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You are the reason I drink’ — Airmen bid adieu to decrepit aircraft dubbed ‘Lucifer’s Chariot’

Colin Parkinson

Army.ca Myth
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Worth the read, not an exactly glowing review of the last years of this aircraft.


Few tears were shed this when a 56-year-old Air Force jet took its final flight out to the desert boneyard at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Arizona in November 2020. In fact, several airmen who once flew WC-135 tail number 582 bid the old plane — nicknamed ‘Lucifer’s Chariot’ — good riddance and hoped it never left the ground again.

“I hope they chop you up into small bits that aren’t used for anything,” said Will Markham, a pilot who flew 582 from 2015 to 2019, a period which he described as “four terrible and terrifying years that aged me well beyond where I should be.”
 
Worth the read, not an exactly glowing review of the last years of this aircraft.


Few tears were shed this when a 56-year-old Air Force jet took its final flight out to the desert boneyard at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Arizona in November 2020. In fact, several airmen who once flew WC-135 tail number 582 bid the old plane — nicknamed ‘Lucifer’s Chariot’ — good riddance and hoped it never left the ground again.

“I hope they chop you up into small bits that aren’t used for anything,” said Will Markham, a pilot who flew 582 from 2015 to 2019, a period which he described as “four terrible and terrifying years that aged me well beyond where I should be.”
That is really a 707 right? Like the white knuckle airline variety we used to fly in?

Those old 707s took a beating for sure.
 
Every fleet has a dog/hangar queen that should be taken out on the ramp and burned…

582 seems to have made Old Yeller look like a young pup, just weaned from his mother…less the one Über-old school pilot who lover flying it manually through thunderstorms…that’s some certifiable shizzle right there! 😆
 
One has to wonder why the replacements where also -135’s.
I’d have thought that that mission would have gotten a little bit more support than retired tankers being refitted.
 
One has to wonder why the replacements where also -135’s.
I’d have thought that that mission would have gotten a little bit more support than retired tankers being refitted.
They’re also 135s, but notably upgraded and newer, more efficient turbofan engines (original CONSTANT PHOENIXes had same old TF33 low-bypass engines as the B-52G) and I understand an old-school steam-driven flight deck with ‘legacy’ flight management system.
 
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