News Search

Airmen demolish Moody's last A-10A

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Janiqua P. Robinson
  • 23rd Wing Public Affairs

Moody demolished its last remaining A-10A Thunderbolt II, the predecessor to the current A-10C model, here Dec. 1.

The demolished aircraft was manufactured in 1980 in Baltimore, Maryland, and was officially completed Nov. 3, 1981, before it was assigned to Air Force bases in South Carolina, the United Kingdom and Arizona. It was then brought to Moody in 2011 to be used as a training aircraft.

A lot of A-10As received upgrades in technology that converted them to A-10Cs, but a few remained as static displays, training aircraft and some parts were used for spare parts.

“There was a new avionics package the Air Force bought to help the A-10 fly better with newer screens, more precision when firing the gun and dropping munitions, and made laser guided technology easier to use,” said Staff Sgt. Sean Carroll, 23rd Aircraft Maintenance Squadron A-10 maintenance instructor. “Every jet that’s flying [here] right now was an A-10A at one point, but this aircraft had something wrong internally, so it went to training status.”

During it’s time in training status, Airmen practiced loading and unloading weapons, calibrating hydraulic systems and used the aircraft in weapons load competitions. The aircraft also had parts removed from it and put on other aircraft including the windshield, an engine, part of a wing, its gun and other critical components.

“The aircraft had so many parts removed from it that taking the time to put it back together would’ve cost more money than to scrap it, because it was in such bad shape,” said Master Sgt. Nicole Guy, 23rd Maintenance Group maintenance training section chief.

Once it became clear the aircraft couldn’t be used for any more training, leadership filed the appropriate paperwork to have the aircraft broken down and sent to the scrap yard.

During its lifetime, this particular A-10A accrued 10,812.1 flying hours and fired 162,145 rounds from its gun.