In September 2011 a big reunion will be held for all ex- 1st Air Defence personnel at Edmonton, Alberta. This reunion is meant to include all RCAF and CAF personnel and their dependents who served at all 4 wings HQ Metz, Air Weapons Unit Sardinia, 61 AC&W Sqdn. 401 Comm Sqdn, RCAF personnel attached to 4ATAF Ramstein and all others who were there during the glory years of the RCAF. The exact day is not yet known but we will keep you updated. For more information please add yourself to the facebook group
or mail to Gary Watson.

At Agrinion AB, Greece, the F-104G 6639 can be found preserved for a number of years. Before the open house the personnell decided to refurbish the aircraft since the old paint was very much damaged due to weathering. It looks very fresh now and the people at the Air Base did a great job!!

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. (October 22, 2009) - Today, NASA and Starfighters, Inc. announced the signing of a formal Space Act Agreement enabling Starfighters, a private aerospace company that operates high performance fighter aircraft, to fully utilize the Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF) to conduct flight operations providing commercial space flight training, support research and development, test and engineering for the benefit of the emerging commercial space industry, and to otherwise advance aerospace and space-related technology in Florida.
Space Florida and Starfighters began initial discussions in 2007 and officially partnered in 2008, when Space Florida reached an agreement for the aerospace company to house and maintain aircraft in the State-owned and operated Reusable Launch Vehicle (RLV) Hangar, located adjacent to the SLF.
"Our alliance with Space Florida is a natural fit," said Rick Svetkoff, Starfighters President and Chief Pilot. "We both want to see the commercial aerospace industry grow in Florida. With Space Florida's assistance, we are making real strides toward that vision."
As part of the new agreement, Starfighters will operate its fleet of Lockheed F-104 Starfighters at Kennedy Space Center (KSC). Currently the company has four vehicles in the fleet, but anticipates adding five more in the coming months. The vehicles can simulate suborbital vehicle trajectories and provide both training and technology development for the reusable launch vehicle industry. Starfighters currently has 10 employees scattered across Florida. In the coming months, it will relocate these employees to KSC, and also expects to employ up to 20 additional highly-skilled workers to perform vehicle maintenance and other technical work at its KSC operations.
"We're thrilled for Starfighters. This agreement with NASA-KSC exemplifies the gradual shift toward commercial space industry development, and is an example of a Florida-based company we were able to keep and help expand its operation in Florida," noted Frank DiBello, Space Florida President. "While our state has always been known to excel at the launch of spacecraft, businesses like Starfighters will help prove that we have the capability to handle research and development, testing, engineering and training activities. We are delighted that it will also serve as a catalyst for additional business as well."
Space Florida and Starfighters are in negotiations to extend the original lease agreement at the RLV Hangar. As part of the alliance, Space Florida may also assist Starfighters in securing additional long-term funding to fully establish their operations and headquarters at KSC.
In a NASA press release today, KSC Director Robert Cabana stated, "This agreement with Starfighters aligns well with NASA's mission and national space policy direction to support and enable the U.S. commercial space industry."
The aerospace company is also currently in discussions with NASA and other government users to provide flight test services under Starfighters recently awarded blanket purchase agreement from NASA's Airborne Science Program from the Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland.
Starfighters has previously flown several operational test and evaluation flights from the SLF, which included NASA sponsored Pathfinder Trajectories for Orbital and Sub-Orbital Flight Environmental Impact Studies, Autonomous Flight Safety systemsn with INS and GPS Termination Measuring payloads and Station High Sensitivity Ocean Research Experiments.
Starfighters' landmark agreement with NASA-KSC sets the groundwork for additional commercial opportunities to come to KSC in the future.
About Starfighters: Starfighters was founded in 1995 by President and Chief Pilot Rick Svetkoff. The company operates a fleet of Lockheed F-104 Starfighters, a supersonic fighter aircraft that had a 50-year operational history with 15 countries including the U.S. and Canada.
Starfighters is currently gearing up for planned flight test work in 2010 and finalizing their Suborbital Space Flight Training syllabus and will conduct flights from the NASA Space Shuttle Landing Facility at John F. Kennedy Space Center, Florida. The 4 day training syllabus will be the most comprehensive available to the public.

Years ago the F-104G 22+92 was offered for sale (scrapping purpose) at the German federal VEBEG. Then it was withdrawn from sale and put in storage at Kiel-Holtenau with fake serial "26+72". Recently it was reported that it had been transported to Nordholz and indeed in September it was seen in the main hangar at this Naval location. The aircraft was seen without nose, tail and wings. There is no information about what will happen with this aircraft. Let's hope it will end up in a museum somewhere. Photo shows it still at Kiel-Holtenau.

A while ago people at the barracks at Duren-Gurzenich were very busy cleaning their preserved F-104F 29+14 which had become green from all the trees and bushes. However things have changed recently since the aircraft was taken away from the barracks. Since all preserved aircraft at military locations are owned by the German Defense they also belong to the Deutches Museum in Berlin. It was decided to hand this aircraft over to the museum “Sammler- und Hobbywelt“ in Alten-Buseck, near Giessen. There it is on loan. It arrived at the museum location by truck on September, 25th, 2009. There are plans to restore the aircraft completely. While dismantling the aircraft for transport they found a construction number plate with werknummer 5067 which should be wrong since that aircraft had been lost in a crash in the sixties and this 29+14 should have number 5066 in stead. It was decided to analyse all plates in the aircraft during the upcoming restoration.

We heard very sad news from the "Deutch Kandischen Luftwaffen Museum" near Sollingen. Herbert Lienhardt died recently and since he was the man who was very busy getting F-104G 21+00 to the museum these negotionations came to a hold. Now the F-104G, currently at Karlsruhe, is planned to go to the Germersheim barracks where it will be put in storage. (The photo was taken when it was still on a pole at Karlsruhe)

After a very successfull TigerMeet in Belgium the F-104G FX52 has been transported back to Weeze Apt where it arrived in the evening of September 29th. Sadly it sustained a bit of damage during the transport to and from Kleine Brogel AB but the owners will be keen to have this fixed soon again. The people at Kleine Brogel were very surprised by the beautiful appearance of this Tiger Starfighter and would like to keep the aircraft on the airbase. However the owners decided to bring the aircraft back to their shelter at Weeze Apt.

In September the F-104G 22+58, owned by Robert Dietz, has been moved from the shelter at Memmingen Air Base to the museum Meilenwerk at Böblingen, Germany. Robert Dietz will stay the owner. It arrived at the museum on August 27th. See for information of the move here and a more clear photo of 22+58 on its new location here.

On September 4th, 2009, the 156th Gruppo at Gioia del Colle was officlally transferred to Ghedi Air Base. All Tornado's were flown over that day and earlier on the Gioia gateguard MM6782 / 36-36 had already been transported to Ghedi. It can be found at the preserved Starfighters area which is really becoming a Starfighter museum on its own now... See photo of MM6782 at Ghedi AB here.

Today we got news from Tom Svendsen that CF-104 104766 has been removed from its pole at Kjeller Air Base and moved to a nearby hangar annex paintshop (200meters away) to receive an intensive treatment. This will include a corrosion inspection and also it will receive new paint. This time they choose to give it back its traditional Norwegian oliv-grey colorscheme with "766" on its tail. They will also try to get the lights working again which should be switched on during night times. The personnel stated that the work should be finished on October 5th latest and so around that time we can expect it back on its pole.
Tom has taken some photos (see right hand side) and is planning to search for construction number plates for his CF-104 mix-up investigation program. We will keep you all updated.

Today we got news from Tom Svendsen that CF-104 104766 has been removed from its pole at Kjeller Air Base and moved to a nearby hangar annex paintshop (200meters away) to receive an intensive treatment. This will include a corrosion inspection and also it will receive new paint. This time they choose to give it back its traditional Norwegian oliv-grey colorscheme with "766" on its tail. They will also try to get the lights working again which should be switched on during night times. The personnel stated that the work should be finished on October 5th latest and so around that time we can expect it back on its pole.
Tom has taken some photos (see right hand side) and is planning to search for construction number plates for his CF-104 mix-up investigation program. We will keep you all updated.

The 2009 movie "Night at the museum - Battle of the Smithsonian" is released. Inside this move there is a certain moment that an actor is entering the Smithsonian Museum in Washington DC. At least it should give the attention but in the main hall you can clearly see a two-seater Starfighter with serial FG-294 and markings of the commander of 479TFW George AFB (late 50s). To find out more about this Starfighter Mark Wassenaar contacted the Smithsonian museum.
They told him: "The NASM collection has only one F-104.  It is currently on display near the Milestones of Flight Gallery on the second floor above the west escalators.  You can read about its history at:
http://www.nasm.si.edu/exhibitions/gal100/starfighter.cfm  
None of the "artifacts" used in the Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian were true museum artifacts, although some items were visible in the actual filming inside the buildings.  A great deal of the movie was pure fantasy, to include the two-seat F104 at the Smithsonian".
We believe that most likely this must have been NASA TF-104G N825NA which is preserved at Moffet Field and was seen a while ago inside a hangar, being prepared for a new fresh paint-job. But we still have no confirmation yet. But to be honoust it could also be just a scale model which has been reflected into the movie scene. Especially when you look carefully at the tires and the canopy area...
(See right handside a photo taken roughly from the movie)

On Wednesday September 9th,the Belgium 10 Wing based at Kleine Brogel, will officially reveal their new Tiger colored F-16 (FX87) “blackbird”. During this ceremony the F-16 will be accompanied by the F-104G FX52 TIGER as the “famous” star of the show. It will have received the currently lacking 10 Wing badges on the tail by then, applied at the Air Base.
Soon after the ceremony the NATO Tiger Meet will be held for two weeks at Kleine Brogel AB where the Starfighter will be participate in the known ceremonies as well. It will be positioned in front of a black background to give it more appearance at the VIP area, near the VIP tent.
On September 18th, a spottersevent is held (press day) which will give hundreds of people to make photos of participating aircraft including the displayed FX52 TIGER.
In spite of the wishes of the Wing, the FX52 will be transported back to Niederrhein Apt after the event

See also videoclip of its arrival here!!!!

We received information that this airport at Villa San Martino is the same location as where the Aero Club Francesco Baracca is at Lugo di Romagna (aeroporto di Lugo). So this means that we are speaking about F-104S/ASA-M MM6935 which arrived there already on May 7th, this year, had been stored on some platform and has now been officially erected at the airfield. In between it had got the Baracca horse insignia painted on the tail sections as the Grosseto aircraft had.
On August 11th 2009 an F-104S/ASA-M was erected as new monument near the aeroporto di Villa San Martino in Italy. It is meant to remember the pilots who lost their lives during wars in the past. There was a lot of commotion about this monument. Some people thought it was no good idea to put a bomber aircraft as monument since who knows how many lifes had been lost due to bombs of that aircraft. Immediately the officials explained that the F-104S was just an interceptor aircraft which has defended the country for many years. The aircraft is still in light grey livery and put on some concrete blocks. We hope to have some real photos soon of this still not identified F-104.

At a harbour on Ikaria Island in Greece an unidentified F-104G cockpit was found. Analysing this cockpit it looks like it is an old Netherlands Air Force aircraft and most likely candidate would be the aircraft 6684 or the 6697. This has been proven by the fact that inside the cockpit clearly a arrester hook release button can be found, typically used by the Dutch Starfighters only. There are some suggestions made to check the plate on the ejectionseat (now covered with dust) to find any kind of confirmation. See also the discussion on the Greece Model forum via this link. Also a Youtube video can be found regarding this cockpit which can be found here. The aircraft front section looks to have been used for a number of years in the HAF Public Relations & Information office located at the corner of University & Bucharest Street in Athens. This also would proof why there is a Greek roundel found just near the canopy.
This week the ejectionseat of this cockpit was investigated and it showed that it was the ejectionseat of the former Dutch Air Force 6680. Indeed this aircraft, now found on the dump of Corfu, lacks its ejectionseat. Now we still have no clue about the identity and have to wait for c/n plate investigations.

We received the first photos taken in August 2009 of the still unidentified F-104A at Travis Air Museum. We are curious about which serial it will receive, the original or the faulty "56-752" again.

Since July 2009 the F-104G 22+57, based at Bruntingthorpe, UK, is for sale. The team over there had big plans with this aircraft, for instance making it ready with engine to perform high speed taxi runs.. Except being fitted with a J79 engine the bird is totally complete, though it has some corrosion. Pprice will be around 12.000 British Pounds, (which is around 11.000 euros or 22.000 US Dollars). For more information please contact mr. Glyn Roberts. His emailadres is; Starmanfatboy@aol.co.uk

F-104J 4515, preserved at the Kaohsiung / National Sun Yat-Sen University Campus, has been disassembled and trucked away. It took three days, and reportedly arrived at its new home on 4 June 2009, for re-painting before display. Its previous location at the campus will become a parking lot. The new location where it will be become preserved after restoration is Chia Yang Senior High School, 1 Chung Ching Road, Ching Shui Town, Tai Chung County, Taiwan.

We already mentioned aircraft 6678 being installed on a pole at the village of Athikia in our news a week ago. Now we received the first photos, taken by Ioannis Mylonas who also participated in the restoration of this aircraft. The result is absolutely wonderful. It has also fuselage code FG-678 applied. See photo which was taken saturday afternoon July 11th. (click on for bigger photo).

We have made a few changes to the website. First of all the header banner has slightly changed, then the links page has been made more intuitive. Last but not least we have added special pages with buttons to the section F-104 USERS. Next to the AirForces who flew the 104 there is no also attention and room for the people who flew the 104 and worked on them. Just have a look and we hope you like this extension !!!

In March 2009 the Luftwaffe Insth Gruppe 21 at Jever Air Base, has officially scrapped the F-104G werknr 7413 and serial 26+67. This aircraft was seen for many years at Jever and at the end as preserved aircraft. It was last noted preserved mid 2006. Parts of the 26+67 have been used to restore the pole mounted gateguard F-104F 29+09 which has just been installed again near the gate. Another F-104G gone forever....

We received news that finally RF-104G 6678, in silver livery, was installed in her new position on June 23/24, mounted on a pylon at the village of Athikia, Corinthia some 30 kms SE from Corinth Canal coordinates are 37o 49’ 12,60” N – 22o 55’ 31,09” approximately). We expect a photo of the aircraft soon.

We never suspected that this would happen but at Cervia they took the cut MM6908 into the maintenance hangar and are building it back together again, with also lots of parts they had still on stock. Since the aircraft was roughly cut, it must be a real challenge for the people at Cervia. It is planned to become a preserved aircraft on a pole but we have not yet found out where it will go when it is ready. Pierpaolo Magglio visited Cervia a few days ago (June 29th) and had a look at the project.

F-104G (c/n 6661) 21+12 from the German Air Force which was preserved at Kazerne Neubrandenburg with its wheels in is now in restoration with LwInsthGrp 22 at Trollenhagen which is almost the same location. It is likely that it will return back on its pole when it is ready.

To increase the family feeling among the members, especially those who once flew the F-104 Starfighter, we have introduced the F-104 pilots members gallery. It has just been started and we are still trying to get more of our ex 104 pilot members on the list. So all of you please contact if you think you should be on the list.
You can go to the list from the IFS society info page but also directly via HERE.

During a dedicated tour by Michiel Vogelploel through Italy a number of preserved Starfighters have been visited and investigated as far as possible. This resulted in some new identifications. These were the ITIS preserved Starfighter at Ferentino (identified as MM6912), the new preserved Starfighter at Caserta (identified as MM6771) and a confirmation that indeed the aircraft preserved at Montegiorgio is MM6781.
More about the Italian identification puzzle on our Grazza investigation page here.

Michiel Vogelpoel visited the Scuola Perfezio-namento Specialisti in Loreto in the end of May 2009. There he found their preserved RF-104G (c/n 6632) MM6632 "3-28" and "3-32" under restoration. Michiel was told that the aircraft will not return on the pedestal again after the restoration is finished. We are anxious to see what they will do with it...

The last couple of months we again detected some strange c/n plate mix-ups in Canadair build Starfighters. This time it was in Norway. Tom Svendsen investigated some aircraft and would be pleased to get some help from all of you. He stated:

We need some help identifying Canadair built Starfighters!!!!
If you are planning to visit a museum or may have this sort of starfighter in the area you live ,could you please help us to check some dataplates on the for us? Anyone who can help us to solve this mystery and explain the identity or roots of this airframe, please contact us as soon as possible!!!!!!

Actual Starfighters to be checked are :
CF-104   constr.nr 1001-1200 , serial 104700 to 104900
CF-104D constr.nr  5301-5338 , serial 104631 to 104668
F-104G constr.nr 6001-6140 ,serials 62-12302 to 12349 and 63-12697 to 12734 and 64-17752 to 17795

More details on his investigation and the mix-ups we are talking about can be found on our f-104 mystery page so have a look and please help!!

There should be a preserved Starfighter located at the Centro Addestramento Sperimentale in Sabaudia (LT). We do not have any details yet and also do not know when it arrived there. Likely in 2008. The barracks are located at Google Earth coordinates 41°18'36.38"N 13° 1'16.49"E but Google Earth photos are a bit too old.

Lots of people within the aviation scene know the great Japanese Aviation photographer Katsuhiko Tokunaga. He has been guest with 20Gruppo a few times and took fantastic photos of the Starfighters Air 2 Air in great angles and razor sharp!! At this moment there is a website with lots of Grosseto Starfighter photos taken in 2004. See this link and enjoy!!!!! Thanks to David Cenciotti for hosting these photos.
http://lowpassage.com/photo-archive/f-104-air-to-air-pictures-by-katsuhiko-tokunaga/

Recently an unidentified F-104S-ASA-M arrived at the Aeroporto di Lugo and meant to be displayed with the Aero Club Francesco Baracca Lugo di Romagna. It arrived by truck from Grazzanise AB.
See also www.aeroclublugo.it
The aircraft does not have any CFE plate applied on the fuselage which is very strange. Recent visits (thanks to forum http://italy-mil-aviation.forumfree.net/ showed the cockpit section. On the typical 10 Gruppo id location the red "32" was noticed meaning code "9-32". So it looks like we have here the aircraft MM6935 which was not seen anymore during a recent visit in April. Of course we still have to get this confirmed but it looks like we are on track now!!!!!!!!!!. TODAY WE RECEIVED INFORMATION THAT INDEED IT WAS CONFIRMED MM6935!!!

The Villafranca Air Base preserved promotional monument F-104G Starfighter MM6525 (3-01 and 3-30) has participated at the big show in the center of Villafranca town, in front of the castle, for the April 25th end of war anniversary!! In between it has returned to Villafranca Air Base. (Photo and information : Daniele Faccioli)

Currently Johan Bringmans is very busy restoring his FX69, stored at Weeze Apt, into a real "sliver" Starfighter. He also owns the main fuselage and tail of F-104G FX-70 for spareparts. Since the main airframe of the FX70 is now stripped he is almost ready to scrap the remains. A Dutch F-104 cockpit collector decided to take over the cockpit section to build his own cockpit at home in Leeuwarden. So last Thursday April 23rd the FX70 was cut in two parts. A crane was available and the cockpit section was transported to Holland. That day also the FX70 tailsection was mounted on the FX69 and also the wings were mounted. This proves that the FX69 restoration process is still ongoing. Photos show the FX69 at 11:00 PM after a day of hard work!! and bottom photo shows the activities around the just cut FX70 cockpit section. (photos by Roger Seroo)

During a bike-vacation last year in Northern Italy German Aviation anthusiast Florian Rodemich discovered an F-104 Starfighter mounted on some pipes along the road near S. Pellegrino East of Lecco, (Lago di Como). It happened to be one of the F-104S Starfighters which disappeared from the Rome Bentivoglio scrapyard. It was MM6758 code 4-22 with tail from MM6744 and nose from MM6788.

End of last year, the famous aircraft storage area of Piet Smedts in Kessel (Holland) was cleared of all it's aircraft. Little was know till now on the whereabouts of all these former aircraft. Two 104's (23+01 and 21+60) were recently seen behind a  cafetaria in Kessel, but the rest were unknown. Recently Mark Wassenaar had the oportunity to check the area form the air (!) and relocated most of the former Kessel- 104's.
See photos, on top Kessel storage and the bottom one shows Baarlo storage area)
Clearly visible behind a shed are five F-104's with a lot of additional parts spread around. Indentified could be the following F-104G aircraft: 23+01, 21+60, 24+89, 25+61 and 26+30.
There was no sign of the 26+72, but the wings with the tiptanks still attached were seen in the garden in Baarlo. Probably the rest of the 26+72 is in one of the hangars together with the 21+71. Still stored outside in Baarlo is 23+76 as "22+90" and to complete the list, the 24+63 is still on it's pole painted as the blue white painted "D-8212"

During a visit at Grazzanise Air Base on 7 April 2009 an F-104S was seen which had been restored for preserval duties. It was found in front of the main hangar and was resprayed light grey overall. It was planned to be transported by truck last tuesday April 14th to Foligno to become a gate-guard. The CFE-plate stated "11508 MM6850" but this was false. The real MM6850 was still seen that day on the F-104 storage flightline. The aicraft was inspected and identified being MM6763 (ex 9-33). The c.n plates could be found on the radome as well as some other locations on the fuselage. This is again a proof that the italians are making everything very complicated for all of us... Sad but true!!

Thanks to some research by Hubert Peitzmeier we found out that the F-104G 21+00 which is guarding the General-Kammhuber-Kaserne at Karlsruhe since 18 May 1995, will soon be removed and transported to Sollingen. The barracks were former VBK 52 and is now divided into two other sections being a "Fernmeldeinheit" and a "Bundeswehr Fachschule". The F-104G will be taken off the pole and will become part of the "Deutch Kanadisches Luftwaffenmuseum located at Victoria Boulevard in Rheinmünster, not far from the Baden Airpark. It is expected to arrive in May 2009.

Inside the Army Museum in Istanbul, Turkey a CF-104 Starfighter could be found beneath some bushes. It was ex Canadian 104733 coded "8-733". It looks like they cleaned or even refurbished the aircraft completely and put it now on some kind of steel frame. This way the aircraft will stay a lot cleaner for sure. It is unknown when the aircraft was moved but it looks like late 2008. The photo was taken by Bernd Lübbert in April 2009.

Two wellknown preserved Starfighters at Balikesir have received an artist paintbrush colorscheme in 2006. The famous Turkish artist Evrim Duyar (25 years old) had received a task to paint the F-104G 7122 in the city centre and also the wellknown TIGER colored F-104G (c/n 9145) near the 192 filo barracks. On the right side a few photos from the Evrim Duyar website (thanks to her) to give a small impression on the result of the paintschenes.. In between there has been created a new Ataturk monument and they Starfighter 7122 has been refurbished into Turkish Air Force 7122 codes 9-191 and 9-192 and placed in front of the new monument on a new created pedestal. So it was moved from the city park side. This must have taken place around 2008.

Who knows more about this and who can confirm both that 7122 was moved (when?) and if the 192 Filo Starfighter has still its paintbrush colorscheme?

For a long time the F-104C 56-912 has guarded the Sheppard AFB area and this has a lot of impact on the metal structure of the aircraft. It was erected late 70s and that is almost 30 years ago. The AB personnel have decided to refurbish the aircraft again. We got a photo of it showing the aircraft with sealed canopy glasses and new paint. In between they have also changed the serial on the tail since it showed "00912" in the past. Now it shows "60912"!!!

For a lot of years we believed that the Hellenic Air Force had lost Starfighter 64-17782 in a crash around 1989 but we never got confirmation. It was simply not seen since. However recently the aircraft was found back at Tatoi. Years ago they put this aircraft preserved somewhere on a secret location at Tatoi and because the paint had been faded it got a fresh paint job early this year. Now it is back on its former location somewhere on the Tatoi premises. The aircraft is wearing the official Hellenic Air Force 104 camouflagescheme and the serials have been applied in a very exotic way. On the fin "7782" can be found and on the fuselage they applied "FG-7782" a bit like they applied serials on ex-German Air Force Starfighters.

Today we received the latest status information regarding the total restauration of F-104G 21+91 at the Air Ailes Anciennes Toulouse, France. Sylvain Dupouy (Trésorier Adj. & Secrétaire Adj.) told us :

We made a lot of work on the plane. We finished the restauration of the landing gears, doors over the fuselage (fuel tanks), back part of the plane and the left wing. We will finish the second wing in some weeks. The canon bay, the airbrake bay and the wing jonctions will be finished in some months.
For more information you can see the progress on the museum website: http://www.aatlse.org

The photos (on right side) have been taken on 14 (top) and 15 (bottom) February. You notice the progress on the left wingbay within 1 day. (Click on the photos for a bigger picture)

Thanks to Tom Svendsen we stay up-to-date on the great 637 Starfighter project in Norway.
The CF-104D 104637 "637" is in excellent state , almost flyworthy but the main problem is the used ejection seats. Also the aircraft will have a 200 hrs check which will be performed during this month or in March 2009. Then VHF ,VOR, GPS must be installed and the aircraft should be civil registered.

The CF-104D "637" originally has C-2 seats but the explosives, which are lacking on the "637" are very expensive (up to 120-150 000 Euro for two seats). For this reason the project team was aiming for good Martin Baker seats instead. Thanks to the Italian Air Force the projectteam got almost new MB seats and also obtaining explosives should be no problem in the near future. However the CF-104D was not intended to be fitted with the Martin Baker 7A seats. The RDAF was the only Air Force which modified their CF-104/CF-104D aircraft to use these Martin Baker seats. Therefore the RDAF ejection seat drawings were needed. Gladly the team got these drawings last year.
The project team was still struggling how exactly the seats should be replaced. Gladly this was solved by contacting a Danish Air Force technician who did this modification on the Danish Starfighters. He was willing to do the modification on the "637" as well. In between the team got permission of the Danish Air Force to obtain needed ejection seat mounting rails and other parts from two of their CF-104Ds so the modification can now be finalized. Needed parts include the mentioned rail but also cockpitfloor in the backseat and connections.

The annual meeting for the Norwegian Starfighter friends for 2009 will be held on April 25th, at Bodo AB.Of course we keep you updated!!!

In January 2009 a special F-104 cockpit has been revealed at dell’Istituto Scienze Militari Aeronautiche, located at Firenze. The cockpit section is from an unidentified aircraft and painted into the famous red 9-99 colors. It is not coming from the real 9-99 which can still be found at Grazzanise AB. The cockpit was revealed by commander of the institute Brig General Settimo Caputo.
It is interesting to notice that the Pratica project refuelling probe has been added to the cockpit.
See for more information here.

This month (January 2009) at least two Taiwanese Starfighters have been erected on a pole at CCK AFB. Both aircraft, F-104G 4301 and TF-104G 4147 have been part of a big museum collection at the Air Base. It is unknown why they decided to give these two aircraft a new location. The aircraft 4301 was seen for the first time (likely the day it was erected) on 10 January, the 4147 was first noted on 13 January while they still were busy securing the mounting of this aircraft. It is located on the left side of the gate. Both Starfighters have new paint and squadron markings on the tail. The markings of 4301 are from 7th TFS and 4147 is carrying markings of the 427th TFW. It still carries the wrong US serial "61-12236" (in fact it should be "61-3030").

Late 2008 the premises of the Technical School at Zwolle has been modernized including some main buildings. The preserved Starfighter was taken away for this reason but was put back again in December 2008. It looks like it is now preserved on a different spot at the school area. We got a photo from Tom Bouwmeester.