Museum of Mountain Flying: Montana's Airplane, a DC-3 (photo diary)

by Ojibwa for Kossack Air Force

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Friday, Mar. 06, 2026 Friday, Mar. 06, 2026 at 7:15:02am PST

Smokejumpers—firefighters who jump out of airplanes to fight forest fires—are an important part of Montana’s airplane history. In 1946, Bob Johnson, a Montana aviation pioneer, purchased DC-3/C-47 NC24320 which was used to drop smokejumpers into remote fires. In 1949, the airplane dropped 15 smokejumpers into the Mann Gulch Fire. In one of the deadliest tragedies in smokejumper history, 12 of the 15 were killed.

In 1954, the DC-3 ditched in the Monongahela River, killing nine servicemen and the pilot. Johnson Flying
Service pulled the plane out of the river, repaired it, and flew it for another 20 years.

In 2018, the DC-3 was christened as Miss Montana and restored by volunteers. Today Miss Montana, which has been proclaimed as Montana’s Airplane, is in the Museum of Mountain Flying in Missoula, Montana.