"Tom Cooper" wrote in message
...

"William Wright" wrote in message
news:kPehb.721214$uu5.119765@sccrnsc04...

"Tom Cooper" wrote in message
...
snip
Iran has also a sizeable tanker fleet (Boeing 707-2J9Cs and Boeing
747-2J9C), and by far the largest transport fleet in the area (Boeing
747Fs,
snip
Boeing converted three 747s to tankers but they were converted from
ex-Eastern, ex-TWA 747-131s. Pictures of 5-8105 and 5-8103 can be found
on
the web. It appears that both of these aircraft currently have civil
registrations and are operated by Saha Air Cargo. I don't the about the
third one for sure. It was probably 5-8104 which crashed in Spain or
5-8107.
The for 747-200Fs are 747-2J9. All four have civil registrations, three
being operated by Saha Air Cargo and one is parked.

See the page 294 of "Iran - Iraq War in the Air":
- the example that crashed near Madrid, in 1976, was 5-283; that one has
never got five-digit serial, introduced with the arrival of the first
F-14s
in Iran, in January of the same year;

Yes 5-283 was lost before receiving 5-8104 as a serial. A bit of notational
laziness on my part. 5-280 thru 5-287 reserialed as 5-8101 thru 5-8108
except for 5-283.

- other examples rebuilt into -2J9C or delivered in the -2J9F (these were
tankers too) configuration we 5-8103, 5-8105, 5-8107, 5-8113,
(probably)

If the 747-2J9F frieghters were converted to tankers it must have been post
delivery. I have not seen any pictures of them. The only ones I have ever
seen are 747-131s converted to 747-100F and in the pictures they are clearly
model 100s.

5-8114, and 5-8115. The whereabouts of the last two are unknown to me; the
5-8113, for example, has spent most of its career with the Saha - and this
did not prevent it from acting as a tanker and a flying command post for
the
"H-3 Blitz" operation...

5-8114 and 5-8115 were last EP-SHA and EP-SHH. I don't understand what you
mean by 5-5113 though. It only spent a year as Iran Air EP-NHN in the 1980s
until finally becoming Saha EP-SHB in1991. Or are you saying that Saha
operated the aircraft with a military serial number?


Don't forget that the main customer of the Saha Air is - and always was -
the IRIAS (i.e. all the three branches of the military): after all, that
was
also the background on which this company was founded.

Tom Cooper
Co-Author:
Iran-Iraq War in the Air, 1980-1988:
http://www.acig.org/pg1/content.php
and,
Iranian F-4 Phantom II Units in Combat:
http://www.osprey-publishing.co.uk/t...hp/title=S6585