For the second year in a row, a Red River College alum has been hand-picked to join Air Force One’s Detailing Team, whose members will spend the next week restoring a fleet of historic aircraft on display at Seattle’s Museum of Flight.
Crisanto Aquino, a 2004 Manufacturing Technician grad now working at Dr. Shine Auto Spa in Winnipeg, is the only Canadian detailer to be selected for the task — by no less an expert than the man who’s overseen Air Force One’s restoration efforts for the last 16 years.
“He’s perfected his skill at cleaning and polishing paint and metal,” says U.S. detailer Renny Doyle of Aquino.
“When I chose him for the team last year, I was confident he was qualified for the job. After a year on the team, he’s proven he has the experience needed to continue our work, and he has the leadership skills to help us coordinate new team members and show them the ropes.”
Each year, a team of detailers from Canada, the Caribbean and the U.S. is selected to restore, maintain and protect Air Force One — which served as a flying Oval Office for former U.S. presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard Nixon — and more than a dozen other historic aircraft, including the first-ever Boeing 747, the Concorde Alpha Golf and the first Boeing 727-022 commercial airliner.
Recent additions to the fleet — currently on exhibit at the museum’s Airpark Pavilion — include a solid aluminium WWII B-29 Super Fortress bomber and a badly deteriorating Vietnam-era B-52G Stratofortress bomber.
All told, Aquino will spend eight days working on the aircraft under Doyle’s direction.
“I am just as excited about being chosen for the team … but I think I bring more to the table this year than last,” he says. “It is an honour to be stewards and caretakers for all these iconic aircraft — especially Air Force One.”
Doyle and his team were first tapped to restore Air Force One in 2003, when a Bush administration exec learned of his expertise restoring classic cars. Though it no longer sits on an open tarmac, the jet still requires a cleaning every year, as the open-air pavilion where it’s displayed leaves it exposed to dampness and cold that causes paint and brightwork to become cloudy.
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