dodgy-alan 1,587 Posted July 27, 2015 Report Share Posted July 27, 2015 Another historic aircraft written off, I wish the movie makers would take more care. For some of them they are just a rescource to be used as they see fit. Throwing money into something does NOT preserve historic aircraft! https://www.warhistoryonline.com/war-articles/catalina-destroyed-florida.html http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=20150703-0 http://www.airport-data.com/aircraft/N85U.html Link to post Share on other sites
SEATAC 400 Posted July 28, 2015 Report Share Posted July 28, 2015 I don't think that is the case. but the fact is that the plane had to make a landing on the sea. I am sure the pilots of that aircraft did not want to see it damaged and they seem to have set it down safely. It is the salvage crew, if anyone, that messed up job. At least they were using a genuine aircraft and not CGI. Still a shame the salvage crew screwed up. Link to post Share on other sites
Captain Coffee 2,030 Posted July 28, 2015 Report Share Posted July 28, 2015 Such a shame. Hopefully parts can be salvaged and used to keep others flying. Link to post Share on other sites
Bruce (a.k.a. brian747) 142 Posted July 28, 2015 Report Share Posted July 28, 2015 A shame to lose to such a historic aircraft, especially when the crew had done what they could. The numpty that did the damage was surely the bright spark who had the idea of trying to hoist it on board a barge. But I'll bet the lawyers have an expensive field day deciding who's going to pay.... I have to agree with Richard — credit to the film company for opting to use the real aircraft. They weren't to know what was about to happen, and are probably now going to have to expensively re-shoot parts of the film to work around the absence of aircraft (after the accident I somehow doubt that Cat owners are currently queuing up to rent them theirs). Frustration all round. Cheers, bruce a.k.a. brian747 Link to post Share on other sites
J G 927 Posted July 28, 2015 Report Share Posted July 28, 2015 This makes me sick. A beautiful vintage aircraft destroyed for a pathetic film. No doubt the film makers will net billions from the film in due course. Some of those super-profits should go to completely reconstructing this aircraft. 2 Link to post Share on other sites
Bruce (a.k.a. brian747) 142 Posted July 28, 2015 Report Share Posted July 28, 2015 Hmm, the last film I took an interest in and so researched has so far only brought back from the box office barely half of what it cost to make. It's a notoriously difficult market to predict, so I suspect that netting "billions" might be a teeny tad exaggerated? Cheers, B. Link to post Share on other sites
dodgy-alan 1,587 Posted July 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted July 28, 2015 I imagine the insurers will be paying out for the loss, The film makers just move on and forget it as an expendible commodity. I used to work in the Aviation Movie industry and over here we were always mindfull of the fact that we were using valuable vintage aircraft in the films hence damage had to be kept to a minimum and wouldn't do anything that could potentially lead to the loss of an aircraft. Tony Bianchi was very firm in how the various projects were handled. However in the USA it seems that Hollywood is king and the movie is everything. By all accounts the makers of this film were not that bothered about the loss of the aircraft. There were however, as has already been said, major issues with the salvage crews work. That aircraft could easily have been saved in one peice but instead they went in like a bunch of amateurs. The result is there for all to see. It's not the first time this has happened though and I daresay it won't be the last. If I remebmer correctly there was a WW1 fighter film made by Howard Hughes in the 1930s and it used 97 WW1 vintage aircraft of which most were destroyed during the film! Link to post Share on other sites
allardjd 1,853 Posted July 28, 2015 Report Share Posted July 28, 2015 I can't see why you are holding the film makers responsible. Aviation services for films are typically contracted with companies that specialize in that kind of thing. They contracted for a service and the owner/contractor had a bad day or made some bad decisions. It's deplorable to have one lost but I think you're barking up the wrong tree with the blame. Chances are the PBY was available on the commercial market for use in the film to help the owner defray the very high cost of restoring, operating and maintaining it. If not for the revenue generated for that kind of thing, many of them would be decaying away on some God-forsaken ramp somewhere for lack of money to do the required maintenance and inspections to keep them flyable, which doesn't come cheap. I agree with Brian - I don't know if any film has ever netted even one billion and many these days seem to come in at a multi-million loss. The film companies feel like they have to make ten to have one be a winner that covers the cost of the others. I'm not defending the movie makers - there's plenty to criticize them for but laying this one at their doorstep is a stretch. John Link to post Share on other sites
dodgy-alan 1,587 Posted July 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted July 28, 2015 Maybe I am judging the filmakers themselves a bit harshly, but someone screwed up badly in this case. I'm just thankfull that no-lives were lost in this incident. Link to post Share on other sites
brett 2,310 Posted July 28, 2015 Report Share Posted July 28, 2015 A real shame that this aircraft got messed up but I did not read anywhere that the movie company was at fault. It's an old aircraft and took on water while parked up. I would call that as an unfortunate accident. The subsequent salvage operation was obviously botched. Hopefully the contracts were written in a way for the aircraft to be restored although that would be a long road. I am surprised Alan by such a negative sweeping statement about our movie industry but not by your bias against the US. Sad to see this PBY destroyed and Nichols Cage in another movie. Link to post Share on other sites
dodgy-alan 1,587 Posted July 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted July 28, 2015 Prehaps I was somewhat disingenuous towards the film makers, I'm not biased against the US by any means. I just remember what was said when I worked for PPS about more classic aircraft being trashed by US Movie makers than anywhere else. Those actors that were also pilots were a lot more careful, hence the reason that the Vintage Wings Sindicate, that Tony Bianchi set up to get classic aircraft availiable for training, included such luminaries as Tom Cruise, John Travolta, Harrison Ford among others. It was nothing unusual to walk into our office at Booker and find one or more of them sitting there drinking coffee! Those guys got the importance of looking after the assets and told us on several occasions that producers had asked them to crash into barns etc! In most cases they refused to do so and replicas were constructed. How true any of this is I wouldn't know, but the impression I got was that not all producers were as sympathetic towards their assets as they could have been. When I first saw this I though something similar was going on, but it looks like that in this case the crew put her down safely enough but it all went pear shaped afterwards. Link to post Share on other sites
J G 927 Posted July 29, 2015 Report Share Posted July 29, 2015 I wasn't blaming the film makers, rather stating that some of the profit from the film should be spent helping get the aircraft back into the air or at least back to museum state. And yes billions was an overstatement, but millions are possible. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
brett 2,310 Posted July 29, 2015 Report Share Posted July 29, 2015 Worldwide box office earnings can easily go into the billions, take Avatar and Titanic as an example, each earning over two billion dollars. Nicolas Cage movies alone made a little over four point seven billion dollars over fifty-seven movies but I think his top earning movie made close to a half a billion dollars at the box office. In general it is still a crap shoot http://www.the-numbers.com/movie/budgets/ 1 Link to post Share on other sites
allardjd 1,853 Posted July 29, 2015 Report Share Posted July 29, 2015 Is that gross or net? Hard to believe anyone nets a billion. John 1 Link to post Share on other sites
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