Rob,

Its not really Homeland that has a problem with Historical US Owned Aircraft go over to the UK its more with your side of stuff by what I’ve been told. But since I’m not part of Liberty Group I’m not sure what the major hang up is except for what I’ve already posted.

As for Pink Lady the price I’ve heard is that they folks who own it have been offered 2.5 USD now how true this is I’m not sure but it does come from a reliable source in the US based Warbird Community

Hi Jorgon,

I have a few other items that I need to have research at Maxwell so I’ll add your aircraft to the list, in the past I’ve found that they hold most of the aircrafts complete records including Units and IRAN records.

I’ll keep you posted when I get the stuff back from Maxwell

What about money raised in other ways such as sponsorship or airshow appearance fees?

Yak 11,

Yes both of these idea have been discussed by many groups but the problem is this the regulating that both the CAA and EU put on flight ops make it rather hard for any US base Bomber to come over. As for airshow appearance by what I understand the fee would be so high that it wouldn’t be in the best interest of the folks putting on an airshow in the UK. To give you an idea if you want a B-17 to come to your show it will cost you the following,

Appearance fee $2500-5000 USD
Fuel at $3.50 Per gallon(for now)
Hotel Rooms for crew of 4-6
Rental Car(s)
Innsurrance $2500 USD

Now trying to get sponsorship is a nice idea but even Glacier girl couldn’t get and form of Sponsorship from any UK Companys.

Hell look at the Mustang gathering the Fuel Sponsor pulled out and most of the West Coast Mustang decide not to attend. The Folks at Geneseo are trying to have the largest P-40 Gathering but one of the major hitch’s is Fuel Cost the most that they will get is 5 or 6 East Coast based P-40s why because the cost of fuel. Even if all the owner of West Coast P-40 decide to wave their appearance fee’s it still will cost anywhere between 1500 to 4000 USD to fly a P-40 from the West Coast to Upstate New York.

This is why I say that while its a great idea that Liberty Belle is trying to come across the Pond the reality of it is that unless some major sponsor steps up with close 1 million USD then its not going to happen.

Rob,

Not to be the sour note on this whole thing but the folks at Liberty Belle have some rather large hoops to go thru before they can make the jump over the Pond one of them being getting the Okie Dokie from you very own CAA so they can have paying passengers come with them. The one of the many reason that they didn’t come the last few years is because of the CAA rules also their is some question about the EU laws also. Some other things to keep in mind is the US Homeland Security might not like this little trip and put a nix on it, also fuel prices are going to be the real driving force if they can’t get someone to foot the fuel bill then it won’t happen and I got this from two well connect folks with-in the group.

As for Pink Lady you might be seeing it allot sooner then you think the scuttlebut in the States is that three well know collectors have ask for a price for her. And by what I understand the folks who own Pink Lady are looking at these with keen interested. What I’ve been told is two of the folks have given them till the end of March to make a decission.