A somewhat forgotten piece of Salina History made the Salina Airport what it is today. In 1942 the Smoky Hill Army Airfield was constructed southwest of Salina. When the base closed in 1967 it left Salina with one of the largest Municipal Airport runways in the world. Turns out that wasn't the end of Salina's aviation story. For many years aircraft parts were built in several of the old bases buildings by several familiar manufacturers. In more recent years it has become home to K-State Polytechnic with pilot programs in flight including a unmanned flight program. Military aircraft are stll a common site at the airport with a several reserve units having training facilities on the airport properties.
38 years after the closing of the military airfield a record breaking round the world flight took off (02/28/05) and landed (03/03/05) on the historic runway. The "Global Flyer" was quite an event and this monument is the centerpiece of a newly dedicated park with extensive history of the Airfield. It's also a great place to relax and watch the planes take off and land.
To log this cache you must visit the location and complete the following confirmation tasks;
1. Take a photo at the location with the globe included in some manner. Of course a selfie would be great, but you could take a photo of your GPS, Geomobile, etc.
2. Message me thru the geocaching site with the cost of construction for the Airfield when it was completed in 1942.
There's no need to wait for confirmation to log your find, however logs without having completed these two simple tasks will be deleted.
Virtual Reward - 2017/2018
This Virtual Cache is part of a limited release of Virtuals created between August 24, 2017 and August 24, 2018. Only 4,000 cache owners were given the opportunity to hide a Virtual Cache. Learn more about Virtual Rewards on the Geocaching Blog.
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