Search This Site
 
Our 1800+ pages and over 1.7 million words are fully indexed and searchable. You can easily find every reference we have to a name, a word, a target, an aircraft a phrase, etc. Enter your search query into the search field at the top of main site pages. The question mark (?) to the right of the site search button will display this help page.

We use FreeFind as our site search engine for several reasons:

  • It meets our budgetary limitations (it is free).
  • The search result pages are easy to understand.
  • Even though FreeFind is supported by advertisements, the few ads on the search result pages are at the top of each page and are unobtrusive.
  • FreeFind performs a complete site index every 24 HOURS. This means that as we make changes to the site, these changes will be reflected in the search results within one day.
  • FreeFind also provides us with a What's New feature. This feature highlights pages that have been recently added or updated. The main link to What's New is on the home page under "Recent Updates"
  • FreeFind provides us with a complete word index. You can browse this index and see how many words we have spelled incorrectly!
  • FreeFind provides us with a fairly decent site map. You can view this site map in either outline or list format.
  • FreeFind provides us with an excellent advanced search, although most users will not need to use the advanced features available.
  • You will find links to all of the above features on each search result page.

To use our site search engine, just type your query term into the search box at the top of any main site page. Only the pages that display menus will contain this search box.  The search box will not appear on pages that "pop-up" as new windows (crew pages, history pages, etc.)

Finding proper names:

  • Some names may not be easily found with normal searching. Names like "O'Leary" or "McDonald" may be appear as "O LEARY" or "MC DONALD." If you are searching for a similar name, or any name that could be spelled as two words rather than one, try entering the name as two words - or just enter the last part of the name. A search for "leary" will lead you to "O'Leary."

Search engine behavior:

  • By default, the site search engine tries to locate pages which have exact matches for ALL of the words entered in your search query. If that fails, it then tries to locate pages which contain ANY words in your search query. In other words, the default behavior is a Boolean "AND" search when more than one word is entered in the query field. This search engine is not case sensitive. You can enter your query in upper case, lower case, or a combination of upper and lower case.
  • The site search will NOT return database records. The database tables incorporate their own specialized search engines.
  • The site search will NOT return message board topics. The message board (forum) includes its own search engine.

You can also use Google to search this site:

However, Google does have one major limitation:

  • Google only indexes the site every 2-3 WEEKS. This means that changes we make to the site will not show up in searches until after the next index operation.