OK, so what is this I’ve been reading about a military style jet airplane for Google? Hold on a sec, let me double check my stock market report, I thought things were down across the board for these yahoos. According to reports in the Mountain View Voice and the New York Times website, not only have Larry Page and Sergey Brin purchased a training fighter jet aircraft, they also have take-off and landing cleared with NASA’s Moffett Field! So how the heck did the two founders of the Internet’s uber-search engine managed to pull this off? Let’s take a closer look at the details of these reports and see if we can read between the lines to get a better idea of what it means to fly in style with Google Air (wait, is that coming next?).
OK, so what’s the real deal behind this? According to Steve Zornetzer, deputy director of NASA Ames, the jet fighter is being converted for civilian use and loaded with a NASA payload of scientific instrumentation for such nebulous activities as data collection from wildfires. While that sounds all nice and charming, consider for a moment that this new aircraft will be one of five that have access to the Moffet air strip that belong to H211 LLC, a company which Brin and Page own. Other planes that these tech superstars have at their disposal include a Boeing 757 and 767 and two Gulfstream V’s. To be fair, all of the aircraft are owned by H211, which has no relationship with Google other than the connection with the founders. H211 only used the Moffet Field air strip around 190 times in 2007, or approximately 1% of it’s actual usage.
Now for the back story. The lease between H211 and NASA required that an airplane would be fitted with scientific equipment to participate in research for various research projects. Part of this exchange also allows the airplanes to be stored at a hanger at Moffet. Unfortunately, the initial aircraft housed there could not be modified without requiring a lot of wading through FAA red tape with one significant outcome: changing the plane’s certifications. Previously H211 has used the larger craft for personal flights and entertaining guests (like the reception for San Francisco’s Mayor Gavin Newsom’s wedding party). This is perfectly acceptable, after all they are private aircraft. However, when the re-certification issues came up, the need for another aircraft that could serve as the research carrier to comply with the lease became necessary. They pulled the craft out of use for a joint effort between NADA and the European Space Agency project.
At the end of the day, what does this amount to? Hey, nothing more than a couple of guys who have made it big living some of their dreams! Look at it this way, they aren’t the first people to privately own a fighter jet, and they probably won’t be the last either. Take a few minutes to think about the type of money we’re talking from the creation of Google and it’s success and if you had access to it I’m sure you would find a few nice manly toys to purchase as well, right? Talk about the “jet set”.
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