On Feb 13, 8:32 pm, Howard Kveck wrote:
In article ,
Jack Hollis wrote:

On Mon, 12 Feb 2007 23:12:28 -0800, Howard Kveck
wrote:

The only difference is that she would
need a plane that has greater rangethan he did because she needs to fly
further.
It's really pretty simple.

Why can't she stop to refuel? Do you think it's worth another
$200,000.00 of taxpayer money per round trip to save her an hour?

The DoD are the ones who are taking care of this and they seem to think it isn't
worth the added expense and trouble of working the logistics of planning a refueling
stop, in addition to the logistics of security. Again, she isn't the one requesting
the plane - the Sergeant at Arms and the White House want it this way and the DoD
are complying.

Wel - the $200,000 figure seems to be for the C-32, and there's still
no evidence of Speaker Pelosi ever asking for a specific aircraft. My
understanding is that the C-37A she was flown in on Thursday and back
to Washington has a far lower operating cost.

It's worth pointing out that trying to deal with a plane that can make it across
the country (based on fuel load) if conditions are optimal is kind of silly. If
there are conditions that make the plane use more fuel than expected, then they need
to work out a stop part-way home. The logistics of that are not good: expensive,
time consuming, etc.

You'll generally notice that there aren't many commercial flights that
go cross-country in a 737. The specified range of a 737-700 is
theoretically enough to fly cross-country, but I don't imagine most
airlines want to take the chance of losing a plane or at the very
least making an unscheduled refueling stop. I do understand that the
newer 737-700ER has a longer range, but most American carriers seem to
want a larger plane for cross-country trips.

Since this is a bicycling group, maybe I can pose a query. My old
road bike is ancient technology. It's a Bottechia Columbus SL steel
frame with a mish-mash of assorted parts that mostly I installed
myself. I think the only original parts are the original Campagnolo
Xenon (plastic-coated Athena) headset, front-derailleur, crankset,
bottom bracket, rear wheel, and seatpost. Everything else was added
on later, including a couple of front wheels that I built myself.
It's still uses a 7-sp freewheel. Is this bike worth keeping? I
don't really ride it much but it carries a lot of sentimental value.
The biggest pain is that '96 Campagnolo Record front hub (one of the
built wheels) with this dustcap that requires a special tool to remove
without scratching.