Dynamic Aviation Columbine II and Rod Lewis Bataan C-121A's

[bdk]

Ralph Pettersen has reported that the restoration of Columbine II has been halted and the entire crew laid off

That is really disappointing to hear. They had been making great progress.

Labor of love for the founder who recently passed away, perhaps not for the new management.

Last edited by bdk on Mon Feb 08, 2021 12:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[bdk]

Does anyone know how the work on Bataan is progressing?

Still being worked on as of a few weeks back according to one of the mechanics. A lot of the component parts are in the restoration shop so progress isn't really apparent looking at the carcass sitting outside. It will sure be nice when done!

[RyanShort1]

Without being political, any smaller companies in the oil business are probably halting anything that is not an integral part of their operations until they see how things are going to shake out over the next year or so. I suspect you will others within the warbird world start doing the same thing fairly soon.

I think that is an understatement...

[wendovertom]

Wow - i hope things work out so that the restoration can continue.

As an aside - what in the heck was Lufthansa doing to spend $156 million dollars and NOT get thier plane restored?! it seems to me that there was some funny business going on somewhere.

Tom P.

[LysanderUK]

Wow - i hope things work out so that the restoration can continue.

As an aside - what in the heck was Lufthansa doing to spend $156 million dollars and NOT get thier plane restored?! it seems to me that there was some funny business going on somewhere.

Tom P.

New management came in at Lufthansa and saw how much money was being spent for so little progress, and immediately pulled the plug. The story goes that the guys working on the project were doing the job as slow as possible for an easy living, complete it too soon and they'd be out of a job. Oversight from the previous Luft' management must have been pretty awful if they didn't pick this up. End result is that the airframe was cut up to transport back to Europe by road and sea, so she will never fly again, and truckloads of useful parts went to scrap. There are some pretty upsetting pics out on the web of all these parts being disposed of. Lufthansa also suspended all heritage ops, so the Ju52 and Bf108 no longer fly. All in all, a disaster.

Best wishes to anyone restoring a Connie, not an easy or cheap thing to do. Here's hoping the work on Columbine II can resume at some point.

[wendovertom]

Wow - i hope things work out so that the restoration can continue.

As an aside - what in the heck was Lufthansa doing to spend $156 million dollars and NOT get thier plane restored?! it seems to me that there was some funny business going on somewhere.

Tom P.

New management came in at Lufthansa and saw how much money was being spent for so little progress, and immediately pulled the plug. The story goes that the guys working on the project were doing the job as slow as possible for an easy living, complete it too soon and they'd be out of a job. Oversight from the previous Luft' management must have been pretty awful if they didn't pick this up. End result is that the airframe was cut up to transport back to Europe by road and sea, so she will never fly again, and truckloads of useful parts went to scrap. There are some pretty upsetting pics out on the web of all these parts being disposed of. Lufthansa also suspended all heritage ops, so the Ju52 and Bf108 no longer fly. All in all, a disaster.

Best wishes to anyone restoring a Connie, not an easy or cheap thing to do. Here's hoping the work on Columbine II can resume at some point.

Wow - what a sad, sad waste - to quote RUSH, "people are basically decent - its just the exceptions we read about in the paper everyday".

Tom P.

[jcochr50]

MUCH Better news from Ralph Pettersen today regarding Columbine II:

http://www.conniesurvivors.com/1-connie ... FEB11-2021

Thank you once again Ralph, for obtaining the updated news for us.

[Thomas_Mac]

Latest Connie news update shows that Lewis Air Legends VC-121A 'Bataan" has made it inside

http://www.conniesurvivors.com/1-connie_news.htm