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Davis-Monthan
AFB; aka the 'Boneyard'!
Dreams are made of this.
For as
long as I can remember the "Boneyard" in the desert has been a fascination, a
place where titans of the air rest before going on their way to the aviation afterlife.
When the chance came a few years ago to visit Tucson, Arizona (and my wife let me out of
her sight to find the facility) I was finally able to see this modern marvel. Since that
first visit I have been back twice more, each time taking in more of the changing scenery.
The most recent visit took place at the end of November 1999.
The Davis-Monthan airbase sits just inside
the city limits of the quiet southern Arizona city of Tucson. You will quickly bump into
the air base fences whenever you head south through the city. The only good road to cross
through the base from the city is Kolb Road, which conveniently connects with Valencia,
the road that runs by both the Airport and the Pima Air & Space museum. From the Santa
Catalina mountains in the north, the base is a vast tan coloured space in the centre of
the urban expanse of Tucson, but from ground level you see only a small percentage of the
base and its content.
For many years the US Air Force ran tours of
the base and the AMARC, née "Boneyard", so on the most recent visit I looked up
the Air Base phone number and called to book my place. After being redirected twice I
finally found myself speaking to a woman at the Pima Air & Space Museum (PASM) (Tel.
520 618-4806), who booked me onto one of the new base tours. The new schedule is much
easier to handle and fit in to a trip: Monday to Friday (Except US Federal Holidays) with
five tours each day. The PASM web site has all the
details of the tours, including the costs.
The Air Force calls the desert facility
"Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Center" (AMARC), the rest of us call it
"The Boneyard." We are probably both right: this place serves a special purpose
to US Forces keeping many types flying long after production ceases, however, many of the
aircraft also have all the hallmarks of being skeletal.
View from the fence
There
are several roads that have views of the "Boneyard," three good ones are: Kolb
Road (dangerous but possible); Escalante and Irvington. There are other roads around the
base that offer views of the private scrap yards, which in themselves can be quite
interesting. A tall wire fence separates the base from the riff-raff aircraft enthusiasts,
but is easy to see through and in places look over: rental cars are useful camera
platforms. Escalante & Kolb front a part of the facility that seems to be home to the
most recent entrants. The area you can see is in the order of two-thirds ofa mile square,
and is temporary home to some 500 - 800 aircraft at any given time. This part of the base
is quite active, in geological terms, as aircraft move in-and-out of here in short order.
Currently the area is home to A-10s, F-14s, F-15s,
F-16s, P-3s C-130s and more F-4s than you can
shake a stick at.
The view from Irvington is quite different.
This borders a part of the facility that is home to guests that will not be leaving on
their own wings. Many types adorn the land. Most aircraft are propped up on concrete
stands, there to allow the aircraft to be raided for parts. There seems to be little order
to the scene, I saw RB-57s mixed with F-111s
and F-15s, all mixed in with P-3s and KC-135s. You will not bore of picking out rare and unusual aircraft. Bring good binoculars!
A bus ride in the sun
There
are only three ways to view the aircraft at the heart of the Davis-Monthan facility: fly
over the place (tough unless you're riding in on an F-15); from a satellite (see Microsoft
Terraserver, to view the US Geological Survey's images on the subject); or by Bus from
the PASM. While wealthier than some, I cannot afford an F-15 nor a KH-12 Spy Satellite, so
I mixed it with twenty-four other fanatics and rode the bus.
The trip brings you into the AMARC facility
by the back door, off Kolb Road. We were driven passed a line of
example aircraft, a line-up showing the most common aircraft at the facility and a few
unique items (like a D-21 drone for an SR-71/A-12 and Century series
fighters). The tour then wandered through a mile or more of assorted fighters (mostly
A-10s, F-16s and F-4s) and P-3s. A couple of German Airforce Tornados
were also amid the throng to give an international flavour to the scenery. We stopped a
short distance from one of the Maintenance sheds. The shed was interesting for only one
thing: six EF-111 Ravens. It is now just after the Kosovo crisis and the publishing of
various reports on how little EW support US and NATO forces had over Yugoslavia, and here
at the AMARC they are dusting off the Ravens. Coincidence?
The bus recommenced its travels, passing a
cleaning shed where a number of F-4s were being showered before going on to become missile
fodder as target drones. We re-passed the entrance, and proceeded across the Kolb Road
bridge and into the largest part of the site. Lines of Boeing 707s, most tail-less,
disappeared over a low ridge on the right of the bus's path. To the left were many
aircraft, most in advanced stages of cannibalisation. A row of RB-57s here, a line of
T-38s there, dozens of F-111s; Navy patrol aircraft, including Hawkeyes, F-14s, an A-6,
even a line of F-106s. A massive line-up of UH-1s, kept here because
their sale might precipitate a collapse in the civil helicopter industry, drab green
examples from the Vietnam era forming a dark line over the same ridge the 707s are trying
to hide behind. Then the leviathans of the site; 100 plus B-52s, all
that remain of nearly 400, slowly being destroyed as part of the Strategic Arms Limitation
Treaties, and the force reduction treaties. These bombers are chopped up using a 130 ton
blade, then left for a week or more to allow the Russians to photograph and confirm their
destruction. Just beyond the remaining Buffs, where the bus turned to make its way back to
the museum, are two parks of odd looking equipment. The equipment is the tooling and jigs
for the B-1 and B-2 bomber production lines. One day those bombers will take up residence
under the clear blue Arizona sky, and there might still be B-52s to keep them company.
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