The historic 307 Stratoliner airplane that crashed into Elliott Bay in March will fly again. Boeing recently announced it will repair the airplane to the condition it was in when initial restoration was completed by company employees and volunteers last year.

The repair team determined the airplane suffered only secondary structural damage. The 1940-vintage Clipper Flying Cloud has been part of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum collection since 1972 and is slated for display at the museum's new northern Virginia companion facility, the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. The repair effort involves cleaning, repairing and reinstalling parts, and Boeing officials decided to repair it to flight-worthy shape in Puget Sound during the summer of 2003, rather than transporting it to the Washington, D.C., area.