This is a follow up on my interview. Make sure to read that blog post before you read this one, LINK: Capstone #3: The Interview
After my interview was done we walked back downstairs to the level were we checked in. Then we saw some pictures with text and suddenly I felt like I was in a art museum and who I interviewed was my tour guide. What we did next was like I was on a tour, we walked around looking at some pictures, Rudi told me facts about it and told me little stories and fun facts and I must say It was quite interesting. I tried to write down every little detail he was saying and luckily my mom was there to help me. I learned new things about Westchester County Airport and about planes themselves. After we looked at pictures and Rudi told me about them for several minutes we walked into a room, not just a public room but a private one. It said, “Only Authorized people are aloud beyond this point.” We walked in and then we walked through another door and the room was HUGE!
It was a plane hangar. It stored about 4 – 5 planes in it. It was very big, however the planes were private jet, but was still really cool! We walked around the planes and touched different parts of it and Rudi told me facts and stories about these planes, while my mom was trying to write every single little detail down. We walked around the hangar and it was really cool. I have never been in a hangar before. I thought the hangar was cool because it had the supplies that you need to fix a plane, on the side. It had all this equipment and it feels crazy when you actually see it in person instead of watching it on a video. After we walked around inside the hangar, we walked outside the hangar. We walked onto the airport tarmac, that is where planes taxi to the runway and has active planes all day and all night. We walked around and walked up to a big area with loads of small planes. The planes there were about the size or a car, pretty small.
As we approached the small planes Rudi said something, he said “Do you want to go in the plane and see what it’s like??” And of course I said, “YES!!” We walked to a plane that was different then the others, it didn’t have the sun protection screen on it, so all we could do was open the doors and walk in. Well, that is exactly what we did. We opened the doors as we walked into the plane. They had all these advanced computerized screens. It was amazing! We looks around inside the cockpit as Rudi told us facts, how to fly it, how easy it was to fly, and a funny, true story about the plane. After we learned a LOT more, we closed the plane doors then Rudi said, “Want to see a old plane built in 1950 and compare it to that plane we were just in??” And again, I obviously said, “YES!” As we walked quickly down the taxiway to the plane, I finally could be able to see the plane. It looked like the odd one out. As we approached the aircraft I could see how old it was. It had it’s wings over the cockpit and inside the cockpit, there were no computer screens, just old switches and dials, and a car wheel instead of a joystick. It was also very cramped in there! It was really cool to see how technology advanced over the past 67 years. I was amazed by the difference between the 2 aircrafts.
After we saw this cool plane, our time was sadly up. We ran out of time so we had to say goodbye. We had a really fun time for the interview and the site visit. Overall, this site visit helped me a TON in Capstone, I really couldn’t find a better person to teach me all this crazy cool stuff.