Send Lawyers, Guns and Money

[skidbuggy]

Caution! Graphic. MD-11 in picture!

Enjoy.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/feb/15/cargo-jet-impounded-zimbabwe-body-south-african-rand#img-1

[Raceaddict]

Article says body in landing gear bay... FB says body found in engine.

And if that plane doesn't scream "spooks on board" I don't know what would.

[vince14]

Go to almost any airport in Africa and you'll find some sort of unmarked aircraft...you'd think the CIA would paint them up to look like normal airliners, and thus they would be less conspicuous than leaving them unmarked...mind you, in Africa it was pretty easy to see who was a US 'Spook', because they all dressed and acted the same!

[STEN8]

"I was gambling in Honduras,

I took a little risk.

Send lawyers, guns and money,

Dad, get me out of this!"

Warren Zevon is missed.

Money being the cargo makes it more macabre.

Harry,

Lutz, FL

Edited February 17, 2016 by STEN8

[82Whitey51]

That is the air conditioner bay that the body is hanging out of.

Africa is a crazy a$$ place...pick a country. We had a crew go into Dakar, Senegal for some stuff, nothing "spook" or anything just showing the Coast Guard how to do a few things, but a brief case (actually a Pelican case :) )full of U.S. dollars was part of the pack out for them to pay for gas.

Operating out of Djibouti is also interesting...half the time the tower folks are asleep so you really need to keep your outside scan on point.

[82Whitey51]

They might as well paint "Ace Tomato Company" on the side...

Edited February 17, 2016 by 82Whitey51

[Don]

I agree, all white or all black (heck all of any color) just screams "we're up to something" in those parts of the world.

So...

...get frat-boy crazy and send a "we're all high as kites in here" message... :lol: ...

[TaiidanTomcat]

Go to almost any airport in Africa and you'll find some sort of unmarked aircraft...you'd think the CIA would paint them up to look like normal airliners, and thus they would be less conspicuous than leaving them unmarked...mind you, in Africa it was pretty easy to see who was a US 'Spook', because they all dressed and acted the same!

Sounds about right. Spy uniforms will be uniform

[11bee]

Am I missing something? From the article:

The Herald, a state-run newspaper, reported that the MD-11 trijet was travelling from Germany to South Africa “with millions of rands”. At the current exchange rate, 1m rand is worth £43,866.

Assuming the plane had as much as 10 million Rand, we are only talking 430,000 Pounds. A nice haul but certainly not an exorbitant amount of money to have on-board in that region, since as 82Whitey mentioned, it's often SOP to travel with some cash for fuel purchases (and probably some bribes here and there).

[Mfezi]

The money was apparently on its way to the South African Reserve Bank: We print most of our money in South Africa (and even print money for many other countries), but apparently they do occasionally outsource some of it to Europe and this was a batch of newly printed notes on their way to South Africa. It doesn't sound like a particularly large amount, but they didn't disclose exactly how much.

As for white jets: Unmarked cargo aircraft is very common here in Africa. Especially charter and cargo companies that make extensive use of leased aircraft often don't even bother to add anything except the required registration markings. In this case, the aircraft was chartered by Western Cargo Airlines. I have quite a few friends that fly for such companies and there really is nothing unusual about these all-white aircraft.

Finally, on the body: I guess we'll find out later but most likely it was a stowaway. Since the aircraft flew from Germany, this does make it a bit unusual, but stowaways in general are quite common: Usually they sneak aboard somewhere at an African airport and the authorities in London, Frankfurt, Paris, Amsterdam etc., are left with the mess when the aircraft arrives there.