Fat Albert Grounded After Mississippi Crash

[awal2049]

The Blues Angels' beloved C-130 "Fat Albert" has been grounded along with the USMC's KC-130T reserve fleet following a deadly crash that occurred in July. This grounding affects 12 total aircraft in the fleet.

The crash occured on Monday, July 10, 2017. For those of you who don't know, the crash involved a Marine reserve KC-130T stationed at Stewart National Guard Base in New York. The plane was performing a training flight from MCAS Chery Point to NAF El Centro. It broke apart in the sky above Mississippi and spun in, killing all 16 crew, 15 marines and a sailor, on board.

Fat Albert had just returned to service after being sidelined for a year to receive repairs for extensive corrosion. The plane has only been back with the team since they flew in Pensacola at the beginning of July. The Blue Angels announced that the C-130 would not be performing with the team at Oshkoshthis week.

A few stories for background info are included here. Hopefully this stand down won't last long.

Fat Albert Grounding:
http://weartv.com/news/local/blue-angel ... lane-crash

KC-130 Crash:
http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/10/us/missis ... index.html

[awal2049]

Following the MV-22 Osprey Crash last week, all Marine Corps aircraft were grounded for 24 hours as a safety measure. As far as I know, this period has ended.

The KC-130 is still grounded, and it's still unclear when Fat Albert will return to flying at air shows. I'm sure this is aggravating to any fans who have been waiting a year to see Bert again. If anyone has any new information, it would be greatly appreciated.

[RyanS]

Following the MV-22 Osprey Crash last week, all Marine Corps aircraft were grounded for 24 hours as a safety measure. As far as I know, this period has ended.

Actually the 24 hours will be taken individually by each unit, some time in the next 2 weeks. That allows most units to be flying at any particular time.