Aircraft Age: Is it all that it’s cracked up to be?

As a professional pilot, I would like to write to you about a very important aviation subject. This subject has been brought into the limelight most recently by the anti-airport group “10,000 hawks”. In their efforts to disparage, discredit, and mock the many professionals involved with Tweed New Haven Airport, Avelo Airlines and Aviation as a whole, this group has spewed more rhetoric once again, this time pertaining to aircraft age. Their effort requires a professional retort to include a description of aircraft and engine maintenance. Buckle up!

In what equates to nothing more than locker room gossip, the “10,000 Hawks” have been routinely disclosing that the average age of an Avelo Aircraft is 20 years old. First, according to www.planespotters.net, they are wrong: the Average age of an AVELO 737 is 15.2 years old. Now, I can hear you laughing. Big deal, they were wrong in a minor way. Hold on though!

What does a Hawk know?
Ask yourself this, “do the 10,000 Hawks know anything about Aircraft maintenance and aircraft age and do you for that matter”? Answer 1: The “10,000 Hawks” do not. Answer 2: At the end of this article you will know enough about aircraft maintenance in order to be able to relate the age of an aircraft into proper context and thus be able to squelch the purposeful deceit, misinformation and deliberate effort to create fear by the claws of the “10,000 Hawks”. Proper context makes the Hawks rather unhappy. They only want you to see things in their context. As your “community pilot”, I’m here to share the proper context of aircraft age as it relates to routine/planned aircraft maintenance. Your safety and comfort is my job.

With eyes like a Hawk, you’d think one would know these things.
When attempting to bring discredit to Avelo Airlines regarding the age of their fleet, the “10,000 Hawks” fail to highlight the numerous, rigorous and routine maintenance practices conducted on an airplane throughout the course of its life. Are you familiar with the routine checks and overhauls that all airlines conduct on their airplanes? As a I pro-Pilot, I am, and you’re about to become familiar too!

Did you know?

Avelo jets undergo:

✅ Routine Line pre & post flight checks done by Maintenance Technicians. These are done every day or nearly so.

✅ Routine pre & post flight checks done by pilots before and after every flight.

✅ The aircraft has myriad computers that run near constant checks on various aircraft systems and instruments. These occur every time you turn the plane “on” and they report to HQ and are downloaded by maintenance techs…routinely.

It’s as easy as A,B,C,D.
In addition to the daily Pilot and Maintenance Technician routines as described above, the airplanes then undergo planned checks (see below). These checks go from the more “casual” A-Check to the “intense” D-Check in which the airplane is considered rebuilt or returned to OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) standards.

These checks are done according to hours flown, cycles flown (takeoffs & landings) and repetitively over the life of the airplane. This means these checks are done multiple times, not just once. The more the plane flies, the more of these checks get done and the more frequently they are done. Click each link below for the specific of each check.

A-Checks. B-Checks. C-Checks. D-Checks. This explains REAL FACTS.

To make you feel even better regarding aircraft maintenance consider this: the checks described above pertain only to airframe and aircraft components. This would include items like tires, brakes, hydraulic pumps, fuel pumps , electrical generators, control mechanisms and even the very structure of an aircraft, otherwise known as the fuselage. As a general rule, throughout the lifespan of an airplane and its maintenance regiment , all of these items are changed dozens, hundreds or even thousands of times. These parts are not representative of the actual aircraft age. These parts are new (or overhauled), and replaced many times throughout the life of an airplane.

✈️In essence, a 20 year old airplane is made up of thousands of newer parts!🤔 Someone bring this FACT to the Command Staff of “10,000 Hawks”.

Don’t forget the engines!

In addition to the above mentioned maintenance routine, the aircraft engines are inspected and overhauled on their own unique cycles and engine monitoring programs. These cycles and programs are spelled out and specified by the specific engine manufacturer. Aircraft engines are inspected, maintained and replaced in an entirely separate routine from the aircraft itself. Yes, I said replaced. In the course of my professional flying career, I’ve seen engines replaced, rebuilt and overhauled like you get oil changes! In your spare time, read about Turbine Engine Overhauls. This should not only make you feel better about engine maintenance info itself , but should help you understand that again, aircraft age isn’t what the “10,000 Hawks” would like you to believe. They clearly want you to be afraid 😱

As a Pilot, when it comes to aircraft maintenance and flying in general, I’d like you to believe the truth. The truth means telling you more of the story than on first glance. My job is to make you comfortable.

The above descriptions of routine and planned aircraft maintenance were very generalized. To describe the specific minutia of these routines would be well outside the purview of a Patch Article and certainly outside the comprehension capabilities of the “10,000 Hawks”, so I abstained.

This said, I know you, the concerned citizen, to be very capable of grasping and understanding the concept of aircraft maintenance and how it relates to aircraft age. This is the very reason why I am reaching out to you on this and other HVN airport matters.

The “10,000 Hawks” are a clever group…clever in their deception. They are skillful in leaving you with urgent sounding morsels of “information” and then walking away. Much like they accuse Avelo Airlines of doing to their customers, the “10,000 Hawks” like to leave you stranded with any number of mischaracterized, misapplied and errant “facts”.

As a life-long Professional Pilot and community member, it’s my job to pick you up…WITH REAL PLANE TRUTHS.