It's a shame that the Martin Aviation JRM Mars isn't more of a well-respected and well-celebrated aircraft. Considered the largest operational amphibious flying boat in the history of the U.S. Navy, the Mars had a stellar follow-up career as a forest firefighting juggernaut.
Sadly though, that hasn't made it any easier to get somebody to purchase one of the very last airworthy Mars flying boats left on the planet. With its scarcely believable sixth year on the open market passing this month, we can't help but think there has to be at least one wealthy aviation enthusiast that's enamored enough with this quad-engined leviathan to take it home.
That just hasn't been the case in the last 72 or so months since this enormous red and white warbird dubbed Hawaii Mars II took to the skies for the EAA's 2016 Air Venture. There, it conducted simulated firefighting drills over a crowd of cheering spectators at Oshkosh Airfield in Wisconsin. Ever since, the aircraft's been sitting in a lake in Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada waiting for someone to buy it.
Photo: Platinum Fighter Sales
Powering this aircraft is a set of four Wright R-3350 Duplex-Cyclone 18-cylinder radial engines generating 2,500 hp (1,900 kW) each. The very same engines that powered the iconic Boeing B-29 Superfortress when it dropped two atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, to end the Second World War. Hawaii Mars II received a comprehensive avionics and glass cockpit upgrade before its last big show in 2016, so everything should be all ready to go as soon as someone is bonkers enough to actually buy this plane.
A plane of this size is bound to need one heck of a big crew to keep it going. Ultimately, a shift to smaller, less maintenance-heavy water-bomber aircraft in North America is ultimately the reason this near one-of-a-kind winged boat has stayed on the open market for so long.
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