Over a dozen vintage planes are currently scattered across an aircraft boneyard in northern Wyoming. If you can travel about 85 miles east of Yellowstone National Park to Big Horn County, relics such as a Lockheed P-2 Neptune could be yours for as low as $25—just don’t expect to fly away in any of your new purchases.
“They’re aircraft in various stages of undress. But they’re county assets, and the county is selling them,” Big Horn County Airport manager Paul Thur told Wyoming’s Cowboy State Daily earlier this month.
The PublicSurplus.com auction is the culmination of a years-long legal and logistical headache for Thur and local officials. In 2021, the plane carcasses’ original owner suddenly stopped paying the county airport to store the plane the husks of Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcars, Martin 4-0-4s, and Boeing KC-97 Stratofreighters. Big Horn County subsequently filed a $543,600 storage lien against the property, resulting in a countersuit from the former tenant. The case made it all the way to the state supreme court, which ultimately ruled in the county’s favor earlier this year. Since then, Wyoming officials have worked to arrange an auction for at least some of the stranded planes and associated equipment.
The majority of the lots were built amid the Cold War during the 1940s and 1950s. The C-119 Flying Boxcar first took flight in 1947, and as its name implies, was intended as a cargo and troop transport carrier. In contrast, the twin-engine Martin 4-0-4 was designed for civilian air travel in the 1950s, and ferried as many as 40 passengers for companies including Mohawk Airlines and TWA. While the majority of auction lots have been long discontinued, the C-130 Hercules is still in production today as the longest in-service military aircraft.
None of the 16 planes are intact, so interested buyers are basically bidding on the aircrafts’ fuselages, wings, and cockpit equipment. While hobbyists and museums may view the lots as historically interesting investments, others could simply see a way to make some extra cash. Recycled aluminum scrap is currently priced at around 40 to 60 cents per pound.
The auction is set to close on October 3 at 12 p.m. MDT. But regardless of how much the Arizona National Guard’s retired KC-97 ultimately fetches, its new owner will have 90 days to retrieve it using their own tools and equipment. Meanwhile, at least a few more dismantled planes owned by other renters will remain around the Big Horn County airport for the foreseeable future.
“We’re just cleaning up the property,” said Thur. “We would like to recover some legal fees and unpaid lease amounts, but at the end of the day, times are tough with the county, and anything helps.”
