@@albertandrews130 welp, even as they did that, Iran has reversed engineered them and now make their own parts and have upgraded them to modern standards, so that effort was a fail on that part, so with that news, I honestly do hope some tomcats get restored for Air Shows
Are we sure they've been really been destroyed? or are they sitting in some out of the way hangar in Tonopah or Nellis that has better security than the boneyard.
I swear I get pissed seeing tomcats sitting in a boneyard collecting dust, theres only one place that plane is meant to be and its flying 1500 mph in the sky.
I agree. As a former plane captain (ground crew) of a old F14 squadron that was based at NAS Miramar, it is sad to see it there, and despite what the proponents of the newest aircraft, The F14 Tomcat is one of the best aircraft, that cannot only outfly most modern jets, it is also a great "vampire", aka anti ship, and anti aircraft weapons system that can not only launch the Phoenix missile, but can track up to 24 targets at a time, with a look and shoot capability as well. I like to see if the current proponents of the newest planes try to counteract that point, even with threats from China and Russia with their capacity, thanks to traitors like Bill and Hillary Clinton.
@@contraststriker8198 Might have used it for the new Top Gun movie. Glad to see they still have complete Tomcats around. There are still dozens in museums.
I have been directly involved in regenerating 10 KC-135A aircraft from the bone yard which are now flying as KC-135R tankers supporting our allies in three different foreign countries. Most of these aircraft are kept in a flyable state and can be readied to fly upon notice from DOD. Great job AMARG
i don't know what foreign countries your talking about but here over in england we have tones of those kc-135R at raf mildenhall its cool to know that maybe some of the planes i see at mildenhall once was at the boneyard collecting dust
So many beautiful aircraft. Sad to see them sitting. I love the F-4's, F-14's, F-15's ad B-1B's. But like all faithful soldiers, they have served our country well, and have been retired with honor. With that I Salute Them...
Yeah all of them retired with honor except the F14. Politics (Dick Cheney) ruined that aircrafts future. Far from honor and sad. The F14 could have been upgraded just like what they’re doing to to F15’s today.
@@SpeedDemon88X Well, I know nothing about LI cilture, so I can't speak to that at all. But, I read a long time ago that the Navy loved the F-14, but hated the maintenance on it. They complained that the plane had to many external retainers which all required inspection; and the variable-geometry swept wing systems maintenance were getting more and more expensive to maintain on the aging planes. That's what i read.
I was of 2 minds looking at QF-4E drones on the flightlines. I guess it's better to go out in a blaze of glory but I now know how the F-100 guys felt. I was a Phantom radar mechanic.
I just wish they'd allow people to buy the F-14s for airshows. That's always been my favorite aircraft since I was a kid. I grew up about 5 minutes from NAS Oceana. I miss hearing them fly over all the time before it turned into nothing but F-18s flying over. If they ever do allow civilians to purchase them, I will have to find a way to become rich. Most beautiful jet ever built.
I sympathize. I saw the Tomcat at airshows growing up, and there was nothing that sounded like it. Besides maintenance, there are a few critical parts that cannot be repaired or replaced. It might be easier to try and buy the survivors from Iran rather than get the military to save one or two.
@@curtekstrom9531 If I was a billionaire, I’d waste money trying to save at least one. Probably use it as my private jet too. Thats how I love the tomcat.
I know, total bummer. I had hoped to go for the tour this week, only to find that it’s no longer open to the public. Anyone know when and why they stopped the tours?
I spent many years working on the F-14 A, B, B+, and Ds and I miss them. Instead of going for the shit F/A-18s, which is what I work with now, they should’ve taken the substructure of the F-14 and made a Super Tomcat, that way structurally speaking, we depot guys would have more edge distance, tear out, and perimeters to work with, as well as not have 3-dissimilar material stack ups that lead to massive amounts of corrosion that lead to a much shorter airframe lifespan. From an engineering stand point, the F-14 airframe was much more superior than its “replacement,” the F/A-18, which was designed to be a 6,000 flight hour throw away, but now we’re doing life extension modifications to increase their lives an additional 2K flight hours at the cost of structural integrity. 2:29 an old squadron of mine, VF-213 Blacklions.
I've been to Pima years ago. I'm still amazed at what they do to preserve aircraft. Unfortunately there are A LOT of craft that get scrapped and recycled.
When I was stationed at Davis-Monthan AFB in the mid-80s, we had facilities that we visited a least once a day in the boneyard, so there were just a bunch of airplanes where I worked. At the time, they were using the F-100 as drones.
Saw some of those QF-100s at Tyndall back in the early 80s while we were TDY . QF-100s and 102s prevailed but they had a bunch of T-33s there to help train interceptor guys.
Called a Boneyard, yet look at how well maintained the facility is, and how well preserved all the aircraft parked there are. In times of need, so many of those could be recalled to duty or repurposed.
need to donate those hueys and c130s to fire depts across the west for forest fires. the hueys could have a water bucket under them and c130s fitted with internal tanks of water or retardant. surely enough parts to get half them flying. hueys could be used for mountain rescue too or flying skiers up the extreme slopes. Be nice if these planes and helicopters were at more places around the country like parks, airports, museums to see.
We have a bigger potential air force in our bone yard than pretty much every other country. These planes can be made to fly, except we retired them. Other countries keep flying old airframes, at their aircrews risk, which is elevated because of the airframes age.
Had a pair of F-105s from the GA Air Guard come into Moody in 1983-4. Good looking birds but they had the biggest flipping shark mouths I have ever seen on the nose. 😂 They were either Gs or Fs, definitely 2 seaters though.
Amazing seeing all these aircraft standing there at the boneyard waiting either for their last journey or a new career to a foreign Air Force. Are they still having the tour in AMARG available? Would love to take a visit
Considering the tensions there are with China and Russia, I would be putting a stop to all scrapping (except for the very oldest) as many of these aircraft would be useful.
They don't scrap most of them. Anything that is in flyable condition and could be needed again is preserved fully and the process is repeated every 6 months.
There needs to be a bone yard reclamation and modernization team. Especially in this time of declining capabilities and aircraft force structure. This is especially true where carrier capable airframes are concerned. Top of the list should be the S-3. There has been no replacement for this aircraft in the fleet. There has also been no adequate replacement for the A-6, espeacilly the KA-6. Restored A-3 airframes make great ELINT and fast long range COD aircraft. With some additional modifications and modernization they could be used to deploy stand off ASM's like the B-52. Even old F-4 fighters could be equipped with improved engines, radar, and AMRAM. Great cross-deck back-up for newer and higher performance fighters. In some cases all that is really needed, is stressed airframe rebuilding. The restoration of air worthiness then justifies additional modifications and modernization. There is I think, a way to affordably accomplish these goals. Volunteers, and including incarcerated labor, as well as undocumented laborers awaiting emigration court. Classified work would clearly require workers with the proper clearance. But these more expensive workers could be reserved for the best modernization work only.
Agreed 100% - Upgrading some of these unique aircraft with modern tech, with the cost out of the question for a second, would be quite beneficial. Your points are solid and very true.
Remember it's an industry more than anything. OEMs/contractors lobby hard to build next gen airframes. No money in it for them to keep upgrading old ones, at least not compared to a new half billion dollar fighter. Other government agencies and civilian businesses use these airframes, like fire fighting, and give them a second life.
@@geosync9742 Of course it's an industry of corrupt operators! The insane amounts of money charged for "new" more advanced systems. Increasingly exceed the actual value of buying them. If you can't really afford a real force structure. The system; what ever it is; becomes too valuable to risk in battle. Then such a system goes the way of the battleship. Too expensive, to operate, too expensive to lose. In all truth? The entire procurement process should be scrapped. An all new program instituted to stop much of the current state of excessive costs.
It looks like the aircrafts that are still fit for the second line of defense, are wrapped in a different manner. Looks like they sealed the inlets, so that there is no water seepage or anything.
F-14 is the badass plane of the sky, period. The weapons that it carried, the look, the stance, too bad we gave some to Iran. What a damn shame we can't fly em anymore
Bring those beautiful F14s out of retirement already! What a disservice to all humanity letting them rot away like this!! What's more, they're about to make Top Gun ll, which understandably had to be delayed due to not being abled to find a sexier replacement to fill its role!
@@michael43216 F-18 is a slow laggard that looks extremely fugly. Not even half as capable as the F-14 especially the D version Super Tomcats Navy never wanted the Super Hornet. They wanted newly built F-14D Super Tomcats. Congress being in the pocket of the Hornet mafia cut funding for the Navy. Everyone in the Navy knows now it was a big mistake.
People, i have been to this place many times and believe me this no bone yard, on adverage there are 4000 planes on the ground, some leaving some coming everyday, there are teams that go over these planes from front to rear in 63 days. they tried to reduce that 58 days but it didn't work, so it was back to 63. I had some service men on my bus and when i was driving down the row of bombers, a guy in the back of the bus started yelling stop, stop, he said the bomber he flew in world war II was setting there he describe the different decals that were on the nose and what they meant, i thought the poor guy was going to start crying. way over in the southeast corner of the yard there were two bombers fenced in with a big quarantine signs guess what those two bombers did to Japan. Buy the way, they are in the heat in Tucson because they want to test the paint the climate they most likely will be sent to
You'll never see the likes of those legendary aircraft again. #F14 #F16 #B1Bomber #F4 #EA6B. #F111Ardvark. Those planes look better than any of the newer Jets they fly today; the #F18Hornet being the lone exception.
It's troubling to see such great predators of the sky languishing under the hot desert sun. Knowing that many of them gave way to political expediency not "progress". But It's the way of the world.
Only one F-111 from Cannon AFB (CC) looks like Yellow section 524th FS. I was in the 523rd (Blue) and 522nd (Red) Where did they put all the other F-111's?
they can still recycle some parts right? like melt and re-process some metals on those worn out planes or others parts, and use it to build brand new air crafts or other weaponry?
That's exactly what they do. Once an airframe is stripped of its usable parts, it's cut up into small pieces, sold for scrap & recycled. That's what they did to most of the F-14's, as they didn't want parts falling into the hands of the Iranians, who still fly them. There are some videos on YT of the airframes being chopped up.
Iran is the reason why all Tomcats are permanently grounded, stripped of key components, and are either on display at museums or are in line to be scrapped.
Looks like a lot of hardware that will likely never be used again that could be given to Ukraine before it becomes entirely unusable. Dated AH-1s and even 70s and 80s jets can go a long way for simple low level CAS. The cost is sunk into them already so it's practically free, and you won't have to allocate funds for storage anymore. Win-Win.
not really. Reactivating them might not be too expensive but the training would be. Also many of the planes can't use modern munitions without modifications. I would rather them just reactivate F16s there to be sent if anything. They might use them to replace any losses Ukraine might have in the near future.
Bunch of cities acting like night lights bad. Current wars are pretty much come as you are conflicts. They don't last long enough to either referb or manufacture new airframes.
It's sad how they can't fly anymore. I wish they could find some use for them. I don't know why they had to just stop them from being able to fly. I mean they could've found use for them. Like for air shows and other cool events.
There are still 10 there. Been there for years. 3 each A,B and D models plus number 80 of the 80 that got sold to Iran and was held back due the revolution. This info is available on the AMARG web site index of aircraft. Only reason I can think of as to why they were not shredded is for a future heritage aircraft type airshow scenario.
@@kenheppell4941 that is badass. So we actually still have the last iranian tomcat that was never delivered. I bet they took all the iran-unique parts out of the cockpit, however. I gaurantee that iranian tomcat is probably and LITERALLY the most intact and airworthy tomcat in the world as it's never been flown in service and was not cut up! haha.
@@PoxyBear It was that Dick head Cheney. There are still supposedly about 40 of these, "obsolete maintenance heavy troublesome", jets being flown today in ACTIVE duty. All by a nearly 3rd world country Iran. Yet the big bad USA could not afford to keep them flying. Iran saw how amazing they were in 1979 and bought them. Then even after we withheld the repair parts, Iran reverse engineered a vast number of parts and used the big cats to amazing success in the Iran-Iraq war and absolutely dominated the Iraq air force.
