I
am sure that those of the readers, who might have seen the Hollywood
flick
“Transformers:
Revenge of the Fallen” would definitely remember the shots of the
huge airport shown in the film. I was always under impression that
this airport must have been set up in the film studio itself on a
miniature scale using small model aircraft. However, it is quite
bewildering that such an airbase is actually in existence near Tucson
city: Arizona in USA. There is a small difference though; Tuscon
airbase is no airport but a huge cemetery for old disused aircraft.
This
aircraft dumping ground, official known as Davis-Monthan Air Force
base is as large as 1430 American Football fields or has an area
equal to 2600 acres. It is popularly known as Boneyard, a name which
describes it rather accurately, and was built just after second world
war.
The
weather at this airbase is extremely dry and that perhaps was the
main reason for selection of this place, as it was thought that the
aircraft based here would not be damaged by rusting. Besides the dry
weather, the soil at this place also has some unique kind of
properties. Just below an upper layer of dust, the soil consists of
an extremely hard layer of soil. Because of this hard layer, it has
been possible to park all kinds of aircraft here without constructing
a concrete tarmac. A unit of United States Air Force called “309th
Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group (AMARG)” keeps busy
on this airbase, looking after the aircraft. It is hard to believe
that this airbase has more than 4200 aircraft and 10 space craft
parked with a combined value exceeding 35 Billion Dollars.
This
one of a kind museum of real aircraft, boasts of F 14 TomCats. The
readers might recall that these aircraft had featured in the
Hollywood movie, Top Gun featuring actor Tom Cruze. The other
aircraft parked here include B 52 Flying Fortress Bombers of cold war
era and anti tank A 10 planes. During last 25 years, at least 20 % of
the aircraft parked here, were refurbished for use again. Many of
such planes were sold to other countries also. The planes which are
beyond refurbishing are normally cannibalized to recover spare parts,
which can be used in other planes of similar class. The planes that
are beyond any use are mainly sold as junk or scrap.
After
seeing the pictures of this airbase with row after row of neatly
parked aircraft, I was reminded of a childhood memory, which I can
always recollect. About 25 miles away from my home town, Pune in
India and near a railway station called Dehu Road, there used to be a
huge motorized vehicle depot of military transport vehicles, many of
them from WWII vintage. This depot used to be along a railway line
towards Mumbai. Whenever, I used to travel by train to go to Mumbai,
I would keep watching from the train window, long and never ending
rows after rows of all kinds of military transports parked in a most
systematic way, which only an army can do, as the train moved slowly
along. Later on, the depot was moved somewhere else and since then I
have always missed that great spectacle of my childhood days,
whenever I happen to travel by train. Now I realize that this depot
of yesteryear and the Tuscon air base, as seen, curtsey Google earth,
both highlight how mind bogglingly large the defense industries
really are.
I
can imagine that some small kid living in Tuscon and moving along the
perimeter of this airbase in his dad's car, must be getting similarly
thrilled looking at the rows and rows of modern aircraft as I was
once was with the vehicle depot, and later kept dreaming about them.
I
wouldn’t call the Davis-Monthan Air Force base as an aircraft
cemetery or a Boneyard. I would prefer to call it an aircraft dream
factory for the kids.
27
September 2012
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