A/C Graveyard tour USA recommendation req

[Mr Falcon]

Please can any of you recommend a tour of an aircraft graveyard in USA ?

Planning to fly into Phoenix and do a graveyard 1-2 days while driving leisurely between Phoenix and SFO. Open to suggestions though .

Thanks in advance for any advice.

Mr F.

[Hartington]

I suppose it depends on your interests but arguably this Tours (http://www.pimaair.org/view.php?pg=15) is "the daddy" of them all. Trouble is that Tucson is going away from San Francisco from Phoenix; only a couple of hours but the wrong way!

Mojave is more on your route but I have no idea if it has tours. The only other place I know is Roswell (yes, that Roswell) in New Mexico which was mainly, if not wholly, civilian when I passed a good few years ago but that is definitely the wrong way from Phoenix.

[Duchess_Driver]

Kingman, Az.
Victorville, Ca.

If Tucson is in the wrong direction, Roswell, NM is also completely out.

There is more than DM down Tucson way... Pinal for example.

Been a few years since I did the desert, so whats in storage now I have no idea. Beware, VCV is difficult to view from the outside. Mojave is, from all accounts, a patch on what it used to be.

Cactuswings seems not to have been updated recently.
Just found Field Guide To Aircraft Boneyards (http://www.johnweeks.com/boneyard/) (not had a chance to check it out)

HTH

DD

[ConstantFlyer]

For lovers of Soviet aircraft types, there are plenty of 'graveyard' aprons at otherwise active airports across Russia, Ukraine, and the other former USSR republics.

Access is not always easy, but the extensive museum at Kyiv-Zhulyany is a good place to start. All of Moscow's airports have swathes of Soviet types parked up - especially Domodedovo and Vnukovo; but Novosibirsk, Minsk, Tashkent, Baku and Yerevan also have a good selection.

[Jn14:6]

Been about 8 years since I went there, but lots to see around TUC/PHX area.
TUC itself has a sizeable airliner storage facility, along with an active F-16 unit.
Just down the road is Davis-Monthan, and next to that is the amazing Pima Air Museum, which you must not miss. The museum also offers 1 hour tours of D-M. Although it only scratches the surface of this vast facility, it is well worth doing. Book ahead as the tours can get busy. Visit the museuem's web site for more info.
A great way to see everything at D-M is to hire a Cessna 172 from one of several "photo flights" operators at Tucson. ( I used Sonoran Wings, located not far from the tower, and they were great. They take you overhead, orbiting the facility, so have your camcorder ready! You can also arrange to transit across to the airliner facility at Marana, Pinal Air Park, which is otherwise inaccessible from the road.
Also near to Tucson is Avra valley (Connies).
TUC-PHX is around a 2 hour drive.Near to PHX is Mesa, with lots of interesting aircraft. I believe you can still arrange a flight in a B-17!
Airliner storage at Goodyear is only a short drive from PHX.
And the list goes on!
Enjoy your trip, I sure did!

[paulc]

In October this year myself and a mate did an overflight of Davis Monthan / Marana using an operator based at Ryan Field in Tucson - weekends re usually better as the DM base itself is not very active so overflights can be done at a lower altitude. From Ryan field you will pass over Tucson itself and the Pima Museum - we also did a transit to Marana Pinal airpark with a couple of circuit / missed approaches. An excellent way to see the extent of DM and good fun.

There is a 3 times daily bus tour from the Pima Museum which is worth doing and lasts just over an hour.

[pasir]

This may be of interest. The 1946 film - The Best Years of our lives -
features a huge US a/c graveyard of mostly WW2 surplus. I think it may be near a place named in the film as Boone City, although this could be a fictional nameplace but is said to be based on Cincinatti Ohio. Whether or not the graveyard still exists I am not sure.
The film sometimes comes around on the box and is also available on DVD.

[AtomKraft]

Go to Pima Air Museum in Tucson- right next to AMARC. Great museum.

They do a tour around AMARC every day- that's the actual Boneyard with about 5000 aircraft in it.

If you're really keen take a slab of beer and see if one of the scrappy owners will let you wander about... That's the real deal.

[englishkev]

If you're really keen take a slab of beer and see if one of the scrappy owners will let you wander about... That's the real deal

Yes, but watch out for the rattlers and Scorpions.

[AndoniP]

AMARG / Pima museum gets a thumbs up from me.

Visited it in 2010 and the guy talking over the mic was an ex USAF with plenty of great stories and anecdotes the whole journey. A wonderful array of aircraft in the boneyard also. Pity you can't walk around them but then again the only way to cover any kind of ground is by coach without stopping, there's so much of it.

[Hotel Tango]

Mr Falcon, be advised that contrary to the information provided by Duchess_Driver (at least the way I read it) guided tours of Victorville are not available. You either drive mainly off road around the perimeter (aircraft are still quite distant in some areas and there's generally lots of heat haze too), or you charter an aircraft from one of the nearby local airfields.

[Duchess_Driver]

You either drive mainly off road around the perimeter (aircraft are still quite distant in some areas and there's generally lots of heat haze too), or you charter an aircraft from one of the nearby local airfields.

Which is why I said...

Beware, VCV is difficult to view from the outside.

;)

[Liffy 1M]

This may be of interest. The 1946 film - The Best Years of our lives -
features a huge US a/c graveyard of mostly WW2 surplus. I think it may be near a place named in the film as Boone City, although this could be a fictional nameplace but is said to be based on Cincinatti Ohio. Whether or not the graveyard still exists I am not sure.
The film sometimes comes around on the box and is also available on DVD.

Some scenes were at Stillwater OK but most appear to have been shot at Chino CA. Aero Vintage Books: The Best Years of Our Lives (http://www.aerovintage.com/bestyrs.htm)

[Mister.E]

I think you would kick yourself if you did not visit Pima only being a couple of hours away although they do not do the AMARC tours at the weekend. I was there last year and stopped by the Titan Missile Museum as well which was recommended by the Pima staff.