April 13, 2020 - No. 027 In This Issue How Airlines Are Using Artificial Intelligence To Optimize Maintenance Operations Like New Again - Etihad Takes Advantage Of Grounded Fleet. COVID-19 Impact On Aviation: Michigan's Extended Stay Safe, Stay Home Order IndiGo employee dies of coronavirus infection; 50-year-old is India's first aviation personnel to lose life due to COVID-19 GA-ASI flies new MQ-9 aircraft to customer location at Holloman AFB 'We want a tax holiday for the aviation sector' USA approves $675 million support package for Korean F-35s Long term grounding of large planes is 400 hours per aircraft How COVID-19 could ruin weather forecasts and climate records Local hangar restores Eisenhower's 70-year-old Air Force One How Airlines Are Using Artificial Intelligence To Optimize Maintenance Operations In 2019 alone, US airlines reported 302 tarmac delays longer than three hours, compared with 202 in 2018 and 193 in 2017, according to statistics by the US Bureau of Transportation. One of the main causes of such delays is unplanned maintenance operations. Technical issues in airplanes can take a long time to identify and resolve, causing major financial losses to airlines, and delays that can have various consequences for their customers. To address this issue, airlines are looking for ways to incorporate artificial intelligence (AI) into their maintenance operations. The use of AI is expanding as a decision-making tool for maintenance teams at commercial airlines. From predicting breakdowns to guiding on-field line maintenance teams, these are some of the ways airlines are using AI to optimize their maintenance procedures. Planning and scheduling maintenance tasks Most of the maintenance operations in airplanes are planned. Most parts on an aircraft have a known 'expiry date' when they must be replaced; it could be after a specified amount of flight hours or when they exceed a certain tolerance. Maintenance teams in airlines need to keep track of all planned maintenance tasks to ensure that planes are always operating at optimal levels and to reduce the chances of unplanned maintenance issues popping up when they least expect it. However, this is easier said than done. Planes have thousands of components that can be hard to keep track of, especially for large fleets. This is where AI comes in. AI-powered systems can keep track of every single component in each plane to generate specific work order tasks for maintenance technicians and ensure that all resources required during maintenance operations - including manpower, spare parts and hanger slots - are prepared and allocated well in advance. Predictive maintenance While unplanned maintenance operations are not as common as planned maintenance operations, they can have terrible effects on airlines. For one, unplanned maintenance accounts for 30 percent of total delay time in airports, which costs airlines millions in revenue lost annually. Using AI-powered analytics, airlines can detect anomalies in planes and deploy predictive maintenance solutions long before a break-down occurs. The ability of AI to analyze large amounts of data can take preventative maintenance systems to new heights. By layering in additional data from aircraft health monitoring sensors, neural networks can enhance more traditional methods like using borescopes to examine engines. When properly deployed, the ability of AI to predict breakdowns and allow planned interventions can also help airlines reduce operating costs and downtime while improving production yield. Coordinating maintenance operations A lot of airline departments are involved during maintenance operations, from engineers to accounting, to customer service. All these departments need to work together to ensure that all maintenance operations are carried out with maximum efficiency. AI-powered workflow organization systems can be used to coordinate maintenance operations across various departments. Typically, these systems can be accessed from desktop and mobile devices, granting authorized departments access to real-time or historical data from any location through alerts, notifications and reports. Armed with this data, different departments can do their part to ensure the airline runs smoothly despite ongoing or upcoming maintenance operations. For example, the AI system can inform accountants of upcoming maintenance operations so that they can ensure that spare parts are ordered on time. Similarly, the system can inform customer service departments of any future flights that will be affected by maintenance operations so that they can reschedule flights accordingly. AI deployments have brought new efficiencies to the aviation industry, especially in the maintenance and repair space. The continued implementation and progression of AI in aircraft maintenance operations will help airlines unlock new revenues, reduce aircraft on ground (AOG) time, decrease operational costs, and improve overall functionality. http://aviationtribune.com/featured-content/how-airlines-are-using-artificial-intelligence-to-optimize-maintenance-operations/ Back to Top Like New Again - Etihad Takes Advantage Of Grounded Fleet Etihad Airways has found itself faced with an unprecedented challenge. The United Arab Emirates flag carrier had most of its fleet grounded when the government enacted a flight ban. However, this gave rise to a huge opportunity for the airline. Typically, if aircraft are not flying it is a very bad thing for airlines. After all, an aircraft that's not carrying passengers through the skies is not making money. If anything, it could be racking up parking charges instead. However, instead of moping about the situation, Etihad has put all hands on deck to take advantage of the unique circumstances. Fleet grounded Typically, aircraft are scheduled for heavy maintenance a few at a time. This means that there should be no noticeable impact on regular passenger services. On any given day, Etihad's fleet of around 100 aircraft would operate some 220 flights. However, with borders closed, many of the airline's planes have nowhere to fly right now. As a result, the flag carrier of the UAE has been conducting maintenance and deep cleans on aircraft that would otherwise be flying. So far, the airline's maintenance crew has replaced 10,000 seat covers, equivalent to around 20 Airbus A380s. Additionally, the airline has taken measures to safely park the aircraft. The airline produced a video showing the maintenance so far: Getting Our Aircraft Ready to Soar Again | Etihad Airways According to Gary Bryne, Head of Technical Operations at Etihad, around 200 people are working on refreshing the aircraft during each shift. Why are the aircraft grounded? Etihad's aircraft have been grounded due to the current crisis that has hit the whole aviation industry. The demand for passenger flights fell dramatically throughout March. This was partly due to passengers no longer wanting to travel, but also due to borders being closed by governments. When passengers don't fly it becomes impractical to operate aircraft, both from an economic and environmental standpoint. As a result, Etihad Airways was already running a reduced service, when the government of the United Arab Emirates decided that it would enact its own flight ban to stop the spread of the virus. However, both Emirates and Etihad were caught by surprise when the government's travel ban was suddenly brought forwards by a day or so with no warning. This left passenger traffic completely grounded. Since then, both Etihad and Emirates have secured the necessary permissions to resume flights, albeit on a much smaller scale. While Emirates is left flying to just London and Frankfurt, Etihad is serving slightly more destinations. The carrier is operating flights to London, Zurich, Brussels, Tokyo, Dublin, Amsterdam, Seoul, Singapore, Manila, and Jakarta. Although these flights are on a very schedule, with some operating just twice for the time being. https://simpleflying.com/etihad-aircraft-maintenance/ Back to Top COVID-19 Impact On Aviation: Michigan's Extended Stay Safe, Stay Home Order Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed Executive Order 2020-42 on April 9 to reaffirm, clarify, and extend the duration of the measures contained in her previous "Stay Home, Stay Safe" Executive Order 2020-21 until April 30. It also identifies additional critical infrastructure businesses and business activities that are allowed to continue minimum basic operations, including aviation and transportation entities. The previous order required all Michigan residents to stay at home and temporarily suspended in-person operations for noncritical infrastructure businesses through April 13, in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The new order became effective at 11:59 p.m. on April 9 and significantly expands the prior order. Critical Infrastructure Workers: Transportation and Logistics Businesses, including those in Aviation The new order, just as in the original order, affects certain critical transportation and logistics entities. This revised order again incorporates by reference the March 19 guidance from the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), excluding any subsequent guidance document released by the CISA. The new order specifically refuses to adopt expanded guidance on what constitutes critical infrastructure, according to the March 28 issuance by the CISA, which means some individuals recognized as critical infrastructure workers at the federal level are not recognized in Michigan. For example, farm auction workers, pest control workers, chemical storage workers, mine workers, and certain warehouse workers are less likely to be included. Therefore, Michigan employers are not able to rely on the expanded descriptions of critical infrastructure that appeared in that new guidance, but instead must still rely upon the prior CISA guidance in making critical infrastructure determinations. The applicable March 19 CISA guidance specifically includes the following aviation-related workers: Employees supporting or enabling transportation functions, including dispatchers, maintenance and repair technicians, and workers that maintain and inspect infrastructure (including those that require cross-border travel) Employees of firms providing services that enable logistics operations Employees who repair and maintain aircraft, and the equipment and infrastructure that enables operations that encompass movement of cargo and passengers Air transportation employees, including air traffic controllers, ramp personnel, aviation security, and aviation management Workers who support the maintenance and operation of cargo by air transportation, including flight crews, maintenance, airport operations, and other on- and off- airport facilities workers Further guidance from the CISA includes in the definition of "Transportation Systems Sector" the "Aviation" subsector which includes commercial and recreation aircraft (manned and unmanned), air traffic control systems, and about 19,700 airports, heliports, landing strips, and sea plane bases. In addition, the aviation mode includes a wide-variety of support services, such as aircraft repair stations, fueling facilities, navigation aids, and flight schools. While the executive order includes these as aviation and transportation workers and activities that are allowed to continue, it is important to remember that the order limits the activities of the critical workforce and exempted businesses by allowing only those critical infrastructure workers and activities necessary to protect and sustain life. Permissible Activities and New Requirements for Critical Infrastructure Workers, Including Aviation Businesses that are permitted under the new executive order to continue in-person operations may do so subject to additional requirements, beyond the following: Restricting the number of critical infrastructure workers to no more than those strictly necessary to perform its critical infrastructure functions Promoting remote work to the fullest extent possible Keeping at least six feet from other employees or patrons to the maximum extent possible Increasing standards of facility cleaning and disinfecting Adopting policies to prevent workers from entering the premises if they display symptoms of COVID-19 or have recently come into contact with someone who is known or suspected to have COVID-19 Implementing protocols to clean and disinfect in the event a critical infrastructure worker tests positive for COVID-19 In addition to these prior mandates, the new order requires employers, aviation among them, to develop a COVID-19 preparedness and response plan, consistent with the recommendations in Guidance on Preparing Workplaces for COVID-19 developed by the Occupational Health and Safety Administration. These employers are still required to designate in writing - via letter, email, public website or other appropriate means - all employees they deem critical in supporting the noted critical infrastructure industries. https://www.natlawreview.com/article/covid-19-impact-aviation-michigan-s-extended-stay-safe-stay-home-order Back to Top IndiGo employee dies of coronavirus infection; 50-year-old is India's first aviation personnel to lose life due to COVID-19 Mumbai: Budget carrier IndiGo on Saturday said one of its staff passed away due to coronavirus infection in Chennai. While the airline did not provide details, a source told PTI that the employee was an aircraft maintenance engineer and he passed away on Friday. The engineer was in his mid-50s and had been working with the carrier since 2006. He was posted in Chennai, the source said. "We are extremely sorry and saddened by the demise of one of our beloved employees in Chennai due to infection of COVID-19 virus," an airline spokesperson told PTI on Saturday. This is possibly the first case of death of an aviation personnel due to coronavirus infection in the country. "This is a heartbreaking moment for all of us at IndiGo and in this time of sorrow we stand with his family and request that we respect the privacy of our employee and his family," the spokesperson said. The number of infections in the country has crossed 8,000 and more than 260 people have died. https://www.firstpost.com/india/indigo-employee-dies-of-coronavirus-infection-50-year-old-is-indias-first-aviation-personnel-to-lose-life-due-to-covid-19-8250801.html Back to Top GA-ASI flies new MQ-9 aircraft to customer location at Holloman AFB General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA-ASI) has flown a new MQ-9 reaper remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) to a customer location for the first time at Holloman Air Force Base (AFB) in New Mexico. Conventionally, the aircraft when delivered is packed and shipped by the company. Once delivered, it is reassembled at the customer location. Flying to Holloman AFB, the delivery of the aircraft saved costs and time invested for shipping. Time required for reassembly was also reduced. This made the reaper aircraft available for training immediately upon arrival. The flight took off from GA-ASI's Flight Operations Center in Palmdale, California and flew through the National Airspace System (NAS). Combined efforts of the Holloman AFB air crews ensured the successful ferry of the aircraft. GA-ASI president David Alexander said: "GA-ASI continues to lead the charge towards enabling large unmanned aircraft to fly in the NAS. "Our efforts, along with other partners, are gaining momentum and successfully flying the MQ-9 to our US Air Force (USAF) customer further demonstrates the safety and efficiency of RPA flight in the broader airspace." According to the USAF, the process of flying the aircraft for delivery has been estimated to save 142-man hours. 49th Operations Group commander colonel Casey Tidgewell said: "This is the first time that team Holloman has taken delivery of a new MQ-9 by ferry flight. "It's critically important because flying outside of our training area helps normalize RPA flight inside the NAS and provides broader aviation experience for our instructors. I could not be more proud of our operations and maintenance professionals that made this happen." https://www.airforce-technology.com/news/ga-asi-flies-new-mq-9-aircraft-to-customer-location-at-holloman-afb/ Back to Top 'We want a tax holiday for the aviation sector' If India plays the game well, there will be a short period of recession, but this will be followed by double-digit growth, says Sanjay Julka, CEO, technical, Club One Air NEW DELHI : Charter aircraft companies are receiving requests to move essential commodities and conduct repatriation flights during the ongoing nationwide lockdown, but are unable to fulfil them due to lack of government permissions, said Sanjay Julka, chief executive officer, technical, Club One Air, one of India's oldest and largest air charter companies. After a brief setback, India will emerge stronger once the pandemic is over, Julka said in an interview. Edited excerpts: How has your sector been affected by the lockdown imposed to contain covid-19? Aviation across the spectrum has been badly affected. Flights are permitted for some special emergency services such as repatriation, transportation of medical supplies, etc. Overall, revenue is down by almost 80% and, in some cases, to nil. Are you looking for some relief measures from the government? The government has taken some initiatives in providing relief. Operational relief has been provided by giving extensions and waivers to aircraft, as well as crew, so as not to ground the aircraft due to disruption in their training and maintenance schedules. This must continue for a while, for at least six months after covid-19 is over around the world. Other government relief measures include late payment of taxes or loan instalments, which are good and needs to continue further. Should there be some stimulus package for your industry? Our sector would need a special stimulus package in the form of low-interest loans, reduction of taxes, maybe a tax holiday for a few years. The government must not equate aviation, or for that matter, any industry which is also a means of communication, with other industries. Do you think the country is staring at a recession? How hard will your industry be hit? Although there will be loss of life, which is tragic for any country, I sincerely feel that India will emerge into a much better position than it was before covid-19. Look at the ingredients that are present-such as the comparatively very low infection rate, our acknowledgment by superpowers, China losing the trust of major economies, etc. I think if India plays the game well, there definitely will be a short period of recession, but this will be followed by double-digit growth. Our industry will also initially hit a recession, but Indian aviation is far away from realizing its potential and the sound leadership of the country should be able to exploit the silver lining in this pandemic. Sales growth for the short- and mid-term have been revised. Being temporary, our reserves coupled with the government's relief package should be able to get us through. How do you think consumer demand could be revived after the lockdown is lifted? Had it been a war or a normal recession-like situation, we would have expected a drop in charter demands. The need for social distancing and personal hygiene is likely to continue for a while (even after the lockdown is lifted) and since business aviation is well-prepared and equipped to handle both requirements, I personally expect charter demands to rise. Will you be looking at either salary or job cuts? This will depend on the duration of the pandemic. Presently, we are hoping to survive it without salary or job cuts. I am confident that all salary or job cuts in the aviation sector, if any, would be temporary. Are you looking for loan moratoriums beyond the three months suggested by the Reserve Bank of India? Should it be further relaxed? Yes. Not only do we expect a loan moratorium, we also expect a complete tax holiday for the aviation sector. The government has already announced a lot of stimulus in the economy and have made provisions for money to come out in the market. https://www.livemint.com/companies/news/-we-want-a-tax-holiday-for-the-aviation-sector-11586793616913.html Back to Top USA approves $675 million support package for Korean F-35s The US government has cleared a potential $675 million deal for the sustainment of South Korea's fleet of Lockheed Martin F-35A fighters. The Foreign Military Sale package includes follow-on support for the aircraft, engines, weapons, spare parts, software, training, and other elements. It follows a request from the Seoul. "The proposed sale will sustain the Republic of Korea's flight and maintenance activity," says the Defense Security Cooperation Agency. "It will improve sustainability and continue support for the F-35 fleet. The Republic of Korea will have no difficulty absorbing this support and services into its armed forces." The key contractors for the work are Lockheed and Pratt & Whitney, which produces the jet's F135 engine. South Korea is in the process of taking delivery of 40 F-35As. Cirium fleets data shows that the Republic of Korea Air Force has 11 in-service examples. https://www.flightglobal.com/usa-approves-675-million-support-package-for-korean-f-35s/137849.article Back to Top Long term grounding of large planes is 400 hours per aircraft As thousands of planes lay dormant around the world, a senior aircraft technician explains a lot of work goes into taking planes out of action. The Covid-19 coronavirus has left the aviation industry in a state of flux, and more than half of Air New Zealand's fleet is being stored at airports around the country. Shutting a plane down is not like storing a car however, and lifetime aircraft technician Eric Reynolds says it will get more complicated the longer the lockdown lasts. Reynolds is the maintenance controller at Massey University's flying school and has worked in the aviation industry more than 40 years, including for the Royal New Zealand Air Force. He said the process for short-term storage and maintenance, while time consuming, was relatively simple. "Typically if you were only storing it from 14 to 28 days you wouldn't do anything to the aircraft particulalry," he said. "You would just go out weekly to start the engine, bring it up to temperature, check its parameters and then park it up, shut it down and put blanks and things in like you'd normally do." Blanks are engine covers that are routinely used on planes when they're not in motion. For longer periods, there is a tipping point for aircraft that requires engines to be essentially frozen, Reynolds says, right on the four-week mark. "If it's going to be more than 28 days then it becomes a little bit more extensive. They need to run up the engines, get them warm, then drain the operating oil out of them and put an inhibiting oil into them. "That inhibiting oil is thicker and heavier and sticks to things better, therefore gravity doesn't drag it to the bottom of the engine over time." Air New Zealand has grounded 58 planes due to Covid-19 so far. The airline could not provide anyone to talk about how it looks after grounded planes, but in a statement it said it took 400 hours to put a single jet into storage and initially maintain it. For turpoprop planes - which are smaller - the initial push is 100 hours. After that, turboprops take about 20 hours of labour per aircraft, per week to maintain while in storage. This includes towing the aircraft with a tractor so the wheels don't get flat spots, security and fluid checks, and idling engines to charge batteries. Reynolds said birds and insects would sometimes build nests in the multi-million dollar machines. "Or even some of the smaller orifices can get mason bees. I've only ever come across it once and they were building nests in the fuel vent, and that was causing issues with fuel flow." Air New Zealand could not provide an estimate on how long it would take to bring its planes out of storage, but said it "varies between fleet and is dependent on the length of time each fleet has been grounded for". Reynolds said it would take as long to get the planes out of storage as it had to put them in, if not longer. He said that after 28 days of being in lockdown most of his flying school's 14 aircraft would have had their calendar safety inspections expire. "If we were to go back to work and start flying again after four weeks, we would only have two servicable aeroplanes at eight o'clock on the first day." He said some aircraft safety certificates were based on hours of flight, but could last between 12 months and 12 years. Air New Zealand said none of its planes were being broken down for parts, but Reynolds said it would be reasonable to expect. He spent 20 years in the Royal New Zealand Air Force and remembered when eight of the force's planes were broken up for parts in Woodburn, Blenheim. He said an airline would first try to sell parts on demand, then parts would get stripped and stored in warehouses. "They take them with these chainsaw-type metal cutters and cut them up and sell off the aluminium for resmeltering." Air New Zealand has 23 Airbus A320 planes on the ground. Some of these have an average age of close to 16 years, according to its website. Their working life is 25 years. "I think you'll only find the breaking down will happen to older aircraft in the fleet," Reynolds said. In the meantime, airports remain waiting rooms for aircraft with have nowhere to go. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/414198/covid-19-long-term-grounding-of-large-planes-is-400-hours-per-aircraft Back to Top How COVID-19 could ruin weather forecasts and climate records Twice per year, Ed Dever's group at Oregon State University in Corvallis heads out to sea off the Oregon and Washington coasts to refurbish and clean more than 100 delicate sensors that make up one segment of a US$44-million-per-year scientific network called the Ocean Observatories Initiative. "If this had been a normal year, I would have been at sea right now," he says. Instead, Dever is one of many scientists sidelined by the coronavirus pandemic, watching from afar as precious field data disappear and instruments degrade. The scientific pause could imperil weather forecasts in the near term, and threaten long-standing climate studies. In some cases, researchers are expecting gaps in data that have been collected regularly for decades. "The break in the scientific record is probably unprecedented," says Frank Davis, an ecologist at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Davis is the executive director of the Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) programme, a network of 30 ecological sites stretching from the far north of Alaska all the way down to Antarctica. Consisting of both urban and rural locations, the LTER network allows scientists to study ecological processes over decades - from the impact of dwindling snowfalls on the mountains of Colorado to the effects of pollution in a Baltimore stream. At some sites, this might be the first interruption in more than 40 years, he says. "That's painful for the scientists involved." Weather forecasting takes a hit Other monitoring programmes are facing similar gaps. Scientists often ride along on the commercial container ships that criss-cross the world's oceans, collecting data and deploying a variety of instruments that measure weather, as well as currents and other properties of the ocean. Most of those ships are still running, but travel restrictions mean that scientists are no longer allowed on board, says Justine Parks, a marine technician who manages one such programme at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California. Port strikes and political instability have halted specific cruises in the past, Parks says. But to her knowledge, this is the first time that the entire programme has shut down for an extended period of time. Measurements made at sea are important for forecasting weather over the oceans, as well as for keeping longer-term records of ocean health and climate change, says Emma Heslop, a programme specialist in ocean observations at the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission in Paris. Her group is still trying to assess the extent of the damage that the pandemic is doing to the ocean-observing community as a whole, but researchers are already feeling some effects. Over the past 2 months, they've seen steadily declining numbers of shipboard observations - amounting to, since the beginning of February, a 15% loss of stations that are reporting data. And although the community is working hard to figure out other ways to collect important data, the situation is likely to worsen as the pandemic stretches on. "The longer the restrictions are in place," she says, "the longer it will take for our operations to recover." Commercial flights provide invaluable weather data, too - measuring temperature, pressure and wind speeds as they cruise. The meteorological data provided by the US aircraft fleet had decreased to half its normal levels as of 31 March, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Maintenance woes Satellites and weather balloons can fill in some gaps, but certain aircraft data are irreplaceable. "It's certainly the case that with the virtual loss of worldwide aviation, there is a gap in some of the records," says Grahame Madge, a spokesperson for the UK Met Office in Exeter. The Met Office estimates that the loss of aircraft observations will increase their forecast error by 1-2%, but notes that, in areas where flights are typically more abundant, scientists' forecast accuracy might suffer even more. The Met Office maintains more than 250 UK weather stations that provide continuous or daily feeds of autonomously collected atmospheric and weather data. For now, those systems are functioning just fine, but if an instrument goes down, Madge says, it will be difficult to get staff out to fix the problem. Much of the world's atmospheric-monitoring data are collected with little to no human intervention, and such projects should be able to keep running. The Advanced Global Atmospheric Gases Experiment, for example, measures ozone-depleting compounds, greenhouse gases and other trace components in the atmosphere at 13 remote sites around the globe. Many of their systems are autonomous: the stations are each staffed by one or two people who perform routine maintenance to keep the instruments running. Ray Weiss, an atmospheric chemist at Scripps who leads the project, says that two instruments have broken down so far, but the loss of a single instrument or even a whole site for a few weeks is unlikely to jeopardize the network's monitoring capabilities. Arlyn Andrews, who runs NOAA's greenhouse-gas-monitoring programme, says that impacts on that network have been "relatively minor", and less than 5% of the NOAA sites have lost data so far. Unless the situation gets a whole lot worse, Weiss anticipates that the programme will escape relatively unscathed. "We're limping through, is the bottom line." https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00924-6 Back to Top Local hangar restores Eisenhower's 70-year-old Air Force One A low hum penetrated the dry Arizona air. The silver wings of a plane sprawled 126 feet, casting a black shadow on the cracked, rust-colored earth. Four engines dotted the wingspan, each with three propeller blades that dwarf a full-grown man. Looping mustard-yellow letters on the airplane's snout spell "Columbine." The 1948 Lockheed C-121 Constellation shuttled President Dwight Eisenhower around the globe for his first two years as president. It was the first Air Force One. Sixty-five years after Eisenhower dismounted it for the last time, the dolphin-shaped aircraft roared for nine hours until it sputtered to a halt on the tarmac of its new home in rural Bridgewater, Virginia. The pilot, Lockie Christler, said its transcontinental flight went off without a hitch. "It was like Eisenhower himself was there watching over us," Christler said. Pieces of Columbine II now spill across the concrete floor of a hangar - a garage for airplanes - at Dynamic Aviation, a 750-acre airpark nestled in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley. The main chamber of "Connie" has been stripped of its lavish presidential amenities. Its wings have been severed to conserve space. Towering chain-link fences form a kitty-cornered blockade to separate it from the classified military aircraft on the other side. "They're restoring it to better than new," Christler said. In its heyday, marble floors lined the plane's belly. VIPs like former presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon and Queen Elizabeth II strode along its 116-foot body. Cradled in a corner was a mahogany desk where Eisenhower penned his 1953 United Nations speech, "Atoms for Peace," which detailed his concerns about the nuclear arms race. Christler's father purchased Columbine II and four other Connies from the Air Force in 1970 to spray crops for fire ants, unaware of the plane's historic significance. He harvested Columbine II's engines and transplanted them into its four sister airplanes. Ten years later, the Smithsonian called. Columbine II is a historic landmark. The plane, now unfit for crop dusting, became an "expensive liability" for the Christler family, who wanted to preserve its grandeur but couldn't afford it. An unsuccessful attempt to auction it led to Christler's last-ditch effort, advertising the plane for sale in an aviation magazine. It was otherwise destined for scrap. Dynamic Aviation owner Karl Stoltzfus picked up the magazine in 2015. He couldn't tear his eyes away from Christler's ad. "I knew I was supposed to buy that airplane," Stoltzfus, a self-proclaimed history buff, said. "It was just that clear." A little under $1.5 million later, Eisenhower's plane was added to Dynamic Aviation's 140-aircraft fleet. Stoltzfus and his crew of 10 spent a year prepping Connie for its voyage east. The team flew from Virginia to Arizona's Marana Regional Airport outside Tucson every three weeks. Desert critters had burrowed a home onboard. Mountains of dust littered the once regal aircraft. The 18-cylinder engines' fuel and hydraulic hoses were corroded. Christler described it as a "plumber's nightmare." Columbine II required 8,000 hours of repairs before the Federal Aviation Administration finally cleared it for takeoff. The city of Marana ushered Columbine II into the sky amid fanfare. Mary Jean Eisenhower, the 34th president's granddaughter, led the crowd surrounding the plane in prayer. And finally, a "seamless" liftoff. "It's an adrenaline rush when you first take off," Christler said. "You prepare for the worst and hope for the best." Several hundred people greeted the silver bird when its wheels touched down in the Shenandoah Valley. Christler sighed in relief, but Stoltzfus knew the real work was about to begin. The buzzing of drills and shouting of hammers echo within the now-empty cavity of the plane. A crew of 15 labors on Columbine II daily. Dynamic Aviation's director of flight safety, Rod Moyer, said he's honored to be a part of the project, but the work is "grueling." "When a guy first comes to work here, for the first week, you just can't believe what you're having the opportunity to work on," Moyer said. "But after a week of having your arm up in a hole and scraping on that same piece of aluminum, you sort of forget. It will all come back when she starts running." While the plane's engines are being rebuilt in Idaho, lead project manager Pasqual Bude said his focus is on cleaning every scrap of metal on the aircraft. The cleaning crew uses a method similar to sandblasting to erase the Arizona crud. Instead of sand, the mechanics spray with dry ice because it evaporates and doesn't damage the plane's skin. "Every day, you have to fight every screw, every bolt - but that's what makes it fun," Bude said. Another crew is completely rewiring the airplane - hundreds of miles of wires worth. Eighty percent of the wires are concentrated in the wings. Next, the four new engines will be mounted and the cabin reupholstered. Stoltzfus said the whole project will probably take three or four more years. Finding spare parts for a plane this old is the biggest challenge for Stoltzfus. Maintenance manuals have been lost. Lockheed's faint, withering blueprint drawings on microfilm are difficult to read. Mechanics sift through hundreds of pages of Lockheed's notoriously complicated schematics. "A guy has got to be a little nutty to do this," Stoltzfus said. "It's a big job." The goal is to construct a museum hangar in a few years to permanently house the airplane for public view. Several times a year, Dynamic Aviation will fly the plane to events around the country so more people can see it. "We look at this airplane with the knowledge that we are custodians of it," Stoltzfus said. "It really belongs to the American public. It's not just an airplane. It's a piece of their history." https://www.breezejmu.org/news/local-hangar-restores-eisenhower-s-70-year-old-air-force-one/article_28a1a05e-7c1f-11ea-830e-c706e6ec0b86.html Curt Lewis