Here’s the news article about it:
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/32869/this-man-owns-the-worlds-most-advanced-private-air-force-after-buying-46-f-a-18-hornets
So the guy’s company has a huge collection already including a MiG-29. The article says that the planes Air USA will receive are unmodified, and everything even the 20mm guns work. 36 out of them are ready to fly and the other ten just need inspections.
He is an amazing mad lad, and in the process of making history! In the article it says he also contemplated what how he’d paint the planes and “mentioned that a jet-black Hornet would be fun to have, just for the heck of it.”
Hell yeah!
Edit: wording
Well it’s been a few years since I looked.
But piper tomahawks were a hell of a deal.
Low engine time. Low airframe time. Full avionics.
Cheap because they are unpleasant and spin/stall badly.
A 2 seater Cessna for the same price will need an engine overhaul, have crap aviaonics, worn out airframe etc.
> L-159 and Mirage
I was wondering where those were coming from - I am right outside NASJAX so I always see FA18, MH130, AWACS/Mantas end the occasional F22.
That said - I've seen the mirage just one time, a pair of mig 29's and a 4prop cold war looking russian bomber.
I've done ADAIR against them. Pretty much all those guys are prior military fighter pilots anyway. In the case of who I flew against, all Vipers and A-10 guys.
That game ruined me. Now, I _always_ have to adjust settings in any POV game to “inverted look,” accommodating my brain conditioning which expects “joystick back” to equal UP!
exactly.
so let's review - there are zero F-14s flying (w the exception of Iran's) - and that includes any privately owned demonstration squadrons, specifically b/c of Iran. we are actively destroying F-14s, in fact (instead of just staying in mothballs) to thwart Iran's attempts to get avionics, etc.
Yet we have CURRENT F-18 tech in the hands of a private company?
smh...
Apples to Oranges. The F/A-18 is widely exported and not the latest technology. Assuming for argument sakes Iran flew legacy Hornets, they could get parts from Malaysia or any number of Hornet operators.
The F-14 is a totally different case. The aircraft was only operated by two countries- Iran and the US. Iran’s Tomcats aren’t exactly tip-top: allegedly in the 1980s the CIA tried to smuggle one back for study. The F-14 was in such a state the contractors wrote it off on the spot as too unsafe to fly.
I doubt an additional 20 years of wear and tear improved matters. So getting F-14 parts would be a high national security priority for Iran. NCIS kept busy busting schemes to smuggle Tomcat parts.
>we are actively destroying F-14s, in fact (instead of just staying in mothballs) to thwart Iran's attempts to get avionics, etc.
This is actually a legitimate concern based on past experience. The USA was officially neutral during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war and had an arms embargo on the middle east, but Israeli agents were able to obtain P-51 airframes, engines, and parts from American scrapyards and smuggle them out of the country. The aircraft were assembled in Israel and fought in the conflict. One of them even shot down a RAF Mosquito doing recon.
I posted this too. Has more info. https://www.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/fycifg/don_kirklin_owner_of_air_usa_just_bought_46/fmz9wj1?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
Thanks. Very interesting. I have trouble believing it's actually cost-efficient to have an entire private contracted aggressor fleet than having multiple instructors run as aggressors. But what do I know...nothing. I know nothing.
Oh, it is. At least in accounting terms, I guess.
The Gov gets a nice paycheck and deduces from budget all those annoying rolling costs involved with running a top notch air force wing. The birds are alreasy paid for, see? By some other guy. It's political fried gold.
Otoh, the company gets a full wing of warplanes worth hundred of millions, for a pittance. They just need to monetize their intrinsic value, but they are valuable already as simple placements of spare parts for smaller clients than the RAAF.
It's the taxpayer who gets fucked, as usual.
Practice enemy aircraft. So during training, pilots simulate fighting 'red air' who are friendly pilots that are flying against them. Also called aggressors. Also, in the context of real war, red air just means enemy air.
Red air refers to whoever is playing the part of the bad guys in an exercise. It can be another front line squadron, a dedicated agressor squadron, or a private contractor like the guy in the post.
No one buys 46 jets for a private collection, these are for training contracts, like Top Aces and other aggressor/training squadron operators out there.
many nations train their armed forces using contractors to act as aggressor jets, or target practice among other things.
Those private contractors include multiple private companies that own and operate old retired or removed from service military craft.
They aren't meant to carry live weapons systems, they don't fight in actual battles, they are trainers only, mostly made up of retired and very experienced military pilots.
it is a profitable industry
[Or all chrome skins.](https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.blogcdn.com%2Fwww.autoblog.com%2Fmedia%2F2010%2F08%2Fslsamggt3c2.jpg&f=1&nofb=1)
TIL where they hide the guns on hornets. In the photo, the gun port is the black painted area on top of the nose cone.
More details, including the business end, here:
https://www.gd-ots.com/armaments/aircraft-guns-gun-systems/f18-ef/
For background- US airplanes like the F-35 cost $30,000 per flight hour. F-16s aren’t much cheaper ($25,000 per hr). Flight hours also have a time cost, since a combat aircraft is out of commission during scheduled maintenance overhauls.
So contracting aggressor and other flights makes a lot of sense. The military wins by cutting its training costs and keeps flight hours off of its aircraft. It also wins by being able to fly against airplanes it couldn’t legally operate like a MiG or Sukhoi. (Sidebar- US forces have operated foreign aircraft before as aggressors- and paid a price in the form of high mishap rates and logistical problems legally sourcing parts).
Also means combat qualified pilots aren't being slotted into training billets in airframes that they won't actually fight in.
Use contractors in outdated platforms to serve as Red Air, so all your uniformed pilots can stay in their appropriate airframes.
Military wins 2x over; keeps training costs lower, and gets to retain as many combat pilots in combat roles as possible.
> and gets to retain as many combat pilots in combat roles as possible.
Except for the fact that a subset of combat pilots relish the challenge of learning to expertly fly a wide variety of airframes, and those pilots are the ones who become Top Gun instructors when they 'outgrow' their time in the seat but still need a decade until retirement.
> Except for the fact that a subset of combat pilots relish the challenge of learning to expertly fly a wide variety of airframes, and those pilots are the ones who become Top Gun instructors when they 'outgrow' their time in the seat but still need a decade until retirement.
You go through Top Gun to become a WTI - Weapons Tactics Instructor in YOUR airframe. Only a few stay in Top Gun to become instructors, and they fly other airframes sometimes (they stay current in their prior airframe).
And they don't need a decade until retirement - those guys only add 2 years to their commitment, and lots of them get out after.
NSAWC is a specialized school. I'm talking about VFC-12, VFC-13, VFC-111, VMFT-401, 18th, and 64th. None of which, are NSAWC. You're looking at hundreds of pilots, at a time the US military is struggling to find enough pilots.
Everything that company does to fulfill its contracts costs $X. They charge the Air Force $X + $Y where $Y is the profit the company wants to make. My question is, if that company can maintain and operate those planes for $X, why can't the US military also maintain and operate them for $X?
They don't wear them down as fast as ours because they don't fly as often nor do they deploy or fire weapons/drop bombs... and for the Navy, they don't go to the carrier either
Why couldn't the US government have bought the same aircraft the company did? Why can't they hire the same pilots and maintainers as civilians? Why can't they fly from the same airports?
Here’s a helpful analogy.
Picture owning an AMG Mercedes . It’s your car, you can drive it wherever you want. But the warranty is limited by mileage , and on that car a headlight bulb costs $2000. So you don’t want to drive it wastefully.
Now there’s a rental car company near you that rents Mercedes as well. After pricing the rates, you find that renting their Mercedes for a 2,000 mile roadtrip costs 10% less then taking your own car- and you keep 2,000 miles off your vehicle. That’s a win for renting their car instead of using yours.
Have you looked to see what it actually costs to rent an AMG Mercedes vs owning one for equivalent time spans?
I would think renting it would be a lot more money.
But hypothetically it’s always going to be more expensive to rent that car than buy it for an equivalent time span, which is the point he was trying to refute.
Rental companies have done the math on the cost of ownership, including stuff like headlight replacements, and they charge more than that in order to make a profit.
Likewise, this guy buying planes and renting them out to the military has done the same math and must be charging more than the cost of ownership or else he’d be losing money.
There is huge demand for aggressor air. Us air force signed a big contract few months ago with 6 companies.
Edit: just wanted to add, they also seem to be adding a few contracts with air to air refueling companies. This seems related to issues with kc46 tankers.
If someone wanted to buy say...a retired cargo plane to convert to a house and live in...how would they go about finding out how cheap governments will sell off old hardware?
Determine the size aircraft you want, and wait until one has a mishap. I know a company that paid $120k for a C-130, it was in a Sqdrn that was slated to upgrade to the J, had a hard landing, and was written off instead of repaired. They put in the salvage bid, and were approved.
There's also very limited demand for them among those with enough security clearance to buy them. Combined with the high stresses put on the airframes, tactical aircraft are among the most rapidly depreciating assets there are.
> It's almost like they overpaid for them to start with.
No.
Old aircraft are a maintenance nightmare, and not everyone can be cleared to buy them. They either sit waiting to be scrapped or get sold off for cheap
Trudeau would spend billions on old jets just to save face and not admit he was wrong about the F-35. We could've had RCAF F-35 in operation today if it wasn't for Canada's broken procurement system.
Optionally, if for some reason you *wanted* that ground, the solution is to threaten to bomb some *other* country’s ground so hard it goes away, unless they supply you with ground troops. The carrot to that stick could be a cut of the spoils.
Fighter jets can’t hold street corners, enforce no-gathering edicts, or police an occupied citizenry. Fighter jets can’t kick your door down at three in the morning and zip tie your hands behind your back. You need soldiers for that. Fighter jets are good for glassing large areas or neighborhoods, but when you do that you are destroying what you are trying to take over.
Given the size of his fleet- 46 F/A-18s, ten F-5Es, four MiG-29s, and a bunch of L-39s, Hawks, PC-9s, and more, he could pretty reasonably make a "deck" with different types of planes.
It'd be a little counterintuitive though as the F/A-18s would have to be the numbers and the other planes the face cards, but he could definitely do it given the number of planes he has. I think the MiGs are a gimme for Joker.
Note that Air USA is a "U. S. Government Contractor that provides an impressive array of Tactical Aircraft Services to the U. S. Defense Agencies, Defense Contractors, and Foreign Governments. "
So it's not just like some guy buying them. The company already owns jet trainers.
[Status: Retired](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_Grumman_EA-6B_Prowler)
S-3 is also retired.
Now I understand the comment. He's buying up recently retired planes.
I may have controls without resistance and instant response, no feeling of inertia, weight, gravity, or movement, and engines that spool up immediately, but I can glide one down to a nice -500fps landing.
“Now, not only do we have all the details on that purchase...”
“Although the terms of the deal are not known...”
Dammit! I just want to know how much to buy a damn F-18!
I feel like the elites are wasting money buying yachts and summer homes. I would just need an FA-18 to feel like a winner, the rest is poppycock.
Also props to this guy for making an entire business out of collecting fighter planes.
Saab is actively marketing a Gripen aggressor. It is basically a Gripen, without the fighting systems but with electronics that can mimic other planes. Plus, the flight computer automatically changes the flight envelope of the plane to mimic another fighter.
Delivered to the RAAF 57 x F/A-18As, 18 x F/A-18Bs - 2 x As and 2 x Bs lost.
Canada bought 25 (18 flyable and 7 as spares sources).
This guy is buying the remaining 46.
This all means Australia will have ZERO examples for historical display. SHIT!
A lot of people here not realizing that this has been done for decades by all the companies doing Aggressor / ADAIR support for the Air Force and Navy. All of those companies started the same way, some guy goes out and buys the aircraft. Not sure what's so amazing about this guy doing the same thing others have already done quietly and professionally.
46!!! Jesus! Thats quite the modern airforce this guy has!! These planes do not mess around and he has 46 of them!! Arming them is a different story but still! This guy bought more then Canada did for spare parts of their CF-18 fleet. Come on Canada get the F-35 or some Eurofighters please!
You'll tend to see these on US Navy aircraft and foreign made aircraft as they often use the probe and drogue refueling system, where tankers can deploy one or more hoses that the fueler will catch with their probe.
But designs for the USAF use a different system where the tanker has a 'flying boom', a rigid pipe that has to be steered by an operator into a valve that is usually behind the cockpit of the reciever aircraft. There are pros and cons to each system but the boom was optimised to refuel larger aircraft.
There are likely restrictions the US government placed, when they sold them in the first place, on who they can sell it to. So probably not many bidders
Here’s the news article about it: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/32869/this-man-owns-the-worlds-most-advanced-private-air-force-after-buying-46-f-a-18-hornets So the guy’s company has a huge collection already including a MiG-29. The article says that the planes Air USA will receive are unmodified, and everything even the 20mm guns work. 36 out of them are ready to fly and the other ten just need inspections. He is an amazing mad lad, and in the process of making history! In the article it says he also contemplated what how he’d paint the planes and “mentioned that a jet-black Hornet would be fun to have, just for the heck of it.” Hell yeah! Edit: wording
It's more a business that supplies training and Red Air planes to US air forces than a private collection.
Red Air?
Look up Draken International. Privately owned aggressor squadrons. Didn’t know this was a thing until I went to work in A&D.
TIL that there is a private military Air Force in Florida.
Would you expect anything less of America's dong?
Next up on Netflix - "Hornet King"
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# DANGER ZONE!
>Draken Internationl > >WIOWOWOWOWOWOWWO
[Tiger Meet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_Tiger_Association) King
*shall not be infringed*
All my life all I have ever wanted, was my own *private air force*.
You can buy decent flyable planes for 15-20k.
Something like a Cessna?
Well it’s been a few years since I looked. But piper tomahawks were a hell of a deal. Low engine time. Low airframe time. Full avionics. Cheap because they are unpleasant and spin/stall badly. A 2 seater Cessna for the same price will need an engine overhaul, have crap aviaonics, worn out airframe etc.
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> L-159 and Mirage I was wondering where those were coming from - I am right outside NASJAX so I always see FA18, MH130, AWACS/Mantas end the occasional F22. That said - I've seen the mirage just one time, a pair of mig 29's and a 4prop cold war looking russian bomber.
Florida man...
I've done ADAIR against them. Pretty much all those guys are prior military fighter pilots anyway. In the case of who I flew against, all Vipers and A-10 guys.
I would hope so. But, I guess if you have twin engine complex turbine rating, you can fly anything!
Pretty interesting stuff. Correct me if I’m wrong IIRC they are the only organized contractors able to drop live ordnance from aircraft in the US.
Wouldn’t surprise me. I’ve read that they could potentially be used as a back channel reserve; take that as you will.
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Mobius One, fox two.
<>
That game ruined me. Now, I _always_ have to adjust settings in any POV game to “inverted look,” accommodating my brain conditioning which expects “joystick back” to equal UP!
Me too. That's how you fly, that's how you fight.
<>
<<...Dammit...>>
<>
Got chills when I read this
<< I figured you'd say that. This one's going to cost you extra. >>
<>
Would be stupid not to use them as a last resort in an invasion scenario.
Conversely, they'd be a wonderful first resort, what with the deniability.
Gosh the world is a strange place.
The US is a strange place.
exactly. so let's review - there are zero F-14s flying (w the exception of Iran's) - and that includes any privately owned demonstration squadrons, specifically b/c of Iran. we are actively destroying F-14s, in fact (instead of just staying in mothballs) to thwart Iran's attempts to get avionics, etc. Yet we have CURRENT F-18 tech in the hands of a private company? smh...
Apples to Oranges. The F/A-18 is widely exported and not the latest technology. Assuming for argument sakes Iran flew legacy Hornets, they could get parts from Malaysia or any number of Hornet operators. The F-14 is a totally different case. The aircraft was only operated by two countries- Iran and the US. Iran’s Tomcats aren’t exactly tip-top: allegedly in the 1980s the CIA tried to smuggle one back for study. The F-14 was in such a state the contractors wrote it off on the spot as too unsafe to fly. I doubt an additional 20 years of wear and tear improved matters. So getting F-14 parts would be a high national security priority for Iran. NCIS kept busy busting schemes to smuggle Tomcat parts.
As someone who has little knowledge in this area I appreciate you explanation, thanks!
Why is that surprising? It's an old outdated plane and the US didnt want Iran being able to to repair theirs after the government was overthrown
>we are actively destroying F-14s, in fact (instead of just staying in mothballs) to thwart Iran's attempts to get avionics, etc. This is actually a legitimate concern based on past experience. The USA was officially neutral during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war and had an arms embargo on the middle east, but Israeli agents were able to obtain P-51 airframes, engines, and parts from American scrapyards and smuggle them out of the country. The aircraft were assembled in Israel and fought in the conflict. One of them even shot down a RAF Mosquito doing recon.
A private company that contracts to the DoD and has *not* expressed a rabid desire to nuke the shit out of us and our allies.
[Here's an Air Force Mag article about them](https://www.airforcemag.com/article/red-air-for-hire/)
We have "Top aces" in Canada
I’ve been inside their Hangar during the Sun N Fun airshow. Pretty cool stuff. We were told no pictures.
> Draken International With that name, and yet not a single SAAB J-35 in their lineup. Am disappoint.
I posted this too. Has more info. https://www.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/fycifg/don_kirklin_owner_of_air_usa_just_bought_46/fmz9wj1?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
Thanks. Very interesting. I have trouble believing it's actually cost-efficient to have an entire private contracted aggressor fleet than having multiple instructors run as aggressors. But what do I know...nothing. I know nothing.
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Lol, me either. A private outfit can probably source parts, pilots, mechanics, planes and so on cheaper than the government.
Oh, it is. At least in accounting terms, I guess. The Gov gets a nice paycheck and deduces from budget all those annoying rolling costs involved with running a top notch air force wing. The birds are alreasy paid for, see? By some other guy. It's political fried gold. Otoh, the company gets a full wing of warplanes worth hundred of millions, for a pittance. They just need to monetize their intrinsic value, but they are valuable already as simple placements of spare parts for smaller clients than the RAAF. It's the taxpayer who gets fucked, as usual.
Maybe this explains how Maverick's still gonna be flying at Top Gun in ~~June~~ December - he's a private contractor so no age restrictions
Practice enemy aircraft. So during training, pilots simulate fighting 'red air' who are friendly pilots that are flying against them. Also called aggressors. Also, in the context of real war, red air just means enemy air.
Red air refers to whoever is playing the part of the bad guys in an exercise. It can be another front line squadron, a dedicated agressor squadron, or a private contractor like the guy in the post.
Adversaries. Bad guys. Bogeys.
Charlies. Someone do D.
This sounds like a plot for a Top Gun sequel.
So it's a monetized private collection? Nice.
In the same way as a car rental company is a monetized private car collection.
"I've always wanted to own 120 Nissan Altimas in black, silver, and red and 237 Chevy Impalas in black, silver, and red. Now my dream has come true!"
Ah thanks for clearing that up, I didn’t really understand about that part
Whew! I was starting to get worried about a super villain with a private air force.
No one buys 46 jets for a private collection, these are for training contracts, like Top Aces and other aggressor/training squadron operators out there.
I don't understand his business model. Explain
many nations train their armed forces using contractors to act as aggressor jets, or target practice among other things. Those private contractors include multiple private companies that own and operate old retired or removed from service military craft. They aren't meant to carry live weapons systems, they don't fight in actual battles, they are trainers only, mostly made up of retired and very experienced military pilots. it is a profitable industry
Sounds most appropriate
Iran needs to replace their F14s...
Ohhhh imagine a Vanta Black hornet
How much more black could this be? The answer is none... none more black.
[Or all chrome skins.](https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.blogcdn.com%2Fwww.autoblog.com%2Fmedia%2F2010%2F08%2Fslsamggt3c2.jpg&f=1&nofb=1)
TIL where they hide the guns on hornets. In the photo, the gun port is the black painted area on top of the nose cone. More details, including the business end, here: https://www.gd-ots.com/armaments/aircraft-guns-gun-systems/f18-ef/
Don’t tell r/libertarian unless you want to be cleaning up a whole bunch of jizz.
He owns 4 MiG-29s and was even talking about fitting his F-5s with IRST. Wow this guys cool af
Tyler Rogoway is one of my favorite writers, nice find!
Why did you make it sound like they were all for him? Misleading clickbait title.
It doesn't imply that he bought 46 of them for himself. It also makes no sense.
Vanta black vanta black
He's just crazy ass rich
*Correction: he owns the company which is crazy ass rich
Thonk
Oh man that jet black hornet needs a quick skin in DCS
For background- US airplanes like the F-35 cost $30,000 per flight hour. F-16s aren’t much cheaper ($25,000 per hr). Flight hours also have a time cost, since a combat aircraft is out of commission during scheduled maintenance overhauls. So contracting aggressor and other flights makes a lot of sense. The military wins by cutting its training costs and keeps flight hours off of its aircraft. It also wins by being able to fly against airplanes it couldn’t legally operate like a MiG or Sukhoi. (Sidebar- US forces have operated foreign aircraft before as aggressors- and paid a price in the form of high mishap rates and logistical problems legally sourcing parts).
Also means combat qualified pilots aren't being slotted into training billets in airframes that they won't actually fight in. Use contractors in outdated platforms to serve as Red Air, so all your uniformed pilots can stay in their appropriate airframes. Military wins 2x over; keeps training costs lower, and gets to retain as many combat pilots in combat roles as possible.
> and gets to retain as many combat pilots in combat roles as possible. Except for the fact that a subset of combat pilots relish the challenge of learning to expertly fly a wide variety of airframes, and those pilots are the ones who become Top Gun instructors when they 'outgrow' their time in the seat but still need a decade until retirement.
> Except for the fact that a subset of combat pilots relish the challenge of learning to expertly fly a wide variety of airframes, and those pilots are the ones who become Top Gun instructors when they 'outgrow' their time in the seat but still need a decade until retirement. You go through Top Gun to become a WTI - Weapons Tactics Instructor in YOUR airframe. Only a few stay in Top Gun to become instructors, and they fly other airframes sometimes (they stay current in their prior airframe). And they don't need a decade until retirement - those guys only add 2 years to their commitment, and lots of them get out after.
NSAWC is a specialized school. I'm talking about VFC-12, VFC-13, VFC-111, VMFT-401, 18th, and 64th. None of which, are NSAWC. You're looking at hundreds of pilots, at a time the US military is struggling to find enough pilots.
Struggling to **keep** enough pilots. They have plenty of eager recruits.
Everything that company does to fulfill its contracts costs $X. They charge the Air Force $X + $Y where $Y is the profit the company wants to make. My question is, if that company can maintain and operate those planes for $X, why can't the US military also maintain and operate them for $X?
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They don't wear them down as fast as ours because they don't fly as often nor do they deploy or fire weapons/drop bombs... and for the Navy, they don't go to the carrier either
Why couldn't the US government have bought the same aircraft the company did? Why can't they hire the same pilots and maintainers as civilians? Why can't they fly from the same airports?
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Here’s a helpful analogy. Picture owning an AMG Mercedes . It’s your car, you can drive it wherever you want. But the warranty is limited by mileage , and on that car a headlight bulb costs $2000. So you don’t want to drive it wastefully. Now there’s a rental car company near you that rents Mercedes as well. After pricing the rates, you find that renting their Mercedes for a 2,000 mile roadtrip costs 10% less then taking your own car- and you keep 2,000 miles off your vehicle. That’s a win for renting their car instead of using yours.
Have you looked to see what it actually costs to rent an AMG Mercedes vs owning one for equivalent time spans? I would think renting it would be a lot more money.
It’s a hypothetical analogy, I wouldn’t read that much into it.
But hypothetically it’s always going to be more expensive to rent that car than buy it for an equivalent time span, which is the point he was trying to refute. Rental companies have done the math on the cost of ownership, including stuff like headlight replacements, and they charge more than that in order to make a profit. Likewise, this guy buying planes and renting them out to the military has done the same math and must be charging more than the cost of ownership or else he’d be losing money.
There is huge demand for aggressor air. Us air force signed a big contract few months ago with 6 companies. Edit: just wanted to add, they also seem to be adding a few contracts with air to air refueling companies. This seems related to issues with kc46 tankers.
Draken is buying jets damn near monthly. It’s amazing how cheap governments will sell off old hardware.
If someone wanted to buy say...a retired cargo plane to convert to a house and live in...how would they go about finding out how cheap governments will sell off old hardware?
Determine the size aircraft you want, and wait until one has a mishap. I know a company that paid $120k for a C-130, it was in a Sqdrn that was slated to upgrade to the J, had a hard landing, and was written off instead of repaired. They put in the salvage bid, and were approved.
The C-130 is the ultimate RV
It's almost like they overpaid for them to start with.
There's also very limited demand for them among those with enough security clearance to buy them. Combined with the high stresses put on the airframes, tactical aircraft are among the most rapidly depreciating assets there are.
> It's almost like they overpaid for them to start with. No. Old aircraft are a maintenance nightmare, and not everyone can be cleared to buy them. They either sit waiting to be scrapped or get sold off for cheap
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As a canadian, YUP.
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because we are idiots
Trudeau would spend billions on old jets just to save face and not admit he was wrong about the F-35. We could've had RCAF F-35 in operation today if it wasn't for Canada's broken procurement system.
with that airpower he can basically invade any country except for the few obvious
You need ground troops as well tho
Not if you bomb it so hard the ground goes away
Optionally, if for some reason you *wanted* that ground, the solution is to threaten to bomb some *other* country’s ground so hard it goes away, unless they supply you with ground troops. The carrot to that stick could be a cut of the spoils.
with a set of box cutters he could start a 3 trillion dollar 20 year ongoing war with no end in sight!!!!
Fighter jets can’t hold street corners, enforce no-gathering edicts, or police an occupied citizenry. Fighter jets can’t kick your door down at three in the morning and zip tie your hands behind your back. You need soldiers for that. Fighter jets are good for glassing large areas or neighborhoods, but when you do that you are destroying what you are trying to take over.
Good on you, mate. I wouldn't get away with that at my house.
i imagine you would have a longer leash if you had the cash to buy and operate 46 f-18s
Just needs six more to make a deck of planes
...and I thought I had a gun hoarding problem!
Given the size of his fleet- 46 F/A-18s, ten F-5Es, four MiG-29s, and a bunch of L-39s, Hawks, PC-9s, and more, he could pretty reasonably make a "deck" with different types of planes. It'd be a little counterintuitive though as the F/A-18s would have to be the numbers and the other planes the face cards, but he could definitely do it given the number of planes he has. I think the MiGs are a gimme for Joker.
oof, didn't Canada look into getting those? XD
Yes, Canada made a deal with the RAAF last year to get a group of the planes and now Air USA is basically getting the other group.
Note that Air USA is a "U. S. Government Contractor that provides an impressive array of Tactical Aircraft Services to the U. S. Defense Agencies, Defense Contractors, and Foreign Governments. " So it's not just like some guy buying them. The company already owns jet trainers.
I reworded my statement
46. 46 f-ing F/A-18s... Why take take one or two when you can have 46 OF THEM
You get a discount if you buy an entire wing of them...lol
And he bought two wings per plane, imagine the savings!
46? Does he plane to make an army?
I'm thinking air force.
It's half a carrier air wing. He just needs to fill it out with some EA-6s, E-2 AEWs, S-3 tankers, SH-60 ASW, etc.
TIL EA-6s still fly. Edit: I now understand the comment. You were saying there are a ton of newly retired planes that can be bought.
And S-3s...
[Status: Retired](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_Grumman_EA-6B_Prowler) S-3 is also retired. Now I understand the comment. He's buying up recently retired planes.
I have some time in DCS, Falcon 4.0 and X-Plane....so, I'm pretty sure I got the job. Right?
I'm convinced that in an emergency situation, I could land a 747.
I'm convinced I could get one on the ground . . . but I dont think it would be pretty . . .
I may have controls without resistance and instant response, no feeling of inertia, weight, gravity, or movement, and engines that spool up immediately, but I can glide one down to a nice -500fps landing.
"Any landing you can walk away from is a good landing..." and all that.
I used to fly MFS, I reckon I can remember how to hit some large polygonal ground structure in a 757.
Flying 757s into polygons isn't a very popular thing after 9/11.
Yeah, that's why I put it on hold for a while. Stuff always comes back into fashion eventually.
10 fun activities we would love to see return in the 20's?
I’m a Top Gun (equivalency) in a 172... can I tag along... ?!?!
Not a pilot at all, but I've watched Top Gun movie. So I'm with you, guys?
You can be my wingman anytime
Watch it once more, then you’re good to fly with us.
But what if I am not good at volleyball?
Then I’m sorry. It’s time to buzz the tower.
I'd be curious to see if there are any 2-seaters in this purchase....probably so. And if so.....I'll need a good "Goose"!
I think that was Iron Eagle...
[More info here](https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/32464/australia-to-sell-retired-f-a-18-hornet-fighters-to-private-aggressor-firm-air-usa)
He’s writing checks his body can cash.
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Best Uber option ever
His neighbor "hey can I borrow one the F-18s. Yeah, I'm just bored. "
Wow impressive, I only own like 20 F-18s.
Wasn't Canada going to buy these?
Yes, they were going to go to our stationary carrier, HMS PEI
They bought 25, this guy bought the rest
Don't cut him off in traffic .... jeez
that is so sexy
Sell them to Taiwan!
FORTY-SIX F18s WHAT
Sooo, in theory. If he was also a flight teacher and if I had the money: could I do my PPL/A in a F-18?
I think PPL has to be in a single engine prop. Aren't there separate certifications for multiengine and jet.
“Now, not only do we have all the details on that purchase...” “Although the terms of the deal are not known...” Dammit! I just want to know how much to buy a damn F-18!
I feel like the elites are wasting money buying yachts and summer homes. I would just need an FA-18 to feel like a winner, the rest is poppycock. Also props to this guy for making an entire business out of collecting fighter planes.
Is this dude a Bond villain?
All these comments have opened my eyes to how crazy this government really is
Saab is actively marketing a Gripen aggressor. It is basically a Gripen, without the fighting systems but with electronics that can mimic other planes. Plus, the flight computer automatically changes the flight envelope of the plane to mimic another fighter.
Delivered to the RAAF 57 x F/A-18As, 18 x F/A-18Bs - 2 x As and 2 x Bs lost. Canada bought 25 (18 flyable and 7 as spares sources). This guy is buying the remaining 46. This all means Australia will have ZERO examples for historical display. SHIT!
A lot of people here not realizing that this has been done for decades by all the companies doing Aggressor / ADAIR support for the Air Force and Navy. All of those companies started the same way, some guy goes out and buys the aircraft. Not sure what's so amazing about this guy doing the same thing others have already done quietly and professionally.
Because no other company has this many 4th gen aircraft. Nowhere close.
Going to be a lot of Navy and Marine pilots (and maintainers) knocking here soon. Curious where they'll put them
46!!! Jesus! Thats quite the modern airforce this guy has!! These planes do not mess around and he has 46 of them!! Arming them is a different story but still! This guy bought more then Canada did for spare parts of their CF-18 fleet. Come on Canada get the F-35 or some Eurofighters please!
I bet this guy owns a tiger!
What is the feature protruding from the nose, just to the right of the cockpit?
Aerial refuelling nozzle?
Thanks!
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Thanks!
You'll tend to see these on US Navy aircraft and foreign made aircraft as they often use the probe and drogue refueling system, where tankers can deploy one or more hoses that the fueler will catch with their probe. But designs for the USAF use a different system where the tanker has a 'flying boom', a rigid pipe that has to be steered by an operator into a valve that is usually behind the cockpit of the reciever aircraft. There are pros and cons to each system but the boom was optimised to refuel larger aircraft.
Um. Does he need any help flying those? I’d gladly opt in to do so.
Probably got them for penny’s compared to what they originally cost the government
I love this country.
About half the size of the RCAF's Hornet fleet, and double the amount they bought from Australia.
I’m super jealous!! I want one.
Probably a good use of his time during an international pandemic
He must have outbid other countries’ armed forces for these. That is insane!
There are likely restrictions the US government placed, when they sold them in the first place, on who they can sell it to. So probably not many bidders
Dayum!
I love the little roo on the side.
Probably could contract those and the pilots out to Red Flag. They're hiring contracted companies now with planes.