
Airport Stuffed with Airliners - vinnyglennon
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/33141/these-aerial-and-satellite-photos-of-an-airport-absolutely-stuffed-with-airliners-are-nuts
======
toomuchtodo
YouTube video of 500 foot above ground level (AGL) approach of the runway
shutdown to accommodate storage:
[https://youtu.be/zIbXai0l174](https://youtu.be/zIbXai0l174)

Airport details:
[https://www.airnav.com/airport/KVCV](https://www.airnav.com/airport/KVCV)

Runway 3-21 is the temporarily closed runway being used for storage

~~~
tgb
So what fraction of operational airplanes are in flight at any given (pre-
Covid-19) time? Are they normally "stored" in the air?

~~~
khuey
To a large extent they normally are "stored" in the air. A typical narrowbody
aircraft in the US clocks 9-10 block hours a day (a little less in the air)
and widebodies even more. So somewhere around 40% of all commercial passenger
aircraft are in the air at any given time (higher during the day and lower at
night, of course).

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ohwaitnvm
If you want to see such a fleet of grounded planes in person, it's worth going
to Tucson to visit Pima and take a tour of the Boneyard at Davis-Monthan Air
Force Base. Pima is a normal museum admittance but the on-base bus tour
requires preregistration and a background check.

For now since we can't travel, I definitely recommend taking a look in google
maps satellite view:

[https://goo.gl/maps/5jo5jkpXPc9AtrW68](https://goo.gl/maps/5jo5jkpXPc9AtrW68)

In the SE corner of the base you can see long range nuclear bombers with their
tails and wings clipped, for all the world to see.

~~~
jshevek
That's amazing, thank you. Putting the location code 549R+27 into Google Earth
also gives an interesting view.

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porjo
On a related note: Alice Springs Airport, in the centre of Australia, is being
used by Singapore Airlines to store unused aircraft due to it's dry
environment.

[https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-28/during-coronavirus-
pa...](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-28/during-coronavirus-pandemic-
planes-parked-in-alice-springs/12189856)

------
ken
Boeing Field looked like that even before COVID-19, with all the 737 MAX in
storage.

Lots of photos online -- search "boeing field 737 max storage". I like the
ones that show the reclamation of employee parking spaces:
[https://www.pressclub.world/2019/07/22/boeing-737-max-
ground...](https://www.pressclub.world/2019/07/22/boeing-737-max-grounding-
charges-to-reach-8-billion/)

~~~
ceejayoz
I have a mental picture of someone hitting the wrong pedal, hitting a 737 in
the employee parking lot, and having to call insurance.

"I had an accident. The other vehicle is... kinda expensive."

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sandworm101
This has happened before. In the immediate aftermath of 9/11 north american
airspace was closed. All those international flights from europe were not
allowed into US airspace. So they started piling up on canadian tarmac. Small
towns like Gander Newfoundland saw their populations double in a matter of
hours as transatlantic flights landed on their tiny airport. We don't have
drone footage, but I've heard stories about aircraft being parked on grass ...
something everyone is loathed to do.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_Ey5ph4wW8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_Ey5ph4wW8)

~~~
greggyb
> Small towns like Gander Newfoundland saw their populations double in a
> matter of hours as transatlantic flights landed on their tiny airport.

This is dramatized in a delightful musical, Come From Away.

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megablast
So logistically, how does this work. The pilots fly the planes there, and have
to catch a bus home? Of they have a small plane to take them back? They have
special pilots that they fly out just to take them here?

And when they go back to work, the pilots all travel out to pick up their
plane and start their routes?

Where these planes are stored, I imagine they must have constant maintenance
on them. Or do they need to fly them back and get checked over by the airline?

This is such a huge undertaking that is mostly hidden from us.

~~~
cyberferret
A friend of mine was a ferry pilot for the airlines. But essentially, a crew
flies the plane out to its storage destination, and there is usually transport
arranged out for them - either a bus, or a smaller corporate jet or even a
piston engine a/c would be flown out with them to carry them back home or to
their next deployment location.

As for them returning to service, yes, you guessed right - they have to be
checked while still on the ground by a maintenance team, then if they have
been there for a while, they have to be flown to a maintenance base for fairly
extensive servicing before they can be declared airworthy enough to carry
passengers again.

With luck, this airport probably has a service hangar capable of handling
these aircraft types and make them airworthy again, so I expect that the
airline might find it more economical to ship an entire maintenance team with
spare parts to be based out of here for a month or so while they get their
planes back in the air.

~~~
cromka
Since the procedures require such extensive checks after those dormant planes'
return to service, wouldn't you say that once all of them become airborne
again, statistically speaking the risk of catastrophic failures is going to
increase? I am afraid well see some accidents end of this year...

~~~
hef19898
That's not likely. The checks to get the grounded aircraft back in air are
quite extensive. And similar checks are regularly conducted under normal
conditions anyway.

It might even be the case that we see less accidents, as more aircraft are
getting extensive checks than before. As long as maintenance is done correctly
that is. Which was true before already as well

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rickdangerous1
This is a terrifyingly large amount of capital sitting in one place. The part
of me that wants to mitigate risk is thinking, maybe these planes should be
spreadout around the country a bit. I guess there are no tornados in this
area...but one freak weather event and a couple trillion dollars gets mangled
into scrap?

~~~
xvedejas
What kind of weather event are you thinking of? I think airplanes are
typically designed to withstand high winds. The weather in this region is dry,
and that's really the only word that can describe it. On top of that, we're at
the beginning of the dry season. It's more likely a landing plane accidentally
crashes into these parked planes than the weather leaves us with a trillion
dollars of mangled scrap.

~~~
0xddd
Isn't this a region that's incredibly prone to wildfires?

~~~
rtkwe
Airports aren’t generally very wooded areas... and the SCLA is in basically
scrub land with barely enough vegetation for a good brush fire.

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interestica
There's something so aesthetically beautiful about these images. The
repetition and contrast. And the rarity of the scene.

It all seems so... vulnerable though. That's a lot of expensive craft in one
spot.

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nunez
VCV (Victorville) is often used for aircraft storage. While they have way more
aircraft on their parking lot than usual, it's not abnormal for this airport
to have a bunch of aircraft hanging out.

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nojvek
Boeing doing so poorly is heartbreaking. Come on, Shopify is almost as worth
as Boeing now by marketcap. Trying to let that sink in.

Also I live 20 mins from the Boeing Mega Factory in Everett and the
technological marvel of making flying beasts have been a great source of
inspiration.

Now Boeing is a source of “how to fuck up a great company”.

~~~
thephyber
To be fair, Shopify's prospects for the future look like they will scale far
better (and also Boeing's uncertainty in the short-medium term is currently
priced in).

Reports were that Boeing's expansion into South Carolina were done rapidly
without training up the local workers. Quality control in SC was far below par
with the Washington factories.

Perhaps Boeing's fall is a reflection on the US economy. We still make lots of
things, but we pinch pennies and quality suffers. Then it catches up to us
when it's revealed that we avoided regulatory scrutiny by obscuring a fairly
large change in design. Now we hit severe headwinds and the future is scary
and uncertain because this is the inevitable outcome of the direction we have
been steering for 1-2 generations.

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stevage
The person writing the article went to the effort of obtaining this
"exclusive" imagery, but didn't go to any effort to do any analysis: how many
planes, which airlines, which models etc.

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blhack
How hard is it to reactivate these planes?

~~~
Simulacra
Generally they can turn around and activate a reserve plane in about 30
minutes. It’s got everything it needs except food, water, and fuel.

~~~
redis_mlc
Well, there's some nuances.

If they're mothballed (skin covered and various systems pickled), then about a
month of work each.

If they're not mothballed and they do weekly or bi-weekly maintenance on each
plane like they're supposed to, then an inspection, and then they're ready.

So the worst case is a month, and the best case is an inspection plus 30
minutes.

Also, note that in the mdoern era, a lot of avionics require periodic updates,
which also have to be performed before flight.

But if I was the FAA, I'd be requiring crew-only acceptance flights before any
revenue flights. You never know where those pesky wasps built a nest, or if
those AOC sensors corroded, etc.

Source: commercially-rated airplane pilot.

~~~
Krasnol
Do they have to be maintained in any way or can they just leave them there for
weeks/months?

~~~
ddoolin
They can be left wholly unattended but they will not be considered airworthy
when their maintenance/inspection requirements lapse.

~~~
redis_mlc
Not exactly.

To be left unattended with the intention of flying them again,
mothball/pickling is needed. (Tape the outside including sensor ports, plug
the engine nacelles, use the right hydraulic or motor fluids, disconnect
batteries, etc.)

If you literally just park a 737 somewhere for months, especially a sandy
desert, and walk away, then you might have to do millions of dollars of
maintenance on the plane to be sure it's airworthy. Like pulling the engines
and dealing with corrosion throughout the airplane.

I have a small airplane example. The danger of parking an airplane for an
extended period of time, even in a hangar, is that if mice create a nest in
the fuselage and urinate there, the aluminum corrosion can cause structural
damage. ie. that plane will never fly again.

All those King Airs, Cessna 310s, etc. you see hangared are prone to that. So
clean your airplane regularly!

~~~
Razengan
> _if mice create a nest in the fuselage and urinate there, the aluminum
> corrosion can cause structural damage. ie. that plane will never fly again._

Reading that evokes a somber reminder of how quickly our civilization could
turn into ruins if left unattended for a few years.

~~~
rickdangerous1
I was just envisioning what this storage airport would look like in 10 years
if the airline industry NEVER picks back up to its previous levels. Trillions
of dollars worth of airplanes rotting in the sun???

~~~
redis_mlc
I have a feeling the 800 or so 737 MAX aircraft will all be scrapped (or just
the avionics parted out.)

Besides the AOA sensor system problems, there's been FOD in the fuel tanks,
wire chafing and very long periods of AOG.

One of those might not be fatal, but all of them? Doesn't look good.

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twic
I can't imagine we have anywhere like this in the UK. We don't have a lot of
space, and it's too damp. Similarly for other Northern European countries. So
where do airliners from those countries get parked up? Somewhere in Spain?
Somewhere in the Middle East?

~~~
rhythmofrest
Much of the BA fleet is parked up at Bournemouth airport -
[https://youtu.be/qgPw1jWmdE4](https://youtu.be/qgPw1jWmdE4)

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Waterluvian
Are these airliners safe during a storm? Do they tie them down in some way
when on the runway? I mean I guess that's why they're in the desert. But the
question still stands in a hypothetical context. Do jetliners survive massive
storms on the runway?

~~~
tomglynch
Storms wouldn't cause a problem. These planes travel through air at 800km/h, a
storm with 100km/h winds is nothing.

~~~
interestica
> Storms wouldn't cause a problem. These planes travel through air at 800km/h,
> a storm with 100km/h winds is nothing.

These craft are designed for lift. High winds can make planes "take off" while
stationary. Not sure it's a problem for planes this size, but it's definitely
a problem for smaller planes.

~~~
wtallis
The stall speed for something small like a Cessna 172 is in the ballpark of 60
mph, so those definitely need to be strapped down if there's a chance of even
a simple severe thunderstorm. But for something like a Boeing 737, stall speed
is more like 125-150 mph (depending on flaps configuration). If surface winds
that high are a real possibility, airlines will do their best to relocate the
planes, because there are too many ways they can be severely damaged even
without taking off while stationary.

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bogomipz
The Southwest livery really sticks out in these photos. Is it possible that
this is close to their entire fleet? If so wouldn't seem wise to have some
diversity in your storage facilities?

~~~
moose333
Wikipedia puts their current fleet at 745 planes[1], and I'm not seeing more
than 200 Southwest planes out there by my quick count. Could be close to a
third of their fleet, which is still bonkers to think about.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwest_Airlines_fleet#Curre...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwest_Airlines_fleet#Current_fleet)

~~~
redis_mlc
FYI: Southwest started small, but they're one of the largest US carriers now -
a major. I remember when they were the scrappy startup, but:

"As of 2018, Southwest carries the most domestic passengers of any United
States airline."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwest_Airlines](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwest_Airlines)

LionAir, which had one of the 737 MAX accidents, has a similar story, and will
probably end up being a similar size. Only started in 1999, most of the new
aircraft model launches are done with them, and they have 234 planes on order.

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fiftyfifty
How did the pilots get home after they parked these planes?

~~~
lnanek2
Google says it's just a 2 hour drive from there to LAX, or 4 hours on a bus.
Maybe their airline just bussed them over to LAX?

~~~
toomuchtodo
The non-shuttered runway is also still active, enabling flights back to pilot
home bases. Could look at ADS-B traffic sites (FlightAware and the like) for
details.

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odiroot
I was wondering. All these planes sitting idle for months. Can they just one
day restart without problems? Or do they need extra maintenance?

~~~
thephyber
Yes. All commercial aircraft have regular maintenance + inspections at time +
mileage intervals.

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nikofeyn
how is the maintenance of these planes being addressed?

in general, i wonder how much maintenance in overall infrastructure has been
canceled or delayed and how that's going to affect things long term. it really
brings into question the u.s.' "let's drag this out as long and as painfully
as possible".

~~~
thephyber
The Victorville airport is home to ComAv[1], which is an aircraft storage and
maintenance company.

The aircraft are still subject to FAA inspection + maintenance interval
requirements once they are ready to be flown again.

[1] [http://www.comav.com/](http://www.comav.com/)

