This was posted on the Flying Tiger Website last night: As some of you know, she was within a week of being scrapped when a white knight came along and rescued her. The white kight came in the form of a heavy lift Australian airline that plans to use her in Australia and for inter island carriage in the Southwest Pacific. She has been sitting on the ramp at a Bournemoth, England maintenance facility for about 5-6 years. The facility finally ordered her removed or be scrapped so the reprieve came just in time. The engines have been run several times and she's been taxi tested. The avionics are all working now but that was a problem. Sitting on the ramp at a costal city took it's toll. Some canon plugs had to be completely re-pinned. An engine was found in Africa so the #1 engine was replaced. Another engine will be picked up enroute to Cairns, Australia. The Planned routing will be through Middle East with a few stops. The center tank, tank 6, will not be used so range will be reduced. The -44 is a very long range airplane so this shouldn't be a problem and should still provide a range of 3-4 thousand miles. The Captain has over 10,000 hours in the plane. The FO has little -44 experience but the engineer has thousands of hours. The crew's average age is 67. Malcolm will accompany the flight as Loadmaster. He has over 15,000 hours in the -44. In a brief email today, he told me that she's ready to fly and his bags are packed. Perhaps they're a bit ahead of schedule; the departure from Bournemouth had been set for the 15th. They plan to takeoff and remain in the area long enough to determine that all systems are up to the task and, if so, they plan to head for Australia. She now has Philippine registry RP-C 8023. She was N447T when we flew her prior to being converted into a guppy.
Full text:
http://www.flyingtigerline.org/_06/00000617.htm
Any comments and confirmations welcome...