Who said flying saucers don't exist? The Avrocar was the result of a Canadian effort to develop a supersonic, VTOL fighter-bomber in the early 1950s. This is one of two scaled down test vehicles using the exhaust from turbojet engines to drive a circular "turborotor" which produced downward thrust for takeoff and landing, directed rearward for level flight. Severe instability above three feet high dogged the program at NASA's Ames Research Center and a speed of only 35 mph was attained before the project was abandoned in 1961. After storage at Silver Hill, MD it went on show at NMUSAF in 2008

When the US Air Force visited Avro Canada in 1953 to look at the all weather CF-100 fighter, a "special projects group" showed them plans for a circular disk-shaped aircraft known as Project Y-2. The USAF agreed to fund the project that resulted in two Avrocar test vehicles. Control problems with the aircraft out of ground effect couldn't be overcome and the project was cancelled in 1961. Pictured is the first Avrocar (58-7055 ) that went to the Air Force. The second (59-4975) is in the collection of the US Army Aviation Museum.