Back in the day, especially during WWII, they would have packed something in that hole and slapped 100 mile an hour tape over it or screwed a curved piece of metal over that and got it back in the air, ASAP. They said this plane won't be back in the air until Monday.
These Canadair CL-415 firefighting aircraft aren't even owned by the U.S. They are leased from Ontario, Canada. $5.5 million to lease two Super Scoopers for the autumn months. The county also pays $1,100 per hour to operate the aircraft.
Hell, in Bosnia we would load on C-130s and C-141s and choppers that had multiple small holes in the fuselage and wings from small arms fire to beat the hell out of an area, if the motors were turning and it wasn't leaking fuel and the pilots weren't dead, we were go to go!
ReplyDeleteI've seen so many photos and read so many stories of aircraft in different wars that I didn't think would get off the ground that carried crews and troops over many miles of ocean and land to come home 'on a wing and a prayer'. Those were men back then.
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