Berlin Airlift plane draws crowds, elicits memories at air show

A piece of post-World War II history captivated crowds at the Shop ‘n Save Westmoreland Airshow as a DC-54 four-engine cargo plane was among the attractions.

The Douglas DC-54 helped hundreds of thousands of Berliners stay alive through a Soviet blockade of their city in 1948-49.

“The challenge to flying the DC-54 is trying to make a 1945 airplane work in 2024 with all of the regulations and the demands of the modern air traffic control system,” said Tim Chopp, the pilot for the DC-54 a native of Amwell, Washington Township.

The plane, owned by the nonprofit Berlin Airlift Historical Foundation of Farmingdale, N.J., travels to several air shows a year and provides educational tours for youngsters, said Matthew Chopp of Amwell, the plane’s maintenance coordinator and son of Tim Chopp.

The plane carried a cargo of coal, food and mail that kept people in war-torn Berlin from starving in the former German capital that had been divided into sectors by victorious Britain, United States, France and the Soviet Union. The Berlin Airlift became a necessity from June 1948 to May 1949, when Soviet leader Josef Stalin cut off land access to the former German capital deep inside the Soviet Union-controlled part of Germany.

One of those checking out the museum and exhibits was Douglas Armbrust, 51, a pilot from Southwest Greensburg, who has a special connection to the World War II-era planes.

His late father, Robert L. Armbrust, was a flight engineer in the Air Force during the Korean War, which began in June 1950, about a year after the end of the Soviet blockade of Berlin. Armbrust said his father flew night missions over Korea in a Douglas A-26. Like so many other veterans, Robert Armbrust did not talk about the missions he went on during the Korean War, but kept details in a stored in a container that Douglas Armbrust said he recently found, about two years after his father’s death in July 2022.

“It’s something to be proud of. Your dad served in the Air Force,” Armbrust said.

For the Chopps and the Armbrusts, the air show event holds a special place in their lives.

Tim Chopp said he flew a plane into the 1974 air show at the time when the current airport terminal had just opened.

Armbrust said he and his father would come to the air shows in the 1980s and his father enjoyed himself. He learned to fly at 16, before he even got his driver’s license.

“I followed in my dad’s footsteps,” Armbrust said.

The air show drew an estimated 35,000 people on a sunny Saturday afternoon, but the attendance dropped to 25,000 on a cloudy, yet dry Sunday afternoon, said Gabe Monzo, longtime Westmoreland County Airport Authority executive director who celebrated his 30th air show this weekend.

A few acts Sunday were canceled for various reasons, including mechanical issues, but the main performance of the F-35A fighter jet closed the show with ear-splitting noise as it sped above the airport, doing maneuvers and spins over the surrounding countryside. When it went into the clouds, the only way to know a fighter jet was in the vicinity was its sound.

“It went off without an incident,” Dwayne Pickels, grants writer for the airport authority, said of the show.