Geremy Kornreich sent us this series of photos of the aircraft graveyard and storage space at the Davis Montham Air Force Base in Tucson, Arizona which, he says, “is one of the most impressive and saddest places I’ve ever seen.”
“Thousands of aircraft are in various stages of dismantlement, with a small percentage in resurrectable storage,” he reports. “The history, stories, effort, and cost boggle one’s mind. Just look at the dozens of turboprop T-34s, soon to be scrapped.”
“Civilians get a very limited tour, confined to a coach bus,” he continues. “It also surprised me the ground was so grassy and not just sand. There are multiple other local sites, including for civilian airliners. I strongly recommend the Pima Air Museum if you visit.”
Politics aside, the bureaucracy seems hell-bent on destroying logic, no matter the subject. How many of us pilots would pay a premium for something like a T-34C? The federal coffers would be buffed up and at what possible risk? Someone, someplace in the system must be capable of a rational decision that would benefit all and not simply destroy these valuable and historic airplanes!
I saw some T-41, Mescalaro, Cessna 172’s parked at the boneyard. Possibly these could be sold to Oshkosh, Young Eagles, Middle age Eagles, and the CAP as project planes. I saw some Cessna Sky Master, Bird Dogs parked at the boneyard. What a waste of good airplanes. Put them up for sale, and register the planes in the US, for US citizens only. Only for sale in US and to be used here as trainers and training. Possibly have some kind of Route 66, ‘Airplane Man’ Area 55 and a Half, Oshkosh West, where folks could buy, sell, trade, and work on their airplanes. Away from main airports. Oshkosh West. Bring your camper and tools. 1000’s of interested folks, EAA membership roles available. EAA-FAA branch office on site. Tens of 1000’s of parts. Computer linked to all flying schools. Full facilities available. Take 20 to 50 acres of available nearby desert, and make a National Park, National Monument for people working on airplanes. ‘You will need your drivers license, and social security card. Possibly your FAA license. You will need to register and apply for a buyer, seller, vendor, builder, restorers, license and ticket. Just like a hunting license. Equipment and material must stay in US. All sales computer listed. The EAA, Trade-a-Plane, FAA, Tens of 1000’s EAA members, Aviation Week and Space Technology. The Boneyard National Park and Air, Military, Air and Space Museum, and 1,000,000 people who like to work on airplanes. Bring your camper. Facilities available. Best time of year – fall, winter and spring. Truck and Train transport available to Oshkosh. Must be US Citizen, have aviation interest and registered National Aviation Park member. ALL available ‘on-line’ ????? No drugs or homeless’???? Work with aircraft until your hearts content. The US National Park of Airplane development, work and operation. ‘On Line linked nation wide. Safe aircraft flyable nation wide. ALL aviation interest available. Happy Landings. How did you guys do that?
One of the best ideas of the century. Best way to start in my opinion is to have every EAA and AOPA member send a message to her/his congress person asking for sponsorship of a bill to encourage the Pentagon/USAF/FAA to set up the unfortunately necessary bureaucracy to do the bookwork and collection of funds for aircraft sales – limited to civilian type aircraft.
This would be a big boost to civilian aviation and even be a small source of revenue for the government.
And even if it allows a Bin Laden riding an old usaf Learjet, it still a respectable amount of money that return to the budget and didn’t have to come out of the taxpayers pockets.
I fully understand to protect anything that can be returned to a military use, but civilian planes, please!!!!
Paul, like Trump your rant was wrong ! It was Canadian Uranium, not yours.
The small sale was blessed by the Republicans.
Everyone to date made good points, except for angry Mr. Soapbox. Save your political rants so we can talk about the airplanes themselves.
I flew a T-34B for $30 bucks wet in one of the oldest flying clubs in the Navy back in 1985. The club was the NADC Flying Club at Warminter PA. Loved flying the B into some of the small air strips that were North of Philadelphia!
I flew T-34B out of Japan in the mid 70’s. They are wonderful planes to fly, and I used to fly into small Japanese airports also. Great plane, and sad to see them turned into beer cans….
It is a sad picture indeed. Rather than chop them up for pennies why not sell them to civilians and pocket the greater revenue. Trump is business profit motivated. Congress doesn’t know squat. A bunch of boneheads looking to keep their seats so they can continue feeding at the public trough. So what if one or more of these airplanes end up in the hands of some foreign potentate after being traded off by its original American buyer. Who cares. They already get their hands on our latest tech without having to work that hard to get it. Just make a “”donation” (read kickback) to someone like Bill and Hillary Clinton who will sell the USA down the river in a heartbeat for money as crooked Hillary did with our Uranium ore as if it were hers. The NOKs and Iranians have our ICBM guidance tech now as a gift from Bill Clinton for donations by Chinese to his campaign back in the day. Oh but let’s spend millions of taxpayer’s dollars to find some insignificant dirt on someone who worked with Trump once and met a Russian somewhere in the outback.
Paul, You are an idiot.
I think got GA News and Fox News mixed up… 🙂
No, You’re the idiot, refusing to see what’s in front of your face!
So true on everything you said!!
Stop breaking the pill in half, take the WHOLE thing tomorrow, OK?
Paul, you did some real in depth thinking and still came to an ignorant conclusion.Trump would be proud of you
You don’t know what you are talking about. North Korea got their missile tech from the Chinese and their nuke tech from a rogue Pakistani. As for your political rant why don’t you go fly somewhere to find someone who cares. Besides that you’re an idiot.
A few years ago when the last piston T-34s were scrapped, they went for $0.50/pound. However, they could only be sold to authorized scappers. It was required to chop them up into a designated small piece size, on site. I own a T-34B and fortunately we seem to have reasonably good parts availability, but what a waste!
The bottom line is, these parked aircraft belong to us! We paid for them through tax money and this business of denying purchase because of a bonehead bureaucrat needs to stop.
Now would be a good time to reverse that rule when the government could turn these airplanes into additional revenue.
I asked about the possibility of getting one of the T-34s when they were scrapped last time I was at the boneyard for a work project. Apparently they will no longer sell any of the former military aircraft even if they cannot carry ordinance since the incident a few years a go in which one of bin Laden’s sons got a former USAF Learjet. It had been through at least one other owner before it got to him but congress threw a fit and now the DOD won’t let any of the aircraft in the boneyard go intact.
Didn’t know about the bin Laden son incident! I was just hoping for an old Bird Dog!
Yes I really wanted one of the T-34Cs I probably would go broke trying to overhaul and feed the turboprop but the performance of the C model was just awesome. They do need new wing spars which wouldn’t be cheap but they should be able to be refurbished. What I would like to see some one do is create a company to overhaul them and certify them with an IO-550 in place of the turboprop to reduce the operating cost. The performance would still be great and the range would be ridiculous because of the very large tanks that were installed to feed the PT6
The old Bird Dog’s were left in Vietnam, with the exception for a few that were used for training.
When I see pics like these, I wonder why does the military buy these airplanes and then park them. Not all are old, worn out or unneeded. I understand that budget constraints sometimes put perfectly good airplanes here but … there seems to be TOO many good airplanes meeting their demise.
I, too, strongly recommend the Pima Air Museum to anyone interested in airplanes. As I understand it, the Museum has first choice at any airplanes brought to the storage facility.
A lot of these airplanes ARE worn out… Or more correctly, the aluminum in the airframes have enough hours (loading cycles) that they suffer fatigue failures. The failures may start out as cracks in the metal but in some cases they can result in wings falling off. The Beech T34B is a prime example that received a lot of press. Recurring inspections, reinforcing or replacing the wings is very time consuming and costly.
Totally unrealistic, for sure, but wouldn’t it be nice if each person who toured got a free turboprop T-34 at the end of the tour (just like in Hershey, PA when you get a free chocolate bar at the end of the Hershey factory tour?)
One can dream of course.