Doesn't make sense to me....

MossRoad · Jul 22, 2022

Also, I’ve been reading a few discussions about blending at the pump. Some fuel delivery drivers insist there are separate ground tanks for all grades. Some gas station owners insist there’re blend valves in the pumps. And a couple pump service techs say that blend pumps are the norm. And some folks say it varies by state. So there you go.

lman · Jul 22, 2022

BravoXray said:
When I was at the Goshen airport one Saturday morning a few years ago working in my hangar, a Global Express owned by the ex-CEO and owner of a large tech company out of Boston, came in and two people got off. It was refueled, 1100 gallons if I remember correctly, and left. About eight hours later, it was back and one person got off. Then the next day, it was repeated in reverse, one person got on and left, early in the evening it came back and two people boarded and it left again.
I talked to the FBO manager a few days later, and said the two people were wife and daughter of the plane owner, and they all came to spend a little time at their place on Lake Wawasee. The plane owner had to work 'till noon on Saturday, and go back early on Sunday, so he sent the wife and daughter out earlier, and they stayed later on Sunday.
He said they bought over 4000 gallons of JetA that week end.

View attachment 755263

They probably support green environmental policies for everybody else.

MossRoad · Jul 22, 2022

BravoXray said:
When I was at the Goshen airport one Saturday morning a few years ago working in my hangar, a Global Express owned by the ex-CEO and owner of a large tech company out of Boston, came in and two people got off. It was refueled, 1100 gallons if I remember correctly, and left. About eight hours later, it was back and one person got off. Then the next day, it was repeated in reverse, one person got on and left, early in the evening it came back and two people boarded and it left again.
I talked to the FBO manager a few days later, and said the two people were wife and daughter of the plane owner, and they all came to spend a little time at their place on Lake Wawasee. The plane owner had to work 'till noon on Saturday, and go back early on Sunday, so he sent the wife and daughter out earlier, and they stayed later on Sunday.
He said they bought over 4000 gallons of JetA that week end.

View attachment 755263

Also, that’s one sweet ride!

Bombardier Global Express - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

However, I personally could not justify blowing 4000 gallons of fuel for a weekend.

Working at the airport, seeing people fly their kids in to Notre Dame in the fall ( 2 legs), home and back at Thanksgiving (2 legs), Christmas (2 legs), somewhere else spring break (that’s 6 legs), and home again in the spring (2 legs)…

That’s 14 legs of flight to move 1 kid around. Granted, most times the kid takes some friends, but still, 14 legs at even 1000 gallons per leg is 14,000 gallons of just fuel to move the kid around per year. 4 years of college, and that 56,000 gallons of fuel on 1 kid. And that’s just fuel costs. Add up the total cost of operation per hour of even a modest business jet, and it’s mind numbing.

And that’s just the dollar cost, not considering any environmental impacts.

And, there are dozens of kids like that at each large university. Amazing.

BravoXray · Jul 22, 2022

A prime example of wasted JetA is when ND plays a home game against USC and KSBN is overrun with everything from Bonanzas to B737s. One year there were three bizjets parked at Goshen because SB was out of parking space. There were a couple at Elkhart too.

tacticalturnip · Jul 22, 2022

Doughknob said:
Isn’t that the whole idea of a free market economy?

We don't have a free market, lol.

Sawyer Rob · Jul 22, 2022

I fueled aircraft for a time, also worked at a gas station...waaaay back when.

One time I fueled a DC4 and when it left, if flew a couple miles, lost an engine, had a fire and crashed!

It didn't take long for someone to come along and pull a sample out of my fuel truck to see if I gave the plane some water.

SR

MossRoad · Jul 23, 2022

BravoXray said:
A prime example of wasted JetA is when ND plays a home game against USC and KSBN is overrun with everything from Bonanzas to B737s. One year there were three bizjets parked at Goshen because SB was out of parking space. There were a couple at Elkhart too.

Yep. It’s amazing. Niles, Michigan City and Plymouth, too.

MossRoad · Jul 23, 2022

Sawyer Rob said:
I fueled aircraft for a time, also worked at a gas station...waaaay back when.

One time I fueled a DC4 and when it left, if flew a couple miles, lost an engine, had a fire and crashed!

It didn't take long for someone to come along and pull a sample out of my fuel truck to see if I gave the plane some water.

SR

Or jet fuel. I can recall several instances of inexperienced line techs putting jet fuel in a large plane that was piston powered.

One plane that seemed to happen to was Rockwell Aero Commanders. They were piston powered, but looked very similar to Turbo Commanders.

Almost all Aero Commander pilots would stand there and watch you fill their plane with Avgas just to make sure you weren’t going to kill them after takeoff.

When you think about it, it’s kinda frightening.