This is just plain wrong! New Air Force Planes Go Directly to 'Boneyard'

[Mr Quatro]

http://www.military.com/daily-news/2013/10/07/new-air-force-planes-go-directly-to-boneyard.html?comp=7000023435630&rank=2


New cargo planes on order for the U.S. Air Force are being delivered straight into storage in the Arizona desert because the military has no use for them, a Dayton Daily News investigation found.

A dozen nearly new C-27J Spartans from Ohio and elsewhere have already been taken out of service and shipped to the so-called boneyard at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson. Five more are expected to be built by April 2014, all of which are headed to the boneyard unless another use for them is found.

The Air Force has spent $567 million on 21 C-27J aircraft since 2007, according to purchasing officials at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Sixteen had been delivered by the end of September.

[Tchocky]

Reminds me of Congress buying tanks that the Army didn't want.

[Tchocky]

And COME ON!

in a headline we say it's "just plane wrong"


:/\\!!

[AVGWarhawk]

I'll take that hammer for $600 and raise a toilet seat for $400.

[Stealhead]

Well most of the stuff at the Boneyard is either there to be broken up or to be stored until needed and they take all useful parts and place them back into service.So the facility as whole is not a waste of money it saves money.I should know I have seen it many times.

The C-27 on the other hand is a waste of money forced upon the military.Another example of pork barrel spending.

[Mr Quatro]

After a little research I guess it's not so wrong. The USAF has a budget and they have decided to retain the old C-130's instead of the new planes.

I can't blame them the C-130 is a great plane: http://www.defensenews.com/article/20120202/DEFREG02/302020007/USAF-Turning-Flexible-Multirole-Aircraft


Donley said the reason the C-27 light turboprop transport will not only be canceled but existing aircraft retired is because the C-130 is more versatile.
“C-27 is another prominent program where we think we have good alternatives,” Donley said. “We have demonstrated the ability of the C-130 to support the direct-support mission.”




As the ground forces shrink, the Air Force will need fewer transport aircraft, so the proposed spending cuts call for the Air Force to retire 27 aging C-5As and 65 of the oldest C-130s, leaving Air Mobility Command with 52 C-5Ms, 318 C-130s and 222 C-17s

[Platapus]

If the aircraft were built in "your" state, it was wasteful, irresponsible pork-barrel spending. Government funding unneeded employment only furthers the "nanny-state" entitlement attitude that is bringing this nation down.

If the aircraft were built in "my" state is was a economically sound program to increase employment and to further manufacturing capabilities. Putting good people to work is good for our nation.

:D

All a matter of perspective. :yep:

[GoldenRivet]

This is not uncommon, airlines do it too.

It doesnt mean the plane is being "thrown away" its just being placed into storage.

generally, the parts that are prone to deterioration from long term storage - such as the engines - are removed from the aircraft and either "pickled" in lubricants meant to serve as preservatives or they are sent to various air bases to be used for either their parts or to be used when other aircraft are in need of new engines.

The airframe itself will sit in the "bone yard". Bone yard is an unfair term because it makes you think of an airplane grave yard or a place where old airplanes go to die, and while this is partly true, a good many of the planes in the bone yard are just waiting their turn to be needed in one capacity or another.

Places like Roswell, New Mexico, or Kingman, Arizona are used for aircraft bone yards because there is virtually zero humidity in these areas, and machines like airplanes can be left almost completely un-tended for very long periods of time without suffering from the various effects of disuse. these areas are also popular locations for large hangars which house the machinery necessary to repaint airliners in their new paint schemes. I have flown a number of large aircraft to Roswell for both purposes (painting and storage)

So in a way this is not wasteful pork barrel spending... this is frugal.

If a major event required hundreds of aircraft to be reactivated it would simply be a matter of a few days maintenance, some leg stretching flights and sending them to their front line assignments.

Hope this cleared up the mud

:salute:

[Stealhead]

This is not uncommon, airlines do it too.

It doesnt mean the plane is being "thrown away" its just being placed into storage.

generally, the parts that are prone to deterioration from long term storage - such as the engines - are removed from the aircraft and either "pickled" in lubricants meant to serve as preservatives or they are sent to various air bases to be used for either their parts or to be used when other aircraft are in need of new engines.

The airframe itself will sit in the "bone yard". Bone yard is an unfair term because it makes you think of an airplane grave yard or a place where old airplanes go to die, and while this is partly true, a good many of the planes in the bone yard are just waiting their turn to be needed in one capacity or another.

Places like Roswell, New Mexico, or Kingman, Arizona are used for aircraft bone yards because there is virtually zero humidity in these areas, and machines like airplanes can be left almost completely un-tended for very long periods of time without suffering from the various effects of disuse. these areas are also popular locations for large hangars which house the machinery necessary to repaint airliners in their new paint schemes. I have flown a number of large aircraft to Roswell for both purposes (painting and storage)

So in a way this is not wasteful pork barrel spending... this is frugal.

If a major event required hundreds of aircraft to be reactivated it would simply be a matter of a few days maintenance, some leg stretching flights and sending them to their front line assignments.

Hope this cleared up the mud

:salute:
I agree with the storage part and already pointed that out.

However it is very far from frugal to have a pork barrel program that forces the military to take on an aircraft that it has no need for just so you can give 500 people in your state a job.

That is the polar opposite of fiscal conservatism.Yet many politicians of both parties do exactly this some of them claiming to be conservatives and I would not be shocked at all to find some that claim to be fiscal conservatives pork barreling it up.It would be like giving out tickets at a NASCAR race for speeding if you went around and chastised every member of Congress that pork barreled maybe one or two do not in any way and being overly generous to say that.

To say that this was frugal is to completely ignore that the planes should never have been constructed in the first place.

Storing aircraft that where placed into service for an actual need and then storing them in a bone yard when it is useful to do so and to also store aircraft for parts collection and to scrap hulks and sell the materials all of that is fiscally sound and can in many cases be frugal.But when the whole shebang was wasteful unneeded spending in the first place the only gain is in fact to store then in a bone yard where they cost less in comparison to having to maintain them outside of a stowed state and really then it is not so much a gain as a lesser drain.

[GoldenRivet]

ebbs and flows of demand.

perhaps when orders were being placed 5-7 years ago that there may have been a more genuine need for the aircraft.

I've been in the airplane business for a long enough time to know that what you do in the 1st quarter to prepare for the 4th quarter could be a completely irrelevant business move by the 3rd quarter.

not that i disagree with pork barrel spending theories. just saying.

[Stealhead]

News flash it is not a theory did you read the article? Seems not in you think that this is all a theory yet it is pure and simple pork barrel.

They nearly got stuck with 16 added to the more despite the fact that they where not going use them and did not need anymore but Congress stopped it.They where going to carry out an new order this was not something planned years ago those Spartans are the ones going to the bone yard.

You obviously did not read below "National defense, or a jobs program?"

[GoldenRivet]

News flash it is not a theory did you read the article? Seems not in you think that this is all a theory yet it is pure and simple pork barrel.

They nearly got stuck with 16 more despite the fact that they where not going use them and did not need anymore but Congress stopped it.That right there was pork barrel because they where forcing the program then it got closed out yet they still sent some C-130s there to pork it up.

You obviously did not read below "National defense, or a jobs program?"

Yes, and I'm not entirely disagreeing with you, I'm just saying there is often more to a news article than meets the eye. Simply offering my point oh two.

I can see you are very passionate about this post.

I will be drinking wine and watching TV and concerning myself with the things I can change.

[Stealhead]

I can see you are very passionate about this post.


:06:
Not really GT is just a way to cure boredom for me.I was just a bit perplexed that you found it fitting to more or less say something to the effect of pork barrel theories.When it says clearly in the article that there was an attempt to pork barrel an extra batch of the planes.


Messing with my car buying old tractors and fixing them up and selling them other hobbies those things I am passionate about.

[Oberon]

This thread needs more Ford 7000s, so I'll fix that.

http://www.cheffins.co.uk/assets/catalogues/lots/106/3263.jpg

[GoldenRivet]

Maybe theories was the wrong choice of word


And the ford there is a beautiful machine

[Wolferz]

Those aircraft are purposely dropped off the radar to be stolen and later employed to haul drugs up from Columbia It's not the first time this has happened and it won't be the last.

Besides, the military is appropriated a yearly budget which they lose the next year if it isn't used.
Built in self perpetuating boondoggle is the way congress does things. It gives them campaign talking points to make promises they never intend to keep.