Following the premier of the film Top Gun: Maverick in 2022, the Palm Springs Air Museum has been hosting the famous “Darkstar” movie prop, but since May of this year, the museum has also been working to reassemble a Boeing F/A-18E Super Hornet used in the filming of the popular action film, and also become the first museum on the U.S. West Coast to permanently display an early example of the U.S. Navy’s premier multirole fighter, which served not only as a filming aircraft in the making of Top Gun: Maverick, but which has also had a long career as both a testing and evaluation aircraft and as one of the first Super Hornets to be flown by the legendary Blue Angels.
The Palm Springs Air Museum’s new F/A-18E Super Hornet, Bureau Number 165536, was the ninth production model Super Hornet to be manufactured at the McDonnell-Douglas (now Boeing) plant in St. Louis, Missouri, as construction number 1471/E009. On being delivered to the US Navy, BuNo 165536 was assigned to Air Test and Evaluation Squadron 23 (VX-23) “Salty Dogs” at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland, and then to Air Test and Evaluation Squadron 31 (VX-31) “Dust Devils” at Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, California as fuselage code DD-200. Under these two squadrons, BuNo 165536 was not only used to test the performance of the F/A-18E Super Hornet but was also used as a chase plane during the testing and development of the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II.
In 2019 and 2020, F/A-18Es and Fs from VX-31 were employed in the production of Top Gun: Maverick, where BuNo 165536 flew alongside BuNo 165667, both aircraft painted in special schemes to reflect the aircraft flown in the film by the characters Pete “Maverick” Mitchell and Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw. While some aerial photography was done with these and other Super Hornets at China Lake, more aerial sequences were shot out of NAS North Island in San Diego, with BuNo 165536 and BuNo 165667 also being mounted with special cameras to capture the motions of the Navy pilots flying these fighters and conducting close formation with Czech-built Aero L-39 Albatros jet trainers fitted with gimbal-mounted cameras.
Around the time principal photography came to a wrap in 2020, the U.S. Navy Flight Demonstration Squadron, better known around the world as the Blue Angels, was phasing out their legacy Hornets (namely the F/A-18A and C models) for the F/A-18E Super Hornets. BuNo 165536 was delivered to the Blue Angels at NAS Pensacola, Florida, on Jul 27, 2020, and made the #5 aircraft in time for the team’s 2021 season. BuNo 165536 up until the Blue Angels’ 2024 season before being selected for retirement and placed in the inventory of the National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola. By 2026, the Palm Springs Air Museum, a long-time affiliate of the NNAM, finalized an agreement that would place BuNo 165536 on long-term loan to the Palm Springs Air Museum, leading to the aircraft being trucked to the museum in May 2026. As of writing, there is only one other Super Hornet on display, F/A-18E BuNo 165164, the first-ever Super Hornet built, which was placed on display at the National Museum of Transportation in St. Louis, being officially dedicated on August 3, 2024.
