The Air Force will officially retire the T-37 twin-engine trainer aircraft on Friday at a ceremony at Sheppard AFB, Tex. The service began using the Tweet in 1957 and has trained more than 78,000 pilots in it, according to a Sheppard release. Sheppard’s 80th Flying Training Wing conducted its last T-37 training flight on June 17 as part of the unit’s Euro-NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training Program. Last year, the Air Force began using the T-6 Texan II in place of the Tweet for specialized undergraduate pilot training. During Friday’s retirement ceremony, four T-37s will take off from Sheppard one last time on a flight to the Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group at Davis-Monthan AFB, Ariz., for placement in storage.
A-10 Thunderbolt II attack planes in the Middle East are flying with fresh modifications as the Air Force looks to make the plane more versatile amid America’s ongoing blockade of Iranian ports and a tenuous ceasefire in the U.S. air war against Iran.