The KC-135 tanker is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, but so is a retired chief master sergeant, who spent his entire Air Force career working on the KC-135 and continued right on in civilian life. Retired CMSgt. Bobby McCasland was with the crew that picked up USAF’s first KC-135 in 1957 and spent the next 23 years in and around the tanker. After retiring, he worked with the Air Force as a civilian—on KC-135 quality assurance—retiring in 1987. He is now helping convert a KC-135R into a communication test aircraft at the Oklahoma City Air Logistics Center at Tinker AFB, Okla. (Read more here.)
An important U.S. Air Force E-3 Sentry AWACS command and control plane was among the aircraft damaged in a March 27 Iranian missile and drone attack on Prince Sultan Air Base, Saudi Arabia, people familiar with the matter told Air & Space Forces Magazine.