The Scrapyards

THE SCRAPYARDS

First published in Great Britain in 2023 by Tempest Books an imprint of Mortons Books Ltd Media Centre Morton Way Horncastle LN9 6JR www.mortonsbooks.co.uk

Copyright © Tempest Books 2023

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording, or any information storage retrieval system without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

ISBN 978-1-911704-10-2

The right of Graham Robson to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

INTRODUCTION

After the end of World War Two, the United States Air Force established a vast storage site at Davis-Monthan AFB on the outskirts of Tucson, Arizona, to accommodate the growing number of surplus airframes returned from combat theatres around the world, pending a decision on their future. Over the years, the site was managed by various units and commands until 1965, when it was given its own identity as the MASDC (Military Aircraft Storage and Disposition Center) and is now named the 309th AMARG (Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Command).

A consequence of the storage centre’s establishment was the creation of numerous metal recovery businesses around its edges, where thousands of airframes were recycled into aluminium ingots for re-use in industry. This expanded into aircraft parts recovery and airframe restoration, which continues to this day.

I first visited the area in October 1982 and it had a profound effect on me. I have returned many times since, such is my fascination with the subject. I hope this book can do it justice.

This book is intended as a pictorial overview of the Davis-Monthan ‘scrapyards’, as they became commonly known, during the period of the 1980s. I have illustrated the various ‘scrapyard’ locations in the order in

which I first visited; the same route others might have taken when driving around the base perimeter for the first time.

Each yard is described with pictures from October 1982 to establish a baseline of reference and I have included as many pictures as possible from the time, though not everything from each yard is shown –Kodachrome film was much too expensive for a teenager in those days!

Views from later visits during the 1980s are also shown, in order to give a flavour of what had changed in the passing of time and help illustrate the ‘fluidity’ of the yards’ contents, which provided a constantly changing scene around the MASDC perimeter. The timeframe for this book is specifically the 1980s, with illustrations and descriptions pertaining to that time period only. Many airframes shown here remained well into the 1990s and beyond, joined by many more in future years, all with further stories to be told of their resurrection or demise, which I hope can be shown in a future volume covering the 1990s.

The illustrations in this book are all my own (with the exception of three from Mike Bursell, kindly reproduced with his permission) and for each location, where possible, begin with views from that first, October 1982, visit. Subsequent pictures cover later visits and help to show the changes that occurred within the various yards over the following years.

Anyone’s first visit to Davis-Monthan AFB is, without doubt, a memorable occasion. The first action for most ‘first time’ visitors was a drive along the fence line, to take in the spectacle of thousands of retired aircraft stored in the desert. This

MASDC

was most easily achieved by heading eastbound from the main base entrance and driving along East Escalante Road, with lines of aircraft on the right side of the road, across the street from suburban houses!

By turning right at the end of Escalante, onto South Kolb Road – southbound –one could follow the base perimeter fence on the right-hand side, where the multitude of B-52s gave way to line upon line of S-2 Trackers, C-130 Hercules and more.

A further turn, left onto East Irvington Road – eastbound, and the spectacle continued on the right of the street, where wide off-road dirt areas allowed unlimited views across the vast parking areas.

The picture above shows what was my first view from the perimeter fence on East Escalante Road, which runs east-west on the northern edge of the storage area, with suburban housing directly across the street. Here the lines of early model Vietnam War veteran B-52s, viewed at sunrise on 6th October 1982, presented an unforgettable image.

B-52E 56-0650, missing some of its main undercarriage, was retired to the MASDC on 21st January 1970. is particular airframe survived a further 11 years before being cut up into sections and, eventually, removed to a smelter site on the edge of the base.

The view above was taken on East Irvington Road in October 1982, looking to the south-west, capturing the last examples of over 600 various C-97s retired to the MASDC. This magnificent line-up contains the final KC-97Ls that served with the USAF. Many had been frequent visitors to the UK through the 1960s and 70s, during the 10-year period of Operation Creek Party, the Air National Guard TDY to Frankfurt Rhein-Main AB in support of USAFE aerial refuelling requirements. At the time of this picture, 6th October 1982, a total of 32 KC-97Ls and one C-97G were still stored in the MASDC, all of which had been sold and moved off-site to the scrapyards by late 1986.

If the MASDC provided a viewing ‘spectacle’, the sight of numerous local companies located on the land adjacent to the base, whose business was directly related to the acquisition and disposal of aircraft no longer required by the various branches of the military, was equally surreal. The many chain-link fenced compounds, full of ageing

THE SCRAPYARDS

and derelict aircraft on suburban and city streets, had a profound impact on me 40 years ago, which remains to this day.

In October 1982, there were eight aircraft salvage yard locations around the base (this number increased in future years) where former MASDC inmates were parked, often in great numbers, owned by private

companies in the business of either storing, restoring or scrapping. Having driven around the northern perimeter fence of the MASDC, visible from public highway, the first of the ‘yards’ one would have seen was that of Southwestern Alloys, located on South Kolb Road, directly across the street from the base perimeter.

All the other yards were located on the west and south sides of the Davis-Monthan AFB complex and, in those days, finding them required some deft map-reading! The now familiar four-lane and paved East Valencia Road, which passes Pima Air and Space Museum, was at that time nothing more than a small dirt road passing

The picture above, looking north-bound on S. Kolb Road, shows former US Marine Corps C-119F BuNo 131706 and HQ AFRes VT-29B 51-3807 parked adjacent to the street-side perimeter fence of Southwestern Alloys, located directly across the street from the MASDC fence-line.

a collection of aircraft displayed in a dirt compound. The extension of Kolb Road southbound, which now bisects the storage areas inside the base, was yet to be constructed. Thus, reaching the yards required one to navigate city streets around the northern and western sides of the huge

base area and then negotiate numerous small streets through industrial areas on the western side of the base but east of the railroad tracks that headed from Tucson south-eastbound to Benson.

The first yard encountered, in the industrial area west of the base, was Airmet/Kolar

and not far away, again via a labyrinth of small streets, was Dross Metals. Both of these businesses were located directly alongside the base perimeter and enjoyed direct access to the base through gates in the perimeter fence.

Having discovered these two

yards, I found that the remainder were located directly to the south of the base, mostly alongside the dirt road that was East Old Vail Road, approximately where the current East Valencia Road now runs.

Passing

one

A late 1980s view of Bob's Air Park fence-line alongside East Valencia Road, showing former US Army U-8D Seminole and US Navy DP-2E Neptune.

the entrance to Pima County Air Museum on the right of the dirt road,

This is the northern fence line of Delcon/Consolidated, taken from E. Drexel Road – at one-time the private runway for Allied Aircraft Sales’ business, whose huge, fenced compound was on the right, just out of the picture.

reached a crossroads with South Wilmot Road, the north-east quadrant of which was Bob’s Airpark, with a fine selection of airframes parked so close to the roadside perimeter the tail-sections of one or two hung over the fence. From these crossroads, taking S. Wilmot Road northbound

(towards the base) were Western International Aviation and then Delcon/Consolidated, on the right side of the road and, finally, at the road’s end was Allied Aircraft Sales, separated from the others by a dirt track running east-bound, that was East Drexel Road.

The final scrapyard was the most remote, that of Desert Air Parts, located on the south side of the continuation of the dirt track that was East Old Vail road, south-east from the S. Wilmot Road group of yards.

For any serious ‘enthusiast’, the first visit

was always tempered with the wish to have gone there years earlier. In my case, the final examples of two iconic USAF types in the MASDC that had left only months before my first visit bear testament to always wanting more, as depicted overleaf with two of Mike Buresell’s terrific photographs!

The surreal sight of C-124C Globemaster 53-0044 poking its nose over the property fence-line on East Tennessee Street. This was the final Globemaster to arrive at the MASDC, on 19th September 1974 and also the only example to ‘escape’. It was sold in June 1976 to Surplus Aircraft Components and moved to their yard, which would later become Kolar/Airmet. Seen here in October 1979, it was repainted in the yard into a civilian scheme in November 1980, allocated registration N3153F and flown to Las Vegas to become a casino attraction.

Also photographed in October 1979, the very last Hustler. TB-58A 55-0668 was parked in an open, unfenced area behind the Delcon/Consolidated yard, being prepared for transportation to the Museum of Aviation at Fort Worth, Texas. The Hustler subsequently returned to the MASDC in October 1980, before transfer back to the yard the following year, for its eventual move to Texas in the summer of that year.

1. Southwestern Alloys

2. Kolar/Airmet

3. Dross Metals

4. Bob's Air Park

5. Western International Aviation

6. Delcon/ Consolidated (P-2 compound)

7. Delcon/ Consolidated (Main compound)

8. Allied Aircraft Sales

9. Desert Eagle Aviation

10. Desert Air Parts

Over the years, numerous different business names had been associated with various yards and, occasionally, different names registered at the same yard’s address, making the ownership of the premises and aircraft within difficult to ascertain. Similarly, many airframes moved between yards as the aircraft owners, perhaps, sought better storage contracts or required them moving for other reasons.

This map depiction gives a representation of the yards' locations as of the start of the 1980s

Southwestern Alloys Corporation was established in 1945 as a division of National Metals & Smelting Co. Up until 1970, like numerous other local salvage companies, Southwestern Alloys conducted their scrapping and recovery business inside Davis-Monthan AFB, however, government clean air legislation introduced later that year brought a stop to on-base smelting. Although the breaking up of airframes did carry on, any furnace operation to recover the metals had to be moved from the base. Faced with this, Southwestern took up residence immediately outside the base perimeter, in premises close to their original operation but now working on the east side of S. Kolb Road.

At the time, Southwestern possessed

SOUTHWESTERN ALLOYS

the only civilian-operated guillotine large enough to handle entire airframes and had the only operating smelter near the base. As a result, the yard became very busy with the disposal of huge numbers of post-war aircraft and was later responsible for the ultimate demise of almost all of the B-36s, B-66s and B-58s stored in the MASDC, together with huge numbers of C-121s, C-124s, Convair T-29 and C-131s and Navy F-9 Cougars.

Southwestern’s business became a mix of chopping, smelting, aircraft dismantling, parts removal and parts shipping. As with all companies, bids for aircraft were usually done via the US Government’s General Services Administration (GSA), once all airframe and engine parts reclamation by the military had been completed.

At this point, airframes were turned over to the Defense Property Disposal Service (DPDS), who had a regional disposal office (DPDO) based at Davis-Monthan, which administered the auction sales.

Southwestern’s bids were made to suit their capabilities, given they had the only furnace for many years, hence the yard’s appetite for scrap metal rather than restoration. Like many of the salvage companies, bids placed on aircraft at auction were based on expected parts resale value or what the scrap metal was worth. Ancillary components, such as wiring, were sold to companies who would strip and recover copper and precious metals used in the wire and connector pins.

In October 1982 the yard contained no fewer than 28 various Convair T-29 variants,

one C-131B, one C-121J, two C-119Fs, eight HUP-2 Retriever helicopters, one UH-34, two T-2B Buckeyes and the dismantled remains of 26 F-8 Crusaders, two F-100Fs and the nose section of a B-52F. Quite a cache for the first yard visited!

During 1986, Southwestern Alloys Corporation was renamed National Aircraft Inc. and at the same time acquired property alongside the existing Dross Metals (DMI) premises on E. Nebraska Street, on the south-western side of Davis-Monthan.

Southwestern Alloys’ very prominent location, on the side of South Kolb Road, directly opposite the base perimeter fence of Davis-Monthan made the acceptance of airframes very straightforward, with corresponding gates on the base perimeter fence directly opposite Southwestern’s entrance.

e Southwestern Alloys front gate sign was a familiar sight to many motorists and its proximity to the Davis-Monthan perimeter, accessible by road, also made it the rst of the scrapyards seen by any visitor in search of old aircraft during the early 1980s.

In the yard in October 1982 were a pair of ex-US Marine Corps C-119Fs, BuNo’s 131691 and 131706, retired from service with Marine Air Transport Squadron 234 (VMR-234). When the squadron transitioned from the C-119F to the

KC-130F in 1975, to become Marine Aerial Refueler Transport Squadron 234 (VMGR-234) its fleet of 12 C-119Fs were flown to Davis-Monthan as each was replaced by the new KC-130Fs over a period of two years. C-119F 131691

was accepted into the MASDC on 25th April 1975 and ’706 flew into DavisMonthan from Glenview NAS on 6th June 1975, the second to last C-119 to be retired from the unit and the US military as a whole. The majority of

VMR-234’s C-119s were acquired by either Dross Metals (DMI) or Kolar/ Airmet, but airframes 131691 and 131706 were obtained by Southwestern on 25th June 1980 and moved to the yard soon afterwards.

This view shows only a small portion of the vast number of Convair T-29s gathered in Southwestern’s yard in October 1982 and is a good illustration of the type’s wide use in the US military. Foreground (left to right) are T-29C

52-1129 retired on 23rd March 1981 from 105 TASG/New York ANG at Westchester County Airport; VT-29D 53-3532 latterly flown as squadron support for 176 TAG/ Alaska ANG at Kulis AB and VT-29D 533545 whose final assignment had been

with 40th TAC Group/USAFE at Aviano AB, Italy. Other examples in this picture include a VT-29B retired from the 3800 ABW at Maxwell AFB, Alabama where it operated on behalf of the Air Force’s Center for Joint Professional Military

Education (PME); a former US Navy T-29B from VT-29 at NAS Corpus Christi, Texas as well as and a VT-29C retired from operation with the 322 TAW at Rhein Main, West Germany and before that 513TAW at Mildenhall, UK.