very cool suprise. [:)]