Exciting Week at Albany International

Albany International Airport hosted a World War II era fighter last weekend. It was a restored B-17, which travels around the country as a flying museum, and is one of only 14 B-17's that still fly.

For a cool $430, you can take a 20 minute flight on this beauty. I didn't get the chance (because I have a mortgage now) but here is a nice story about a local WWII vet that did.

Last weekend was the induction ceremony at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY. All of the dignitaries that attend that event fly in and out of Albany International. Due to the influx of people flying in, we had another special visitor: a US Airways Boeing 757. I know, it may have been more exciting if it had not been the same week as the B-17's visit, but for me it was a thrill nonetheless.

As a side note, I have dedicated two posts to St. Maarten (this one and that one). Yesterday afternoon, after the Valley Cats were rained out, we went to the Control Tower for some ice cream (I had the Oregon blackberry cheesecake, in case you were wondering). The Control Tower is a mini-golf, batting cage, and ice cream place on Route 7, right by the end of one of the Albany International runways. We had a couple of Boeing 737's and one Embraer taking off our way. It's no St. Maarten, but it was still very exciting.

The second B737 was a US Airways and it took off in moderate rain and took a very steep and sudden left turn right after take-off. Neat-o, right? Next time I will bring my camera.

Now, I know that this post may be overwhelming with all this exciting news, but there's more. A family flying in a Cherokee 180 from Piseco Lake in the Adirondacks to Cherry Hills, NJ had to make an emergency landing at Albany after losing part of the landing gear.


Props to the pilot on getting this plane on the ground safely. My favorite part of the story is that the pilot originally thought that the flapping noise made by the landing gear as it was about to fall off may have actually been coming from sneakers left on the wing. Can't you just imagine his wife telling him, "No, honey, it's the landing gear...and there it goes."