This huge complex with several hangars full of aircraft of all eras, ferries, rockets and missiles is farther from the museum that most tourists know, in the center of the American capital, because on the 50th anniversary, 25 years ago, There was so much controversy that they had to move him to a more remote place.
It is on display at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum based in Chantilly, Virginia, just outside of Washington DC. With a wingspan of 45 meters and covered in polished aluminum that is almost a mirror, the Boeing B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay is for some a symbol of mass destructionBut for others it is the culmination of a heinous war that could have resulted in a million American deaths. It is a sign that it is not just an old artifact: it is the American plane that dropped the first atomic bomb in history exactly 75 years ago in the Japanese city of Hiroshima, caused some 70,000 deaths and started a nuclear race that continues today. What distinguishes it from the rest of the devices is a protective glass, perhaps armored, that prevents objects from being thrown at it from a gangway. Although it seeks to go unnoticed, it appears with its tinny shine, piled between aircraft of the Second World War, and you can almost touch the cabin with your hand, where the black letters with the name of the plane are intact: “ Enola Gay”Like the pilot’s mom. It seems like one more among many, but it is not.