Gallery Update: Spotting in Eugene/Oregon Air & Space Museum

Today was another good day to do aviation-related things. This time, I drove down to Eugene, Oregon to do some planespotting at Mahlon Sweet Field (EUG), otherwise known as Eugene Municipal Airport (with tons of regional flights) and visit a museum there. In terms of airline passenger boardings, Eugene Airport is the second busiest airport in Oregon just behind Portland (PDX) and the fifth largest airport in the Pacific Northwest region. The airport is also home to a small aviation museum I only just recently found out about called the Oregon Air & Space Museum. The museum hours were really tight (noon to 4 PM usually) so I arrived early to try some spotting first. I found a great spotting location at a parking lot by the museum just 300 feet from the numbers of Runway 34L; they say they have people coming by all the time to watch planes so that tells me it was a great spot and it was totally okay to be there. Even though commercial traffic is sparse at best, I'll most likely go back a few more times. The best time for spotting is early morning (according some sources) and again from noon until about 2 PM.

Commercial service is mostly provided by SkyWest Airlines via United Express with flights to Denver and San Francisco, Delta Connection with flights to Salt Lake City, and most recently via American Eagle Airlines with flights to Los Angeles when American Airlines contracted SkyWest to do some West Coast routes for them. And for me, the highlight of this spotting trip was catching an American Eagle livery for the first time! Aside from SkyWest, Allegiant Air flies certain days into Eugene with direct flights to Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Oakland, and Phoenix/Mesa; the prospect of catching Allegiant Mad Dogs at Eugene is reason enough to plan a second spotting trip! And of course, being in the Pacific Northwest, Alaska Airlines offers flights out of Eugene through sister carrier Horizon Air with commuter flights to Portland and Seattle. SkyWest via United Express used to compete with Horizon on the Portland and Seattle routes but have since ceased when their EMB-120s were all relocated to California for eventual retirement. Frontier Airlines also up until recently flew into Eugene from Denver as more of a mainline service but have since ceased upon changing business models to become an ultra low-cost airline. As for the Oregon Air & Space Museum, it is a unique one with a variety of displays in two hangars; a few of the museum aircraft are airworthy as well.

Here are the links to the full photo galleries:

Eugene (EUG) 1

Oregon Air & Space Museum

Previews:

SkyWest Airlines (d/b/a United Express) Bombardier CL-600-2B19 CRJ-200LR (N969SW) arriving from San Francisco.

SkyWest Airlines (d/b/a American Eagle) Bombardier CL-600-2B19 CRJ-200LR (N417SW) arriving from Los Angeles. I am very happy to finally catch an American Eagle livery, particularly the old colors pictured here because the American Eagle brand is changing to become unified with the "New American Airlines" livery.

SkyWest Airlines (d/b/a Delta Connection) Bombardier CL-600-2B19 CRJ-200LR (N460SW) beginning take-off roll for departure to Salt Lake City.

Alaska Airlines (Horizon Air) Bombardier DHC-8-401 Dash 8 Q400 (N404QX) arriving from Portland.

Israel Aircraft Industries IAI-1125 Astra (N777AM) taxiing for departure. According to FlightAware, this aircraft flew down to Reno, Nevada. 

N417SW taxiing for departure for the return trip to Los Angeles.

A little SkyWest smorgasbord!

N969SW beginning take-off roll for departure on the return-trip to San Francisco. 

The world's smallest jet, the Bede BD-5J (N811Q) on display.

Full-scale (and airworthy!) replica of the legendary Nieuport 17 (N25PH) made famous by France in World War I on display.

Monnett Monerai S glider (N8534P) on display.

Mitchell Wing B-10 ultralight on display (no tail number visible at this time).

Erickson Alfred A Herqui (N8176E) on display. Not much is known about this aircraft at the moment.

5/8 scale replica of the venerable F4U Corsair (N86RD). The fact it has a tail number means this mini-Corsair flew!

5/8 scale replica of the Mitsubishi Zero (N4217). This one also flew once.

5/8 scale replica of the Messerschmitt Bf-109. There is no addition information and no tail number on this aircraft, therefore it is believed to be a simple mock-up.

Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17 Fresco (NX306DM) on display. This MiG-17 was flown by Bill Reeseman in the "MiG Magic" air show routines. However, this aircraft suffered an in-flight fire during a test flight in Aurora, Oregon and Reeseman was forced to land this MiG, which was written off and subsequently donated to the museum.

Fire damage evident on the back-left part of the MiG-17.

Grumman A-6E Intruder (162206) on display.

McDonnell Douglas A-4 Skyhawk (148491) on display.