New ‘Fat Albert’ coming to Blues

A new Marine Corps cargo plane will be heading to the Pensacola, Fla.-based Navy Blue Angels from the British Royal Air Force by spring 2020. The Navy awarded a $29.7M contract to the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence for a Royal Air Force C-130J Super Hercules. In a news release, the Navy's Naval Air Systems Command announced the purchasing of a used U.K. aircraft to replace ‘Fat Albert’ as part of the flight demonstration team, and also stated the cost was about $50M less than the cost of a new one. “This is a win-win for the U.S. Navy and the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence,” said Capt. Steven Nassau said in the news release. The Navy announced in May it needed to replace the C-130T ‘Fat Albert’ aircraft. Around the same time, U.K. was divesting itself of an American-made C-130J allowing the replacement to be pursed at a “major cost savings,” he said. ‘Fat Albert’ has been with the team for 17 seasons. The Navy grounded its entire fleet of C-130s in July 2017 after a deadly crash in rural Mississippi that killed 15 Marines and a sailor. Fat Albert hadn't performed since the grounding until the 2018 Pensacola Beach show. Source: Pensacola News Journal 06/24/19) Golden Triangle Note: The special operations group was traveling from Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point, N.C., to conduct pre-deployment training at the Naval Air Field El Centro, Calif. - winter training ground for the Blue Angels. The Marine Corps Reserve KC-130T Hercules broke up and crashed in the vicinity of Itta Bena, Miss.