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Arthur

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June 16, 2004 at 2:03 pm in reply to: The "But that aircraft never flew with that airforce"-picture thread #2689530

Arthur
Participant

Good going everyone. One small note for Ja: that Macchi is the MB339K single-seat prototype, in nice camo colours but with the pretty not-funny civil reg I-BITE. A factory machine.

June 15, 2004 at 1:31 pm in reply to: MiG-25 in action (war)? #2690454

Arthur
Participant

Russian MiG-25RB’s overflew Israel in 1970 while detached to Egypt, and Lybians appearantly did recce-runs at least over Chad in the 1980s.

June 15, 2004 at 9:29 am in reply to: Boeing Team Wins $3.89 Billion Multi-Mission Maritime Aircraft Program #2690569

Arthur
Participant

Indonesia already has the 737 Surveiller for maritime patrol. Curious as to what parts of the Surveiller will be presented as ‘new’ for this 737MMA…

June 15, 2004 at 9:17 am in reply to: Air Forces identical markings #2690578

Arthur
Participant

After flipping through Military Aircraft Insignia of the World:
Chad & Romania.
Belarus & Russia.
Congo & Belgium (Congo-Brazzaville that is)
Burundi & Italy.
Costa Rica & the traditional three-coloured RAF roundels (except for the Costa Rican scribbling through the blue circle).
Bolivia, Ghana, Guinea, Mali & Rwanda
Guatemala, El Salvador , Argentina & Greece
Peru & Turkey
France & Paraguay
India & Ivory Coast (well, if you can’t tell the difference between saffron and orange like me).

June 15, 2004 at 8:45 am in reply to: Restructuring the superpower #2690610

Arthur

Participant

Agree with Eric. Moving bases to Eastern Europe is about as stupid as it could get. While Germany still is a convenient logistical hub for flights from the US to the Middle East (especially with the stuff still being in Germany) with pretty decent connections to the rest of the world, facilities in Eastern Europe tend to be a little less convenient for a high-demand military like the American. Of course there is a difference between using Burgas in Bulgaria as a KC-135 base (but then again, why not use Incirlik?) or using it as a logistical hub like Ramstein.

But i agree, still having a fighter wing and combat troops in Germany or Korea for that matter does not make any sense, and is a waste (although i would miss the stuff of course). Keeping a tradition of waste in mind, with the recent massive improvements done at Spangdahlem (new, widened, lengthened runway, new aprons, new tower, the lot) i wouldn’t be surprised if it would be vacated soon. It wouldn’t be the first time: the USAF started investing millions at De Peel airbase here in the Netherlands to make it an A-10 Forward Operating Location, at the very same time the Alconbury wing was withdrawn and there was talk about retiring the A-10 altogether :rolleyes:

June 15, 2004 at 8:28 am in reply to: Arthurs Spotters Motif Sports Bar #2690620

Arthur

Participant

Behold… the outside of Barthur, with the ornamentation of the parking lot. As you can see, little effort has been spared to make the place look like a cosy little suburb of Novosibirsk.

Behind the concrete wall on the right end of the pic there is an American Corner for those not too comfy with red stars not painted on F-4 splitter plates. There you can find a statue of Curtis LeMay, show your skills on the Slim Pickens H-bomb Rodeo, and good old nudie-bar girls dancing in the former canopy of a B-36. Perhaps you’ll even get served by a strange doctor with a German accent riding in a wheelchair!

And yes, that cute grey van (it’s a 4×4 UAZ) is my car. Perfect to go and get some more booze for you lot, and for the occasional field trip for the members of the Sparkasse.
😀

EDIT: Forgot to bore you guys. The Flagon in front is a Su-15UT, the other one a Su-15TM with ogival nose, so a FLAGON F and occasionally misnamed “Su-21”.

June 15, 2004 at 8:13 am in reply to: Gripens at Halmstad today #2690633

Arthur

Participant

Does Halmstad also still have the former Dutch Navy Bell 204? It used to be there in the early 1990s, still painted in full Marineluchtvaartdienst-colours (they were retired in 1974). Haven’t heard much about it later, although there was a lot of talk going on getting it back to the Netherlands.

June 15, 2004 at 8:10 am in reply to: F-14 Tomcat's Replacement Program #2690646

Arthur

Participant

Super Borenet anyone?

June 14, 2004 at 9:48 pm in reply to: Arthurs Spotters Motif Sports Bar #2690865

Arthur

Participant

The Su-21 designation was one which appeared in the 1980s Soviet Power-spending-excuses-brochures handed out by the Pentagon. It only referred to the Su-15TM FLAGON F (with the ogival nose, not the conical one), and was as a designation completely bogus. There really was no difference between the Su-15TM FLAGON E (with the conical nose) and the FLAGON F, both had the Taifun-M radar but the F had a more conical radome to prevent radar-reflections inside the nosecone.

Besides, all Su-15s that remained in the Ukraine were Su-15TM (single-seat, these were at Belbek and KramatorsK) or Su-15UT (second-generation trainers). They were withdrawn around 1996 and mostly put into storage at Bila Tserkva, where some other lucky spotters actually saw three of them being flown in. Others withered away at Dnipropetrovsk, but the Kosice machine is one of the 40-something which could eventually be seen at Bila Tserkva. None of which were camouflaged, BTW.

As for the L 29 bar – i’ve been mixing watering holes up (wonder how that could happen)! The place in Slovakia had a Li-2 or Il-14 or something like that, but the tail only.

June 14, 2004 at 9:29 pm in reply to: The "But that aircraft never flew with that airforce"-picture thread #2690886

Arthur

Participant

What’s the story on the USMC Thud?

It was a regular USAF Thud, but during the Vietnam war it made an emergency/precautionary landing at Da Nang, and the aircraft was parked at the VMCJ-1 ramp (a Marines recce/ew squadron). The Thud was left unattended for some time (probably waiting for spares, or for a ferry pilot or whatever). A brave Marine who knew about the fine art of zapping grabbed his chance, and painted one side of it with VMCJ-1 markings. There is a story-from-a-guy-who-was-there at http://business.quadlink.net/adirondack/mcarapage4seastories/marinef105/

As for the other ones i’ve posted so far:

The YF-17 was demonstrated to the French (both AdlA as Aéronavale) after Northrop lost the ACF competition and the aircraft served as F-18L demonstrator. They were pretty desparate (finally selling the bulk of the design to MDD) and already painted the aircraft in potential customer’s colours. Later, this one was overpainted in Canadian markings as ‘CF-18L Cobra.’

Greece originally was to get the G91, but after two were delivered these aircraft were reverted to Germany, Greece getting MAP-funded F-5s instead of the (also paid for by NATO) Fiats.

A number of French F-84 and Mystère units operated from Israeli airbases during the Suez campaign in 1956, and hence carried Israeli markings.

June 14, 2004 at 5:21 pm in reply to: Arthurs Spotters Motif Sports Bar #2691010

Arthur

Participant

So the far east even? I got to Kosice by train from Prague, on the way to the Ukraine. Unfortunately there was some political BS going on back then (thank you very much mr. Meciar) so the Ukrainian/Slovak border (the one to Uzhgorod) was closed for smelly Dutch guys.

But Kosice is a nice town, beautiful scenery too. And the aircraft museum there now has the westernmost Su-15 in the world 🙂

June 14, 2004 at 5:12 pm in reply to: The "But that aircraft never flew with that airforce"-picture thread #2691033

Arthur

Participant

Good list you’ve got, Flex.

RAF IA-58, RAF A109

Falkland war booty, there was also a Puma. The civil UH-1H G-HUEY was also ex-Argentinian.

Swedish AH-64 (yes, the markings were applied)
Swiss MS-760 Paris and AS-202
G-2 Galeb with Indonesian fin flags used by IPTN as a test aircraft

Those are all new to me, if you feel like sharing…

Israeli MiG-23, MiG-21, MiG-17 and SA342, L-39 for evaluation purposes, MiG-29 for aggressor role
Mirage 2000B with South African squadron badges
US ARMY FIAT G-91 and Pilatus PC-9 (or were they really in active service?)

Yep, know of those and have pics as well. The PC-9s actually were in service as chaseplanes.

USAF CM-170, MiG-21F (F-113)
A-500 is full USCG markings

An American Fouga? Never knew that, but then again they were pleased enough with the Marboré engine to have it whistling T-37s through the air…
The other ones were as you said common military aircraft (Lybia had a huge pile of SF260s), but probably with civil transfer/test regs.

Another category would of course be the zapped aircraft. An RAFG Jaguar from Brüggen appearantly was zapped completely with German balkenkreuz and bortnummer, but i’ve never seen a pic of it unfortunately.

But how about a USMC Thunderchief?

June 14, 2004 at 4:43 pm in reply to: Arthurs Spotters Motif Sports Bar #2691046

Arthur

Participant

I’m not all too familiar with the Lederhosendirndels, but i can’t blame you for preferring Slovakia. The first time i was in Slovakia i did not amuse myself in any way (Kosice 1993, scratching stamps from pre-split Czechoslovak money). Yet it was exactly there that the phrase ‘visual compensation’ was coined…

June 14, 2004 at 4:30 pm in reply to: Photo Quiz #2691057

Arthur

Participant

At least one An-12 had a toilet mounted in stead of the tailgunner’s seat (there is a crawlway through the rear upper fuselage to the gunner’s throne). I doubt i’d take a read with me if i were to go and take a dump on that loo!
Now, if i could spend the rest of the flight (make that low-level and on a clear day please) in the nose, and i would be perfectly happy. I think the first glass nose i ever sat in was a Tu-16 in the Ukraine, and ever since it’s been one of my many, many wishes… a man can dream, can’t he?

June 14, 2004 at 4:21 pm in reply to: Arthurs Spotters Motif Sports Bar #2691078

Arthur

Participant

Down south in Lederhosenland? Well, Neuburg/Lechfeld/Memmingen is still an ausflug under consideration this summer…

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