Wings Restorations (the restoration arm of Wings of the North) has been restoring a Vultee BT-15 since its acquisition in 2004. After the BT-15 entered the civilian market in 1946, it spent its entire civilian career in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Illinois. The last flight in the logbook took place in August of 1955 while owned by Edward and Chester Pachnik. This year has seen a rapid increase of restoration activities with the goal of getting the aircraft flying within a year. Over the weekend of September 28-29, 2019, the aircraft roared to life again as a test of the 450hp Wright R-975-11 Whirlwind engine. As can been seen in the video, there’s still much to do on the airplane such as recovering control surfaces, but the engine run marks major progress in the quest to get this aircraft airborne again. To learn more about the history of our BT-15, go here.
