Soon, visitors to the Pima Air & Space Museum will be able to enjoy a sit-down meal at the museum's new restaurant.
As part of a $2.25 million expansion, the museum at 6000 E. Valencia Road is finally getting an eatery, though no company is yet contracted to run it.
"(The expansion) provides a number of improvements that will benefit our visitors and our corporate clients," said Yvonne Morris, executive director of the Arizona Aerospace Foundation, the governing arm of the museum.
"The new restaurant is something that our visitors have been asking for for a number of years."
The expansion, which will add 20,000 square feet of indoor exhibit space to the museum's 170,000 square feet, is expected to be complete in August or September. Currently, the museum's small snack bar is closed due to construction.
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The expansion will be attached to the Spirit of Freedom Hangar and feature a Grumman F-14A Tomcat - the same type of aircraft featured in "Top Gun."
The new space will also be used for events - groups pay to use the museum's facilities for banquets and other special occasions.
Some of the aircraft expected to be included in the new exhibit:
• A Lockheed T-33 Shooting Star once owned by Howard Hughes and used in the Cold War romance "Jet Pilot."
• A Bell UH-1H Huey helicopter flown in Vietnam, made famous in "Apocalypse Now."
• A former USAF Thunderbirds F-4E Phantom II.
• An A-10 Warthog cockpit section recently used in the movie "Terminator Salvation."
• A Canadair Mark V Sabre that will be suspended in a mock dogfight with a MiG-15 Fagot.
The restaurant will seat about 100 people inside and 50 on the patio.
"We have not decided who will operate the restaurant yet, but we are interested in hearing from companies who might be interested," Morris said via e-mail. She expects it to serve American cuisine.
Plans for the expansion have been in place since 2006, when the Spirit of Freedom Hangar was built. The expansion project was put on hold due to lack of funds. Now it is being funded by admission sales from the museum's 145,000 to 150,000 visitors a year as well as general donations, most from members of the museum.
The new exhibit space is currently called the Hangar 1 Expansion Project, but the museum is hoping a donor will step forward to be its namesake.
Melody Bartholomew is a University of Arizona journalism student apprenticing at the Star. Contact her at starapprentice@azstarnet.com or at 807-7776