Seattle Boeing Company Museum of Flight (One Museum Equals Five)

In July 2024, our son and daughter-in-law took us to their home in Boston, USA, where we stayed for as long as 50 days. The biggest travel project during that time was a five-day vacation in Washington State in the northwestern corner of the United States. Among those five days, the most brilliant part was visiting this museum.

This is an amazing museum, with so much content that it could easily be divided into five separate museums. If you want to see it in detail, you need at least a full day, and you can get a simple lunch there.

The beginning of a dream.

Museum of Flight, the home of the Boeing Institute of Technology for science and engineering students.

The glider models at the entrance. These should all be fantasies, not actual operable ones.

After ticket inspection, we turned left and immediately entered a separate pavilion. We were astonished to see that it was all about space rather than aviation, and there were plenty of real artifacts.

This is the astronaut seat inside a spacecraft.

It details the entire process from conception to realization of the US Apollo Moon Landing Program from 1959 to 1975.

Saturn engine.

The shell is deformed; it should have been damaged during a fall.

A 1:1 scale model of the lunar rover.

Covered in stains. This should be an actual used rocket engine.

Could this be an actual satellite?

Orbital return capsule.

There is more than one.

This is a full overview of the space race between the US and the Soviet Union. Each year's launches of various spacecraft are listed in detail.

After leaving the spacecraft pavilion, we saw the main hall filled with all kinds of real aircraft, parked and hanging. I thought this was already impressive, but the truly spectacular parts were still to come.

Would you believe it? The great Boeing company started as a furniture factory.

They began building wooden aircraft.

Would you believe it again? Boeing's first engineer turned out to be a genuine Chinese person. To pay tribute to him, this is the only Chinese explanation board in the museum.

Soon, the Boeing exhibition jumped to space, not real spacecraft but completely sci-fi space cities, unfortunately just a concept.

This dreamy rotating space city would have to be tens of kilometers in diameter, right? Can it be realized in a hundred years?

These should all be models of aircraft they actually built.

Boeing, once so great, has been repeatedly caught up in quality scandals, truly confirming the iron law that "no general is always victorious" or "no company lasts forever" or "no dynasty endures." This also seems to be a microcosm or metaphor for the overall situation in the United States and the West.

Crossing a bridge over an external road, we reached the truly most spectacular part of this museum.

This is a real space shuttle trainer. This large thing is about four times the size of a train car. This space shuttle was technically completed and flew successfully several times. Later, it was canceled due to high operating costs.

The space inside can fit a bus.

Here there is a huge canopy nearly the size of a football field, filled with actual examples of most large civil and military aircraft ever built in the United States.

Black Hawk helicopter. That's the model that crashed in Mogadishu, Somalia, right?

This pose, the crew on Chinese aircraft carriers have already learned it.

There is also a real Concorde supersonic airliner jointly built by Britain and France. People lined up to go inside. Since we had already seen one in France, we didn't queue and forgot to take photos.

Boeing 787.

This is the famous US President's plane, Air Force One. And it's one that was actually in service.

This is where the president works. It's actually more modest than I imagined. How come there is only one phone on the desk, and no more advanced electronic devices?

This is where the staff work. Still no electronic devices.

These six US presidents have used this Air Force One.

When Nixon visited Beijing back then, he rode on this Air Force One.

I also had the honor of taking a photo with their display panel.

There is even a 1:1 scale model of a US Mars rover here.

More than ten actual aircraft of US air combat heroes from various years are exhibited here.

Here is their list of heroes.

A photo of the building exterior taken from the upper floor. I surprisingly noticed a neatly shaped snowy mountain/volcano in the distance. How come it looks exactly like Mount Fuji in Japan!

There is also a close-up view inside the museum.

There is a detailed introduction here. Hey! If I ever get another chance to come to Seattle, I must at least go to the foot of the mountain. My son told me this mountain is 4,392 meters high, and the high-altitude part has no tourist facilities. It is impossible for non-professional athletes to reach the summit.

This photo was taken high in the sky when flying from Seattle back to Boston. The mountain shape is still perfect. Of course, as a volcanic remnant, compared to Japan's Mount Fuji, the top is not as sharp, and there is a bit more roughness on the left. But on the far left, we also saw another similar volcanic remnant. It seems there are quite a few volcanoes here!

I am over 70 years old, and my wife is not far behind. In this lifetime, there are still too many wonderful sights we have not personally visited. Those places that are too high, too far, or too difficult, we will have to wait for the next life to visit. What a pity!

Travel Notes Directory: 1. Part 1: Guide Section, 2. Part 2: Space Section, 3. Part 3: Small and Medium Military and Civil Aircraft Exhibition Hall, 4. Part 4: Boeing Company Development History, 5. Part 5: Large Aircraft Physical Exhibition, 6. Part 6: US Air Force Heroes Hall, 7. Epilogue: Rainier Snow Mountain Travel Information, Hotel Index, Strategy Index, Air Ticket Index, Website Navigation, Travel Index, Cruise Index, Corporate Travel Index, Franchise Cooperation, Distribution Alliance, Friendly Links, Corporate Gift Card Procurement, Insurance Agency, Agency Cooperation, Hotel Franchise, Destination and Scenic Spot Cooperation, More Franchise Cooperation, About Ctrip, About Ctrip, Ctrip Hot Topics, Contact Us, Careers, User Agreement, Privacy Policy, Business License, Security Center, Ctrip Content Center, Intellectual Property, Trip.com Group Algorithm Announcement.