B-52 to be in service for over 100 years (1 Viewer)

[MIflyer]

B-52 in the USAF Museum. It was damaged by a SAM on 9 April 1972, made an emergency landing at Da Nang and after being repaired flew four more missions over NVN in December 1972.

 

[Frog]

I believe Greece and Turkey retired theirs this year. But I'm not sure.

Had Canada replaced its CF-100s and Canadair Sabres with Phantoms instead of Voodoos, Starfighters and Freedom Fighters, I expect we'd never have got the CF-18 Hornets, and instead operated the Phantom well into the 2000s until they were replaced by the likes of the Super Hornet, Typhoon or even Lightning.

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For Greece, retirement scheduled on early 2026, to be replaced by F-35A Lightning II by 2028, the interim period being covered by Rafale F3-R.

 

[ThomasP]

THK still has 1 squadron equipped with 19 (as of Jan'25) updated F-4E-2020 airframes. They are mainly intended for anti-ship or ground strike with precision guided weapons. They are currently operating with a couple of different targeting pods, one of which is capable of electro-optically identifying ship targets at ranges of over 40 miles and contains a data-link system that allows an aircraft equipped with the pod to send targeting information to control compatible weapons launched by other aircraft. The current block F-4E-2020 weapons capability includes most of the common NATO precision guided bombs, AGM-65 Mavericks, and the 'Popeye' ASM (of which a modified variant is produced in-country under license), along with various other NATO (JDAM, SDGB, etc) and homegrown ordnance. Air-to-Air weapons may be limited to AIM-9 Sidewinder, although integration with domestically produced Bozdogan (Merlin) IR homing or Gokdogan (Peregrin) Active-Radar homing missiles may occur in the future.

Apparently, the THK intends to keep them in service into the early-2030s at least.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Apparently, the THK intends to keep them in service into the early-2030s at least.

That would have been Canada's path as well had we replaced the CF-100 and CL-13 Sabre with the F-4 instead of the CF-101 and CF-104. As each nation retired their F-4s the CAF would have bought up their stocks and kept flying the F-4 until replacing the Phantom with the Super Hornet or even F-35.

 

[GrauGeist]

In regards to some older U.S. aircraft still in service:
Northrop's T-38 is still very much alive and well.

I even see them occasionally here in Redding as they're doing touch-n-go at RDD.

 

[smutny]

Northrop's T-38 is still very much alive and well.

Alive? Yes. Well? Not so much. The T-38 and T-45 both have significant maintenance issues that are effecting pilot training. Airframes and engines are old and worn out without a robust new parts supply chain. Recently chatted with a young Marine in the training pipeline and she's waiting months to progress to the next training cycle due to T-45 serviceability.

Working on the B-17 I joke that the guys that designed and built it would've laughed at you if you told them that it'd still be flying 80 years later. But if you think about it, those same slide rules that designed the great WWII aircraft we love on this forum also designed these airplanes we're talking about in this thread. In fact, they even overlapped service....

P-51 - retired from USAF service (Air Guard) in 1957.
B-17 - last flight as a drone 1959.
B-25 - last VIP configured retired 1960.

First flights with descendants still in active US service:
U-2 - 1955
B-52 - 1952
C-130 - 1954
UH-1 - 1956

I was friends with Guy Townsend who was the co-pilot on the first flight of the B-52 with Tex Johnson. A couple years before his passing during a bull session we started talking about the BUFF and the life extension program. He said he never would have imagined that she would outlive him...