Donates Record-Setting Plane To NASM

For any other aircraft, a flight from Kansas to Washington, DC would be a cross-country trek; for adventurer Steve Fossett and the Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer, however, Tuesday's flight from Salina seems little more than a regional jaunt for a $100 hamburger... but it was likely the last time the record-setting aircraft will soar through the sky.

"We had a wonderful time in Salina," said the millionaire adventurer, who used Kansas State University's aviation school as the base for several flights -- including Fossett's first round-the-world flight in 2005 and, most recently, the closed-circuit-record flight in March. His second round-the-world flight -- to set the longest flight distance without refueling record -- took off from Florida's Kennedy Space Center, and landed in Bournemouth, England.

"This will be the final flight of the GlobalFlyer," Fossett said Tuesday. "It's had a long, successful run over two years."

The Associated Press reports Fossett plans to donate the Globalflyer to the National Air and Space Museum's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, near Washington's Dulles International Airport. The Burt Rutan-designed airplane is too be displayed in the Boeing Aviation Hangar... appropriately, hanging in the air.

The aircraft's record-setting Williams turbofan engine will be displayed underneath the GlobalFlyer, at ground level.

Not content to rest on his laurels, Fossett is also reportedly planning yet another record-setting aerial jaunt. While he declined to list specifics, the AP reports Fossett alluded to an attempt to fly a glider into the stratosphere, which begins nine miles above the earth.

FMI: www.nasm.si.edu