The massive, historic north hangar at the long-shuttered Tustin Marine Corps Air Station wasn’t the only World War II-era relic demolished last month. In nearby Irvine in mid-November, a demolition crew tore down an old hangar that once stood at the Great Park — along with a rare World War II-era aircraft it housed.
This demolition was vastly quieter than the fire that destroyed the Tustin structure, and the news came as a surprise to Tom O’Hara, a retired U.S. Marine previously employed by the city to head efforts to bring an aviation museum to the Great Park, which stands on what was once the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station.
“The whole military community, the aviation community, is sort of stunned by this,” said O’Hara.
O’Hara and an aircraft restoration team hired by the city spent nearly five years restoring the plane, a 1943 Lockheed PV-1 Ventura — severely damaged during Hurricane Katrina — after it arrived from New Orleans in the summer of 2008.
It was the Great Park’s first vintage plane, and while it’s unknown if this particular plane ever flew out of El Toro, the PV-1 was a fixture on the base during the war. Standing 52 feet long and 12 feet wide with a 65-foot wingspan, the PV-1 was the first stealth aircraft used by the Marine Corps, O’Hara said. It’s a relatively rare plane, with only 3,000 sold worldwide.
But this one was scrapped during a planned demolition of the hangar in mid-November, part of the city’s plans to clear the Great Park of old buildings and structures for a transformation of the park.
The PV-1 was donated to Irvine by Aviator Underwriters of Dallas in 2008. Back then, staff estimated costs to transport and restore the aircraft at $70,000. The Great Park budget then had $500,000 planned to find and restore aircraft, and $250,000 budgeted for maintenance in general.
At that time, Irvine was pursuing plans to open a Museum of Heritage and Aviation and looking for planes and artifacts to showcase,…
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