Chevrolet Restores Sinkhole Corvette
The 1 millionth Corvette has returned to the National Corvette Museum. Chevrolet pledged to restore the white 1992 convertible after being damaged when a sinkhole opened under the the museum on February 12, 2014. The employees that originally built the car signed a different part of the car during assembly and now after four months and 1,200 man-hours of painstaking restoration work, the car has been returned in pristine condition. Only two signed components couldn’t be saved, so the restoration team had the autographs scanned, reproduced as transfers and placed on the replacement parts. One component with a single signature from Bowling Green Assembly employee Angela Lamb was too damaged to save or even accurately scan for her autograph. Chevrolet worked with the National Corvette Museum to secure a new signature from Lamb on the replacement part, so the 1-millionth Corvette will be historically accurate down to the last signature.
The 1 millionth Corvette is the second sinkhole-damaged Corvette that Chevrolet has restored. The first, a 2009 Corvette ZR1 prototype known as the Blue Devil, was only lightly damaged and was returned to its original condition last fall. The National Corvette Museum will oversee the restoration of a third car, a 1962 Corvette. The other five Corvettes swallowed by the sinkhole will remain in their as-recovered state to preserve the historical significance of the cars. They will become part of a future sinkhole-themed display at the museum.
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