How many C-69 Constellations survive today?

The C-69 was the military transport version of the Constellation. After Pearl Harbor, the US government requisitioned the aircraft TWA and Pan American had on order and planned hundreds of examples in various versions, but reality turned out far more modest: by the end of the war only 22 C-69s had been built, seven of which were never delivered. Of all the planned variants, for instance, only one C-69C was ever made.

Except for the C-69C, all the C-69s were declared surplus and sold on the civilian market between 1946 and 1947. Lockheed converted them into L-049 passenger aircraft, the Constellation's first commercial version, so most of the military transports ended up flying in airline colors. The XC-69 prototype itself had a singular life: converted into the XC-69E to test Pratt & Whitney R-2800 engines, it passed through Hughes Tool Company and, back at Lockheed, was stretched to serve as the prototype for the L-1049 Super Constellation.

Of that entire production run, only one former C-69 remains. It is the L-049 registered N90831, construction number 1970, which left the factory as the C-69 with serial number 42-94549 and was one of the first aircraft operated by Trans World Airlines. Today it is displayed outdoors, in a row of airliners, at the Pima Air and Space Museum in Tucson, Arizona, painted in full TWA livery. It is therefore both the last witness of the wartime military Constellation and one of the first Constellations to carry passengers.