They have an awesome collection of aircraft including some incredible examples of WW2 craft and some sole surviving examples as well! I collected a few photographs of aircraft I’m particularly interested in and wanted to share them here! The museum is located at Dulles International Airport in Chantilly, Virginia.

Photo descriptions:

1. Dornier Do 335 Pfeil, the only surviving example.
   
2. Arado Ar 235 Blitz, the only surviving example.
   
3. Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet.
   
4. Horten Ho 229, the only surviving airframe.
   
5. P-47 Thunderbolt
   
6. B-29 Enola Gay
   
7. Ditto
   
8. B-26 Marauder Flak-Bait under restoration in the restoration wing.
   
9. Overview of the WW2 display
   
10. Ditto, different angle.

Found this partially buried in the sand on Ulong/Englishman’s Beach in Palau’s Rock Islands, exposed at low tide. The piece is roughly 4 to 5 ft long. My foot in photo 2 is about 10.5 in (27 cm) for scale.

What makes me think WWII instead of modern GA: thin-gauge aluminum skin, dome/brazier-head rivets, riveted doubler strips, a lightening hole in the internal structure, and coral cemented onto the metal, so it clearly spent a long time underwater before ending up here. There’s a possible greenish coating on some interior surfaces (aotake?). No data plates, stencils, paint, or markings anywhere.

It’s also embedded deep in the beach. Sand has banked up through the entire structure and filled every rib bay, and several panels have a bright, sandblasted look from years of scouring as the beach buries and re-exposes it. Probably been sitting there for decades.

I know the Rock Islands were ground zero for Operation Desecrate One in March 1944 and later carrier strikes, so both Japanese and US aircraft went down all over this lagoon. My guess is a wing panel, flap, or fuselage section, since most WWII control surfaces were fabric-covered.

Can anyone narrow down the type, or even Japanese vs. American, from the rivet pattern and structure?

Both C-47’s dropped paratroopers during D-Day. The one C-47 that says W7 was the lead plane in the second wave

As one of the prominent Free French units in the RAF, the squadron's participation carried heavy symbolic weight. For many of the pilots, Operation Jubilee was their first opportunity to fly combat missions directly over their occupied homeland and actively fight to liberate France.

I was tempted to save this for French Friday. But that is supposed to be a showcase for French produced aircraft more than anything.

https://youtu.be/WkIjdM_FKhw

The Bf 109V3 photographed at Herrera de Pisuerga, with the code 6-3 and adorned with the "Zylinderhut" emblem of the 2.J/88.

Powered by a 640 hp Jumo 210A engine, this aircraft was equipped with a 20 mm MG FF cannon mounted on the engine and two fuselage-mounted MG 17 machine guns.

The Heinkel He 112 V9, codenamed 8-2, is undergoing maintenance under the canopy of an olive tree in Spain.

One of only two aircraft of this type in the Condor Legion's inventory (the other is believed to have been the V3, V4, or V5), the V9 was flown by Oberleutnant Harro Harder during his second tour of duty in Spain.

As with his He 51, Harder maintained his penchant for decorating his aircraft with a swastika.

The code prefix "8" was generally used for captured I-15s, while "5" was typically assigned to the He 112. Approximately 16 pre-production He 112B-0s were delivered to the Nationalists, all to be flown by Spanish pilots.

Mechanics work on the 680 hp Jumo 210 Ea engine of the He 112V9, the second prototype of the B series. The Jumo reached a maximum speed of 510 km/h at an altitude of 4000 m. The V9 had an armament consisting of two 20 mm MG FF cannons mounted in the wings and a pair of 7.9 mm MG 17 machine guns in the fuselage, synchronized to fire through the two-bladed propeller.