Parachute Museum Report

The Aviation Trail Parachute Museum was featured as one of the displays at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force during a Science, Discovery and Family Fun event on Sunday, Jan. 13, from 1 – 4 p.m. The free event was held for young people and their families and featured interactive science and technology displays and demonstrations and a performance by the Air Force Band of Flight.

Air Force Research Laboratory Commander Maj. Gen. William Cooley welcomed Ohio Governor-elect Mike DeWine and his wife Fran to the event. Governor Elect DeWine, just hours away from being formally seated as Governor, spoke and opened the day’s events for STEM activities. Among the many demonstrations, spread throughout the museum, were robotics, virtual reality, flight simulation, wind tunnel, rocketry, optics, fuel cells, engineering structures and scanning electron microscopes.

The Aviation Trail Parachute Museum demonstration was located in the Aviation Hall of Fame and was conducted by Parachute Museum Curator Randy Zuercher, and parachute expert Andrew Kididis. Curator Randy reports that “it was a good event despite the weather 8 inches of snow the day/night before. Our activities included an Emergency bail-out parachute rig for visitors to try on, a full ejection seat/pilot parachute descent system on display and also instruction on the parachute inflation demo unit led by Andrew Kididis to show different types of parachutes and demonstrate their drag and the drag differences between them. Many interesting visitor stories ensued as is always the case when we do a show”.

The accompanying photo shows Andrew Kididis rigging the parachute inflation demo unit.

For more on the Science, Discovery and Family Fun event see this link to the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force website: https://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/Upcoming/Science-Discovery-Family-Fun-Event/

For more on the Aviation Trail Parachute Museum, CLICK HERE to go to the appropriate page on this website.