The secrets of the desert aircraft ‘boneyards’

[Sherman A1]

f you find yourself driving down South Kolb Road in the Arizona city of Tucson, you’ll find the houses give way to a much more unusual view; rows of military aircraft, still and silent, spread out under the baking desert sun. On and on, everything from enormous cargo lifters to lumbering bombers, Hercules freighters and the F-14 Tomcat fighters made famous in Top Gun.

This is Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, run by the 309th Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group (309 AMARG). It’s home to some 4,400 aircraft, arranged over nearly 2,600 acres (10.5 sq km). Some look like they were parked only a few hours ago, others are swathed in protective coverings to keep out the sand and dust. Inside the facilities' hangars, other planes have been reduced to crates of spare parts, waiting to be sent out to other bases in the US or across the world to help other aircraft take to the air again. To those who work here, Davis-Monthan is known by a far less prosaic name, one more in keeping with the Wild West folklore from Arizona’s earlier days. They call it The Boneyard.

Davis-Monthan is not the only aircraft boneyard in the world, but it is by far the biggest. The climatic conditions in Arizona – dry heat, low humidity, little rain – mean aircraft take a lot longer to rust and degrade.

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140918-secrets-of-the-aircraft-boneyards

[Boom Sound 416]

1. I thought the boneyards were

About negotiated arms reductions mostly with the USSR. That's why they park them in the desert, so they can be satellite verified as opposed to scrapped.

[hack89]

2. One of many functions

the military was parking aircraft in the desert well before any arms reduction treaties.

[Sherman A1]

3. Precisely

The boneyards go back to the immediate Post WWII period demobilization. There are photos of what appears to be endless rows of aircraft used, then no longer needed after the war.

[Boom Sound 416]

4. ...

[panader0]

5. My dad was stationed there when I was in third and fourth grade.

I was seven or eight years old. Around 1958. My friends and I would crawl under the fence and climb into the old B-24's.
What a hoot. When I venture up to Tucson these days, I take the Kolb Rd exit off I-10 and there are more planes all the time.

[Xyzse]

6. Is it allowed to visit in one of those, just for fun?

[Sherman A1]

7. I suspect not

but, one could check on the web for more information.

[Xyzse]

8. Ok!

I mean, it would be fun to run around those grounds. Get in one of those planes, without any fuel, but go in the cockpit and play act being a fighter pilot.