Dear Kossacks, I wrote this for my own blog, Paul's Thing, with the intention of cross-posting it here to reach a larger audience. Two days ago, while looking up additional information on the aircraft, I discovered fellow Kossack shortfinals had already posted a dKos diary on the Skyknight. His diary contains valuable information I had not uncovered on my own (and which I shamelessly incorporated), but I want to credit his dKos diary on the Skyknight as the authoritative one and ask you to read mine as a supplement. I hope he approves. -- pwoodford
There's a Skyknight on display at the Pima Air & Space Museum in Tucson, Arizona, where I work as a volunteer tour guide. It catches my eye every time I walk past it, maybe because it's so different. I decided to take some photos, do some research, and write about what I learned. Turns out the old tub -- also known as Willie the Whale, the Turtle, and the Drut (spell it backwards) -- was a far more significant aircraft than I had imagined.
I remember building a model of this airplane during the 1950s. I built a lot of models as a kid and have surely forgotten most of them, but that one stuck in my mind. All I knew about the Skyknight at the time was that it had been one of the Navy's first jet fighters. It seemed utterly antiquated with its straight wings, bulky fuselage, and side-by-side seating, so unlike the other jet fighters developed after WWII. If anyone had told me then that Skyknights were still flying, or indeed would continue flying for many years to come, I would have scoffed -- surely the type had been long retired, replaced by sleeker designs like Douglas' F4D Skyray or A4D Skyhawk.