18-05-2025
Castle Air Museum hosts Open Cockpit Day on May 24. Here's what you need to know
Open Cockpit Day, an opportunity to learn about the history of U.S. aviation, will be held at Castle Air Museum in Atwater on May 24.
Attendees can get an up-close view of more than 30 aircraft, some of which saw military use from before World War II to modern day.
New this year to the museum is the F-4S Phantom II 'Black Bunny,' a variant of the McDonnell Douglas F-4S Phantom II. First flown in 1969, this aircraft was used for night testing and evaluations of its weapons, radar and navigation systems at the Naval Air Station in Point Mugu.
Painted primarily black, the aircraft has the Playboy magazine emblem on its tail in white. The iconic bunny with a bow tie makes the plane kind of part of American pop culture said Joe Pruzzo, executive director of Castle Air Museum. 'You know that's going to receive a lot of attention.'
The aircraft will be at the northeast end of the museum.
In 2016, the museum inquired with the Navy about obtaining the F-4S variant. It received approval and paid a one-time fee of $65,000 for its use. Pruzzo said it took seven years for the museum to raise the money and for the Navy to demilitarize the plane and prepare it for public view.
Admiral Merchant, a Minnesota-based trucking company, picked up the plane at Pima Air & Space in Tuscon, Ariz., in July 2023. Four highway patrol cruisers surrounded the truck during its drive from Arizona to Atwater.
The aircraft is being refreshed with a paint job at the museum's enclosed restoration facility after being at Davis-Monthan Air Force base in Arizona for more than 30 years. Pruzzo said the museum can keep the aircraft as long as it's kept in stable condition.
Opened to the public in 1981, Castle Air Museum is a nonprofit organization that focuses on preserving military aviation heritage for future generations.
The museum's first Open Cockpit Day was in 1996 with a small gathering. From that point, the number of attendees grew with the help of on-air and print media promotion. At one point, upward of 4,500 people attended the event.
Attendees 'come from the Bay Area, the Monterey Bay area, Sacramento, Fresno, Visalia, and, of course, up in the foothills in the west Valley,' Pruzzo said. 'It's a well-attended event.'
Throughout the museum, volunteers help in various ways. Among them is Alvin Osborn, who served in the Air Force for 26 years. Osborn started in the Reserve Officer Training Corps and later took pilot training.
His most memorable moment in the Air Force was being involved in Operation Arc Light, he said. In June 1965, the Air Force deployed a Boeing B-52 Stratofortress to strike locations in South Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and southern North Vietnam.
Osborn recalled using the bomber to deliver conventional bombs to Southeast Asia for several years. 'It was a challenge for maintenance to keep the airplanes up. It was a challenge for the crews to adapt to that schedule,' he said.
Now as a volunteer, Osborn informs newer generations about the importance of these aircraft and the roles they have served. 'The museum is about the only way that we have now to educate those generations, young and old, that either come here to this country that don't understand how we got where we are or that grew up in this country but were never taught that. And so we find the opportunity here to do that, to teach [and] explain,' Osborn said.
Open Cockpit Day will begin at 9 a.m. Attendees can purchase tickets in front of the museum for $25. For an additional fee, helicopter rides are available.
There will be two entry gates, the first near the front parking lot and the other close to the Castle Air Family Health Centers' parking lot.
