US: US buys Boeing 747s once set for Russia for Air Force One

The US Air Force reached a deal with Boeing Co. for two 747 jets to serve as Air Force One, taking advantage of an unusual limited-time discount on planes once bound for Russia. “We got a really good deal,” Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson said Friday . “I’m pleased with that.” The service said the jets, which will require extensive work to serve as planes for the president, are scheduled to be operational in 2024. The pact sets the stage for a modernized Air Force One program after President Donald Trump criticized its cost, threatened to cancel the order and later boasted of negotiating with Boeing to reduce the expense. The U.S. planemaker has had the two jumbo jets in storage since they rolled off the assembly line in 2015 for Transaero Airlines, a Russian carrier that never signed for them before dissolving later that year. The Air Force didn’t disclose the discount price for the two planes, which Boeing considered sensitive competitive information. “Boeing has said they do not want us to release that because they sell these things commercially,” Wilson said in the interview. “The whole program cost will be known, but the actual price of individual airframes” won’t be, she said. That nondisclosure “was part of the condition for the sale,” and “I can live with that.”<br/>