New England Air Museum

Specialty Museum · Windsor Locks, Connecticut

The largest aviation museum in New England, in three big hangars beside Bradley airport, holding something over a hundred aircraft from a 1870s balloon basket through to Cold War jets. The collection is much better than its low profile suggests: a Sikorsky VS-44 flying boat, one of only three built and the only one left; a B-29 Superfortress; an F-100, an F-105 and a MiG; early Sikorsky helicopters, which matter because Igor Sikorsky built his company forty minutes down the road in Stratford. Connecticut made engines and propellers and helicopters for most of the twentieth century - Pratt and Whitney, Hamilton Standard, Sikorsky - and this is where that industrial history is kept. You can sit in some cockpits, there is a restoration hangar you can look into, and on open cockpit days they let you into a great deal more than usual. Check whether the ride and the open cockpits are running before you drive, because the hangars alone are a quieter visit than the museum at its best.

36 Perimeter Road, Windsor Locks, Windsor Locks, Connecticut, 06096, United States

Open most days through the middle of the day and afternoon, year round, with at least one weekday closure at some times of year and reduced winter hours. Closed on major holidays. The hangars are heated but large, so winter visits are cold. OPEN COCKPIT DAYS run on announced dates a few times a year and are by some distance the best time to come. Confirm the day before travelling.

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