NASA Near-Space Airplane Touches Down in Savannah

A high-flying NASA research plane arrived Wednesday at Hunter Army Airfield to begin a two-month mission of collecting data on East Coast snowstorms. One of NASA’s two Lockheed ER-2 flying laboratories — capable of reaching altitudes of over 68,000 feet — was flown from its base in Palmdale, California to Savannah, touching down at sunset. The advanced aircraft, similar to the Lockheed U-2 spy plane, will be stationed at Hunter through the rest of winter to carry out research for the space agency’s three-year Investigation of Microphysics and Precipitation for Atlantic Coast-Threatening Snowstorms (IMPACTS).