Having flown the E most of my career, I jumped at the chance to take one of our E's to the boneyard. I just felt that it was only right for us senior guys to do it. In my mind, it would have just been wrong for the newbies to get the task. They wouldn't see it as an honor or have the sentimental mentality to know what how significant the event was.

The E is a very fine and capable machine. Sure we used a bit more fuel, made some noise, and left a smoke trail, but we loved the thrust reverse on landing and could do the job as well as an R. Ok, maybe a few K less in off load, but most of the time the reciever wouldn't take all they had us planned for anyway, so what's the big deal. I am sorry to see the E's go. I have to laugh at the people that call the R a new plane than the E. The R's we got were only 3 years, on average, younger than the E's we had, and the hours on the airframe were nearly the same. Now, the engine time was a totally different story, but the ANG/Reserve got the engines used from the airlines. A damn better engine than the A's though.