Now It’s A Sonic Boom Town After 7 Years Of Trying, St. Maries Lands A Supersonic Fighter From The Air Force

The spindly Cessnas on the tarmac at St. Maries Airport now rest in the shadow of a beefy cousin: a 1950s Super Sabre fighter-bomber.

After seven years of forms, letters and phone calls, the U.S. Air Force gave the jet to St. Maries last year. Volunteers are nearly done assembling it, and hope to install the non-working jet as a curiosity near the airport next summer.

“St. Maries wants to be first in everything,” said Benewah County Commissioner Jack Buell, who helped ship and assemble the plane.

“We’re really thinking about putting it on a turntable, so when the wind catches it, it’ll turn,” he said Sunday, standing beside the jet. “We’re still trying to figure out where we can put it so it’s legal and so everyone can see it.”

With a little help from former Idaho Sen. Steve Symms, Buell and City Councilman George Currier talked a federal aircraft scrap yard in Tucson, Ariz., into donating the 22,000-pound, 57-foot-long plane.

They’d expected a trainer jet, or a fighter - something a little smaller. Instead, they got the Super Sabre, which otherwise was going to be used for target practice.

Buell bankrolled the three trucks it took to bring the fuselage to St. Maries. He’s reluctant to say how much money he’s sunk into the project.

“Those things are better unknown than known,” he grinned.

The jet arrived last fall in more than a dozen wooden crates. Currier and Buell set about trying to piece the craft together.

Then fate intervened, in the form of a visitor to the tiny airport.

Jim Neufeld saw the old fighter-bomber and wandered over to talk to Buell. Neufeld, of Spokane, is a master sergeant in the Air Force’s 92nd Air Refueling Wing. He also is a former Super Sabre crew chief.

Neufeld offered his help.

The three worked in the cold and rain, sometimes in the snow, for three weekends. Volunteers came out to turn wrenches and gawk. The local telephone company loaned a bucket truck so workers could bolt on the top of the tail. Currier’s now trying to find the appropriate military paint for the plane.

“There’s nothing worse than going to a car show and seeing someone who hasn’t done his own work on his restored car,” said Buell. “When we’re done with this thing, there’s nobody going to pick it apart. We’re doing it right.”

Already, many people have driven out to the airport to see the plane, Currier said.

“In a little community like this, these things take on bigger importance. It adds to the sense of community, and makes us unique,” he said. “We’re proud of what we have in this town.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo