The Last Boeing 727

Yesterday I visited Doncaster Airport, a 20 minute drive from where i live, where I saw the departure and return of Boeing 727-200 G-OSRA of 2Excel aviation.

The interesting thing about OSRA is that she was number 1832 off the Renton line, the final 727 ever produced. She was acquired by 2Excel from Fed Ex, where she wore the registration N217FE for many years service.

Of potential additional interest to the CT community is that she has now been converted for oil dispersal operations and is this a real life spray plane, with visible spray booms et al, making her one of the few genuine spray planes to pictured on this site, lol. Anyway, enjoy the pics.

originally posted by: waynos
...making her one of the few genuine spray planes to pictured on this site, lol.

Nice touch haha. Cool post though. Was it just recently converted? Has it done any oil cleanup operations?

Oil dispersal boom?

Sure that's not for chemtrails?

lol

Somewhat off-topic but somewhat related in the "cool aircraft at UK airports" realm, when I was stationed at RAF Lakentheath in the mid-00s I was taking a bus to Heathrow for a flight back to the states. It was early in the morning, still dark and the bus driver pointed to an open hangar as we were driving around the airfield and said that they keep one of the old Concordes in there, basically just for tinkering, doesn't fly anymore. It was from a distance but the inside of the hangar was lit and I could see a white plane inside with a swoop nose. Sure enough, according to Wikipedia, one of them is indeed kept at Heathrow:

G-BOAB (208) first flew on 18 May 1976 from Filton. Its last flight was a positioning flight on 15 August 2000 as BA002P from New York JFK to London Heathrow after flying 22,296 hours. It remains at Heathrow Airport. It was never modified, and so never flew again after returning home following the Paris crash

a reply to: face23785

They bought her in 2015 and the spray equipment was installed last year. She also has a sister aircraft registered G-OSRB, another 727.

a reply to: waynos

If you play your cards right maybe they'll let you tag along on a flight to spray some cities with their mind-control agents.

a reply to: face23785

Well the mind control agent that stops people walking up and taking photo's right through the hangar doors, doesn't work, lol

I used to do a lot of work with Oil Spill Response - their fleet was awesome. They used to have an Ilyushin and a C130 and the craziest Cpt ever

On one flight accompnied by my contact they were picking bits of trees out of the wings after.

I used to refer to them as the real life thunderbirds (TV series) as their warehouse had Flat Bed trailers loaded with the type of kit for each type of spill (Heavy Crude / Blow Out etc etc) with large numbers indicating which was to be loaded onto the aircraft.

THey were originally funded by a consortium of all the oil companies and were available 24/7/365 with the aircraft on standby at Southampton.

Sadly I moved jobs and lost touch with them till I saw the 727 at Farnborough and knew immediatly who she was purposed for.

On a side note - the C130 was the original spray platform and the trailor for the tank had a HUGE block of Polystyrene on the end to prevent the tank from going through the cockpit in an emmergenc!

The Boeing 727 displaying at the RAF Scampton, Lincolnshire Airshow on 10th September 2017. Water was sprayed during the demo.

a reply to: Silk

They sent one of the Air Force MASS units to Texas after Harvey because of all the mosquitos that cropped up. Although according to one site they're actually spraying a binary neurotoxin to cause Alzheimers.

a reply to: tommyjo

Water. Uh huh. Did They tell you that?

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: tommyjo

Water. Uh huh. Did They tell you that?

I watched it display and spray on both days of the airshow. No ill effects yet!

The crazy chemtrail believers in the UK have a thing about this Boeing 727. Dip into the madness!

Even if they were legit spraying water, I hope they thought to flush the system first.

a reply to: tommyjo

Hilarious video. The guy is getting all wound up about completely the wrong company, lol. The Cessna service centre is a separate business that has occupied the neighbouring hangar for many years. 2excel own the 727.

Very cool. i can still remember boarding them via the air stairs during the 70's

a reply to: FredT

Is it true back then you actually had little niceties like leg room? And the cabin was full of smoke?

originally posted by: face23785
a reply to: FredT

Is it true back then you actually had little niceties like leg room? And the cabin was full of smoke?

Yes, air travel was not the flying inner city bus it is today. You got all kinds of swag like playing card etc. The food was bad but not as bad as today. Seat pitch was comparable with being anything more than a child, and best yet, you got you plastic wings and mid flight the stewardess would escort you to the cockpit and you sat in the copilot seat with your hands on the yoke while the flight was in cruise