LIMESTONE, Maine – A bill that would have made a museum the owner of a crumbling, historic hangar at the former Loring Air Force Base failed in the Legislature Tuesday after conflicting votes by the Maine Senate and House of Representatives.
The bill, LD 1998, would have transferred ownership of the arch hangar from the Loring Development Authority to the Loring Air Museum. The 75-year-old hangar has not received major structural upgrades in 20 years. Its latex roof began sliding down the arch earlier this year, causing snow to soak through the insulated core and into the concrete ceiling. That makes the historic structure vulnerable to future damage.
“[The roof] has slid all the way down now,” said Cuppy Johndro, a volunteer member of Loring Air Museum.
The hangar is at the center of a conflict between the museum, which wants to preserve the huge structure and display historic aircraft in it, and developers who see it as a potential business asset. Its future remains uncertain after the House voted against the bill, contradicting an earlier vote from the Senate to pass the bill.
If both legislative chambers disagree continuously a bill cannot advance.
LD 1998, sponsored by Sen. Troy Jackson, D-Allagash, would have required the Loring Development Authority to submit a written report to the Legislature by March 1, 2025 on whether they expect the Federal Aviation Administration to approve the authority’s master plan to designate Loring Airfield a public airport.
The bill would have transferred the arch hangar to Loring Air Museum after June 1, 2025 if the FAA did not approve the airport master plan. In that plan, the arch hangar wouldn’t receive repairs until after Loring Development Authority creates a five-year capital improvement plan, said President & CEO Jonathan Judkins in February.
At a public hearing in January, officials from developer Green 4 Maine, which acquired part of the former base last year but does not own the airfield, said that keeping the arch hangar is crucial for future aerospace and aviation businesses.
Green 4 Maine President Scott Hinkel said the hangar would be ideal for HyperSpace Propulsion, a Portland-based company that wants to use Loring as a production facility and test launch site for its low-orbit “spaceplane.”
Hinkel and Judkins were not immediately available for comment Tuesday.
Johndro said that Loring Air Museum still plans to pursue a declaration from the National Register of Historic Places for the arch hangar, which could qualify the building for restoration grants regardless of who owns it.
The museum had originally started pursuing that declaration in 2015 but later stopped in hopes that a permanent business could use the arch hangar. Since that has not happened, the museum had wanted to expand its exhibition space, display historic military aircraft and promote the hangar as a major tourist attraction.
Next year, the museum hopes to introduce another bill to transfer ownership of the arch hangar, Johndro said.
“We never wanted to intrude on anybody else’s plans for the hangar. Our plan has been in the works,” Johndro said. “If the hangar is so crucial to [Loring’s] plans, why is it not the first building in line to be fixed?”
