Message posted by Pinyon72 (Member since 02/09/2013) on August 12, 2023 at 1:01:51 PST:
The 2026 retirement date was first specified the USAF budget request in the USAF FY22 budget request. It was not repeated in the FY23 request. You read the stuff about $800m-plus being spent in recent years in my post this week. Yes, very strange to retire. Maybe they will keep the two test jets for the R&D work. Which also keeps the logistics/spare pipeline open for the two ER-2s, which NASA has no intention of retiring. Better still, keep a smaller fleet for contingencies.
In Reply to: Re: U-2 retirement posted by Casper on August 10, 2023 at 12:48:47 PST:
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