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INTERNATIONAL HERALD TRIBUNE

Lufthansa builds hangar in US for rare plane
The Associated Press
November 20, 2008

AUBURN, Maine: German airline Lufthansa on Thursday opened a hangar built in Auburn, Maine, for the three-year overhaul of a rare Constellation Starliner.

Lufthansa bought three of the airplanes last year from local aviation enthusiast Maurice Roundy and contracted Lufthansa Technik in Germany to restore one aircraft back into flying condition using parts from the other two.

A team of five former Lufthansa aircraft mechanics, along with five active mechanics and engineers from Lufthansa Technik will restore the vintage aircraft. Another 12 mechanics are being hired locally, said Martin Riecken, a Lufthansa spokesman.

"For the project team, the formal opening of this hangar is an important milestone. I'm delighted that this building will now be available for this ambitious project," August Wilhelm Henningsen, chairman of Lufthansa Technik, said Thursday.

Hundreds of Constellations, known affectionately as the "Connie," were produced by Lockheed in the 1940s and 1950s. But only 44 Starliners were built. Two of Roundy's were originally used by Trans World Airlines and the third was used by Lufthansa.

Constellations were used by the military as transports in World War II and then by commercial airlines before passenger jets rendered them obsolete.

Henningsen described the Super Star, dubbed the Starliner by Lufthansa, as "the culmination in the history of propeller driven transport aircraft."

Only four L-1649A Starliners are preserved, and none of them are airworthy at present, according to Lufthansa. One of them is on display at the National Air and Space Museum's Udvar-Hazy Center at Dulles Airport outside Washington, D.C.

The planes are so rare that Lufthansa jumped at the opportunity when Roundy put his planes on the market last year. Two of the planes are located in Auburn, while a third is on display in Polk City, Florida.

The primary aircraft already has been stripped of some components in Auburn. The tail section was sent to a Lufthansa Technik subsidiary for overhaul, and the historic Curtiss-Wright engines have been sent to Anderson Aeromotive Inc. from Grangeville, Idaho.

The other airplane in Auburn and the airplane in Florida will be used for spare parts. While the Florida plane will no longer fly, it'll remain on display at the Fantasy of Flight Museum, Riecken said.

The timetable calls for the Super Star overhaul to take place over three years with a goal of making it airworthy by 2011. Eventually, it'll be repainted in Lufthansa's historic colors and returned to Germany, where it'll be used to perform vintage flights.