5 October 2023
WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) — The popular Pull a Plane event scheduled for Saturday in Wichita has been postponed.
The fundraising event for the WSU Tech Foundation and Doc’s Friends involves people seeing how quickly they can pulled the B-29 Doc across a line.
But Doc will not be in Wichita in time for the event to be set up.
The historic warbird has been on a 26-day tour in Utah, California and Arizona. While on the last stop of the tour, a maintenance condition came up and the maintenance team has kept Doc grounded in Tucson.
“Following a routine flight operation last Saturday in Tucson, a condition found with the propeller on the no. 2 engine led to a decision by our director of maintenance Donnie Obreiter to remove and inspect the propeller,” Josh Wells, B-29 Doc executive director, said in a news release. “Upon further inspection, it was determined that the propeller needed to be sent to Doc’s propeller services vendor for further inspection and repair.”
The B-29 Doc team hopes to have the plane back in Wichita on Friday. But Wells says that will not be enough time for the event team to successfully setup and “prepare for the world-class Pull a Plane event.”
“We fully support the B-29 Doc team and their commitment to the safe operation of Wichita’s most historic aviation treasure,” Dr. Sheree Utash, WSU Tech president, said. “While we are certainly disappointed we will not be able to host the Pull a Plane event this weekend, the decision to postpone was made because of the need to ensure the B-29 Doc maintenance team and flight crew can focus on the safe return of the aircraft to Wichita. We look forward to hosting the event in the spring of 2024 and the opportunity to celebrate our WSU Tech students, the WSU Tech mission and of course, the mission of B-29 Doc.”
The event sponsors and team captains have been notified. All money committed and raised for Pull a Plane will be held and moved forward into 2024 for the new date — March 9.
Another weekend event at the B-29 Doc Hangar, Education and Visitors Center will go on as scheduled. The hangar is hosting the B-25 Miss Mitchell while it is in Wichita to provide an up-close look and experience with another historic World War II aircraft. Miss Mitchell is operated by the Minnesota Wing of the Commemorative Air Force (CAF) and will be hosted by the B-29 Doc team at the hangar in Wichita from now through Sunday, for rides and ground tours.
When B-29 Doc arrives back in Wichita, it will join B-25 Miss Mitchell in the hangar, however Doc’s scheduled ride flights for Sunday have been canceled due to aircraft maintenance.
More information about B-25 Miss Mitchell ride flights can be found online at cafmn.org. Information about Pull and Plane and further opportunities to donate and participate in the event in 2024 can be found at pullaplane.com.