V-2 Rocket on Display at the
White Sands Missile Range Museum

     Top left, is a photo of a "Vergeltungswaffe 2" or V-2 being launched from Peenemünde, Germany in the early 1940s.  The V-2 Rocket you see top right, had stood in that location, in front of the headquarters building, for about 50 years.  The sun, rain, sand storms, etc. over those years had caused it to deteriorate significantly.  It was removed from its pedestal on September 12, 2002 and taken to the laboratories of The Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center in Hutchinson, Kansas for a complete refurbishment.  It returned in early May 2004 and is on display in a specially designed shelter at the edge of the Missile Park. 
     The paint scheme was changed from white and black to yellow and black, to match the color of the first V-2 fired at White Sands Proving Ground on April 16, 1946.   The lower photo shows the refurbished V-2 arriving back at White Sands from Kansas in early May 2004.