The famous Northrup Flying wing has been restored and flies once again.  Thanks to old time FASF member, Doc Edwards, of Deming, NM, who brought this to our attention!  The video is short, actually less than two minutes in length, so watch this original model as it once again takes to the sky on its single – – – and only – – – wing.  This project was completed by the expert aircraft restoration folks at California’s famous “PLANES OF FAME MUSEUM” in Chino, California.  The restoration took the ship’s caretakers over 13 years to bring it back to life.

Down below you can see this ship in other videos of longer duration.  Notice the lack of the conventional fuselage, not to mention absence of any tail surfaces.  This was the original Northrup Aviation concept design, which led to the actual design and later flight of several jet powered Flying Wings.  This below video is 1:43 long.

And, here’s another video, 3:05 long.  Did you notice the tricycle landing gear was actually retractable on this initial prototypes?   And how about the 4th wheel at the rear?  That was put on the plane in order to protect the propellers from striking the runway surface on take off when the nose was raised for more lift.

And, here below, is one of the early jet powered flying wings showing its stuff back in 1947.  This video is 6:57 in length.  If you look closely, you’ll see it has eight jet engines, a flight engineer, and some vertical tail surfaces, unlike the early prop driven prototypes.  This old black and white film was a Newsreel clip of the plane in action.

And, lastly, for those of you who love detail and have the time to gather it all in, here is an hour ten minute long special color video about the History of the Flying Wings. The presentation is given to the Golden Gate Wing dinner in San Francisco by War Bird aficionado, Larry Rinek.