Vandalism, security measure, or something else?

Peter,

I did the tour January 2nd and someone on the bus asked the same questions.

The docent used a lot more words, but said basically the markings are destroyed so that they don't turn up on ebay.

As far as the guillotined parts, I think he said they have to lie there for 90 days for treaty compliance.

Now don't ask me why, if those parts are so collectable, the gubmint doesn't sell them!

Mike Z

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"Peter Duniho" wrote in message ...
I was in Tucson over the holidays. At the AFB there (Davis-Monthan), they
keep a lot of aircraft in storage. At the south end of the base, several
recent arrivals were parked near the fence. For some reason, the "U.S. Air
Force" markings on the side had been torn up.

Does anyone have any idea why this was done? There were eight or ten
airplanes, all the same make and model, all with the same kind of
defacement.

You can find a picture of one of the airplanes he
http://www.nwlink.com/~peted/Davis-MonthanAirplanes.jpg

(Bonus points for anyone who can remind me what kind of airplane they
are...I want to say C-141, but I could be way off base).

Pete

"Mike Z." wrote in message
ink.net...
Peter,

I did the tour January 2nd and someone on the bus asked the same
questions.

The docent used a lot more words, but said basically the markings are
destroyed so that they don't turn up on ebay.

Weird. What's the stop someone from taking undamaged metal from the plane
and painting "U.S. Air Force" on it? Or do they just expect buyers to know
that the markings are damaged this way, and so know that anything like that
for sale must be a forgery? And what about the rest of the airplane? There
are any number of other parts collectors would be happy with. Why focus on
the markings?

Anyway, thanks for passing that along. It still doesn't make much sense to
me, but at least it explains the intent.

Pete