thrift plane

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeremybogaisky/2025/05/14/qatar-747-trump/

The royals have failed to sell the plane, which was put on the market in 2020, according to an archived listing. Giving it away could save Qatar’s rulers a big chunk of change on maintenance and storage costs, aviation experts told Forbes. Making Trump happy would be an added bonus.

When the plane was bought in 2012, its list price was $367 million, not including the interior, which took three years to complete and likely cost tens of millions of dollars.

The 2020 sales brochure noted that the plane was due for a landing gear overhaul in 2024 and a 12-year check in 2027. A check in which the airplane and engines are taken apart, typically carried out every six to 12 years, can take months to complete and cost millions of dollars.

The plane would need to be stripped down and swept for bugs. Then, unless the administration is willing to accept the risks of lighter security, it would need to be built up to the Air Force’s requirements to serve as an airborne command center, with encrypted communications systems, shielding to protect the electronics from the effects of a nuclear blast and defenses against missiles.

It would take at least five years starting again from scratch, Aboulafia estimates, unless security requirements were relaxed.

Briefly, Qatar has been trying to offload this plane since 2020 but the market is extremely illiquid since its a massive gas guzzler and everyone is moving towards smaller, leaner air travel. Boeing has a couple planes intended to be for Air Force One in the pipeline but Trump is frustrated that they will be delayed to 2028. Cue Qatar seeing the opportunity curry favor with Trump by giving away their outdated junk (which they can't find a buyer for) which costs millions in storage and maintenance fees.

Soo it won’t even be ready by the time Trump finishes his term
- He can fly it from his library. At least the taxpayer won't be on the hook for the maintenance costs at the point (I hope?).

We're back to giving elephants to leaders we don't like

It's the same model of plane as the existing two Air Force One planes. They will tear it down and rebuild it as Air Force One. Trump wants it because it's a flying palace and believes that he will be able to keep it as is and have his own flying palace. This is cleptocracy manifest.

I have serious doubts that this thing will actually carry a president as Air Force 1 is equipped with quite a lot of equipment that civilian aircraft do not have. Some of it is top secret
Missile Avoidance, Radar, Radios, Aerial Refueling
This is also a potential for general espionage as planes are quite large and there are lots of places to hide things
- Not to mention the Type 1 crypto and ECM equipment. There is no way in hell that the US would let Trump walk away with that gear. I read that it would cost from $10 million to $100 million just to sweep the thing for surveillance and tracking devices and to validate that the software hadn't been modified. Trump just thinks that this is a gift for him that's going to stay the way it is and then be transferred to him when he leaves office.

Bribes come in many flavors, let's make sure we define this "gift" appropriately.

Maybe their plan was for it to crash with him in it?

Well it definitely looked like a flying cumbucket, anyone could tell you that.