Lets try to build up the military info database on here also. I have been entering in the information for military aircraft that I have gotten pictures of.

Glenn Chatfield directed me to a great site for finding out military information -

http://home.att.net/~jbaugher/

If you scroll down on his home page you will get a liink to finding info on military serial numbers, ie: the 93-1047 (or similar) on Air Force planes, or the 164102 (or similar) numbers on Navy planes.

There are a lot of pictures on this site of military aircraft that do not have any info about them. I probably still have a few I haven't entered the info for that I haven't come across yet.

If we could at least get the a/c type, perhaps the c/n or buno number and where the plane is based out of or if it is still active that would be great. Unfortunately Baugher's site doesn't discuss engine info.

To get information on where the aircraft is based, look at the two letters on the tail of the military plane, you will see something like FT (which is the code for Pope AFB - seen often on the A-10s from the East Coast Demo team). You can get the codes here:

http://www.globemaster.de/tailcodes.html

Thank you Dan, and Glenn also. I have bookmarked both great sites.

year-serial number scheme works for me on Army/Air Force

And I've been using bureau numbers for Navy aircraft.

US Coast Guard uses a bureau number scheme also, but the numbers could potentially overlap with Navy bureau numbers. But, we have that same sort of problem with de-registered N-numbers.

Actually for the Coast Guard, they are using a 4 digit number - for example Tim the Coast Guard HH-65 Dolphin that was at Sun N Fun was tail number 6540 I believe. Just look up that number on Baugher's site. Its already been entered.

Sadly, last Friday I just finished entering all of the numbers into the database for the Blue Angels aircraft and ship #6 crashed Saturday. I see my notes went in that mentioned the crash on 4/21

a month later

Dan,

Where did the Blue Angel's Bureau Number's come from? The aircraft that they use must change every so often. Because the Bureau Number that you used for #6 (BuNo. 163105) showed up in La Crosse, WI this weekend.

Tim,

Sorry I took so long to reply. I wanted to get the info from an expert. I was not aware that the Blue Angels use more than one aircraft each for their shows as I have #6 as 163105 that I saw them use in Cleveland last summer. I was thinking that they always used 163105.

However, Joe Baugher replied and told me that the aircraft that actually crashed was BuNo 162897

Daniel's photo in 2006 shows that Buno is Blue Angel #5.

Daniel, should I move your comment under BuNo 163105 over to 162897?

http://www.blueangels.org/Aircraft/Stick/BuNo/BuNo.htm

Here's a web page that lists all of the aircraft that have served with the blue angels. The list of F/A-18's is rather long suggesting that an aircraft might serve for a few years, and then a new aircraft replaces it.

One possible reason for the change is depot maintenance. The usual schedule for the depot is 12 after construction for the first visit, then every 4 years after that.

Also it looks like an aircraft could change it's team number inside Blue Angels during it's service, like 162897 was #5 in 2006, and was #6 in 2007 when it crashed.