Pima Air & Space Museum facts for kids

Pima Air & Space Museum

The main entrance to the museum
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Established	May 8, 1976; 49 years ago (1976-05-08)
Location	6000 East Valencia Road Tucson, Arizona, United States
Type	Aviation museum

The amazing Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird, the fastest crewed aircraft ever!

A Boeing B-17G like the ones used in World War II.

A huge Boeing B-29 Superfortress bomber.

The Pima Air & Space Museum is a super cool museum in Tucson, Arizona, USA. It has almost 400 different aircraft on display! These planes are spread out over a huge area, about the size of 80 football fields. Since 1991, it has also been the home of the Arizona Aviation Hall of Fame.

Exploring the Museum

Many of the museum's aircraft are displayed outside. Others are kept safe inside one of the museum's six large hangars. The museum also has a special hangar where old planes are carefully fixed up and made new again. This is called a restoration hangar.

The museum first opened its doors in May 1976. Back then, it had 48 aircraft. Today, the main hangar alone holds amazing planes like an SR-71A Blackbird and an A-10 Warthog. You can also see an exhibit about the United States Air Force through the years. There's even a pretend control tower!

The museum is right next to Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. This base is home to the 309th Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group (AMARG). People often call it the "Graveyard of Planes" or "The Boneyard." It's the biggest place in the world for storing and preserving aircraft.

A Look Back: Museum History

The Pima Air & Space Museum officially opened on May 8, 1976. The first large hangar was finished in early 1982. More hangars were built over the years, with the fourth one ready by 1994. The museum has grown a lot since then.

In 2012, the museum worked with artists on a project called The Boneyard Project. They took some old, unused aircraft and turned them into giant canvases for art. It was a really unique way to show off the planes!

In 2015, the Boeing company gave the museum a special Boeing 787 aircraft. This was the second 787 ever built and was used for flight tests. It's now displayed in the colors of its first customer, ANA.

In November 2016, Orbis International donated their first McDonnell-Douglas DC-10 Flying Eye Hospital to the museum. This special plane was a flying hospital that traveled the world. It was the oldest flying DC-10 of its kind. It has been restored and is now on display at Davis–Monthan Air Force Base.

The museum also bought more land in 2021. This land will be used to build the Tucson Military Vehicle Museum. This new museum will show off many land vehicles, including 50 that were given by the Imperial War Museum.

Amazing Aircraft on Display

The museum has a collection of 400 aircraft! Here are some of the most famous ones you can see:

The Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress with serial number 44-85828 is actually at the 390th Memorial Museum. This museum is located right on the grounds of the Pima Air & Space Museum.

Besides planes, the museum also has cool space items. You can see the GNS (Guidance and Navigation Simulator) trainer from the Shuttle Mission Simulator. There's also a full-size model of a Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Booster.

See also

• List of aerospace museums
• Pinal Airpark