Originally Posted by
camelspyyder
What the papers didn't mention was the ludicrous expense of having the aircraft built and configured as tankers, and then flown directly to another facility to be reconfigured immediately for Thomas Cook, which is what I believe happened with the first "civilianised" AT 330.
No - not ridiculous - they were bought as tankers and we'd have looked REALLY dumb if a couple of months after delivery we'd needed them and then had to do the conversion
Sure it costs to have the capability - renting them out was never supposed to cover those costs - just reduce them while still having the aircraft if we need them