Originally Posted by
MaydayMark
Latest rumor from a pretty good source ... is that there will be NO MORE DC-10 to MD-10 conversions! It seems the company that has been doing them has completed their contractual obligation for conversions (68 of them I think?), it seems they lost money on the last several. So ... they told FedEx that if they wanted more MD-10's that they wanted a bunch more money. Apparently so much more money that FedEx decided they could get used MD-11's for the same price and said "No Thanks."
So ... what will happen to the DC-10's now? Personally, I don't know. Maybe some returned to the lease holder? Fly them through peak, then park them? Do we own any of them? Can we sell them? Keep flying them because we need the lift? Inquiring minds want to know ...
Maybe Capt. Mark's sources have their ear to the rail?
Regards,
Mark
That's news to me. All DC-10's are scheduled to be converted by the end of 2009 and I haven't heard any change to that plan officially.
Originally Posted by
Jetjok
MM,
I thought one of the reasons to convert the DC's to MD's was because of a lack of available instrumentation for these old beasts (I can't believe I came up with that saying
). Certainly that situation could not have gotten better since the start of the conversion process. But I'd bet that we'll fly them until they can't pass the MEL/CDL/Phase Inspection process any longer.
There are several benefits to the conversion. The big one is a common MD-10/11 type rating along with improved funcionatily and instrumentation, improved dispatch reliability, new wiring, etc, etc, etc...