Private Air Force

[AeroplaneDriver]

Lots of Whiffy potential here as far as color schemes and adding advanced avionics to older jets.

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

[McColm]

Impressive,  I wonder if anyone has thought about returning the BAe Harriers back into service. That and the mixture of Yak-38s plus a
Yak-141/41 or two. CRAB Airways gets to fly again!

[PR19_Kit]

Impressive,  I wonder if anyone has thought about returning the BAe Harriers back into service. That and the mixture of Yak-38s plus a
Yak-141/41 or two. CRAB Airways gets to fly again!

I thought our 'Government' had given them away sold them to the US Marines as spares? 

[jcf]

Impressive,  I wonder if anyone has thought about returning the BAe Harriers back into service. That and the mixture of Yak-38s plus a
Yak-141/41 or two. CRAB Airways gets to fly again!

I thought our 'Government' had given them away sold them to the US Marines as spares? 

Yep, they bought 72 for about $180 million. Evidently it came down to a choice between retaining
5 squadrons of Tornadoes vs. 2 squadrons of Harriers. The decision was driven by a serious budget
deficit of £35 billion going forward caused primarily by cost overruns, along with mismanagement
and technical issues on various projects creating program delays and the cost of ongoing operations
in Afghanistan etc. The new attack sub program being the biggest culprit.

According to some sources a number of the ex-British Harrier IIs in storage at Davis-Monthan
are mostly intact because the USMC retired their fleet in 2020 rather than 2025 as was originally
planned.

[PR19_Kit]

IIRC the Nimrod MRA4 programme and the continuance of the Nimrod MR2s was involved in the 'calculations' somewhere too, if there were any calculations of course.

And we ended up being an island nation without a single MR aircraft to our name. 

Yeah, yeah, I know, this is getting near politics, but then almost everything is these days.

[Flyer]

So that's what happened to the RAAF Hornets. Shame the Australian government didn't put at least one of them into a museum, or give one over to HARS for airshow displays, they served the RAAF so well for so long...

[Nick]

So that's what happened to the RAAF Hornets. Shame the Australian government didn't put at least one of them into a museum, or give one over to HARS for airshow displays, they served the RAAF so well for so long...

There's a pair at or going to the Australian War Memorial in Canberra. A21-022 and A21-040.

https://australianaviation.com.au/2020/12/classic-f-a-18a-hornets-handed-over-to-war-memorial/

[Flyer]

So that's what happened to the RAAF Hornets. Shame the Australian government didn't put at least one of them into a museum, or give one over to HARS for airshow displays, they served the RAAF so well for so long...

There's a pair at or going to the Australian War Memorial in Canberra. A21-022 and A21-040.

https://australianaviation.com.au/2020/12/classic-f-a-18a-hornets-handed-over-to-war-memorial/

Oh... Well good, I retract my whinge 

[McColm]

Impressive,  I wonder if anyone has thought about returning the BAe Harriers back into service. That and the mixture of Yak-38s plus a
Yak-141/41 or two. CRAB Airways gets to fly again!

I thought our 'Government' had given them away sold them to the US Marines as spares? 

Yep, they bought 72 for about $180 million. Evidently it came down to a choice between retaining
5 squadrons of Tornadoes vs. 2 squadrons of Harriers. The decision was driven by a serious budget
deficit of £35 billion going forward caused primarily by cost overruns, along with mismanagement
and technical issues on various projects creating program delays and the cost of ongoing operations
in Afghanistan etc. The new attack sub program being the biggest culprit.

According to some sources a number of the ex-British Harrier IIs in storage at Davis-Monthan
are mostly intact because the USMC retired their fleet in 2020 rather than 2025 as was originally
planned.

I would have thought that the British could have refurbished a few of the USMC Harriers as a stopgap until the first batch of F-35Bs are in service. I mean the Yak-141/41 Freestyle underwent the same problems as the F-35 and it has the potential to become a two seater. Of course you'd have to change the two lifting engines at the front to one that can pivot or just make the fuselage slightly wider so that they can both pivot whilst in flight mode. Or is this a whiff that I have just created?