I got a chuckle...and then I said "wow".

I was reading an aviation magazine that someone graciously sent to me and there was an article in it about the problems of maintaining America's aging B-52 bomber fleet. It talked about airframe, engine and electronic issues and how many of the planes were older than the crews working on them.

The article was written in 1977, THIRTY-SEVEN YEARS AGO.

The last B-52 rolled off of the Boeing assembly line in 1962 and many of those B-52s are still flying today.

Currently these is no replacement aircraft in inventory or under development, so the B-52 fleet just keeps getting overhauled and modified.

And with upgrade and overhaul programs, the Air Force plans to keep flying them into 2040 and even beyond.

Think about that, will you? By 2040, the youngest airframe left would be 78 years old, with many over 80. That's like upgrading the B-17s from World War Two and using them to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan and other hotspots today, and still not having a replacement in mind.

More Boneyard, because who can get enough of the place?

Looking around the Boneyard, you might feel like you're in a trendy store in a shopping mall...Old Navy, for example.

They got A-6 Intruders there.

And A-7s. Lots of A-7s.

Here's an old E-2 Hawkeye early warning bird. You have to wonder how much time this bird spent aloft, keeping an eye out for it's carrier and her battle group.

Here's another, this one looking ready to be unwrapped and redeployed.

They got rows of these.

An old Douglas A3 Skywarrior caught my eye off in the distance. Designed by the legendary Ed Heinemann, this was the largest nuclear bomber ever to fly off of a carrier, but by the time she was deployed, the Navy had re-purposed it to be a tanker and a reconnaissance aircraft.

See how it's tail folds down for carrier storage? These large aircraft served the US carrier fleet from the mid-1950s until 1991, making them one of the longest-serving carrier aircraft in fleet history.

Here's an S-2 Tracker that looks like it'd clean up well.

And this looks like a C-2 Cod variant--Carrier On-board Delivery, for the non-Navy folks reading this.

And they've even got some Marine Corps Harrier jets here.

Oh-and since we're talking about things that fly unnaturally, did I mention that they have heckiflopters here?

The rotors get removed and stored separately for space reasons and due to high winds that come through here at times.

They still supposedly have a bunch of C-141 Starlifters here, but as they're all being chopped up, we didn't get to go over there. Same for the B-52s. We saw the occasional B-52 aside from the one on display on "celebrity row", a sort of petting zoo where they keep one of each type that that have in storage, but most are kept off in their own area where we didn't get to go. Even bribes offered to the bus driver didn't get it done.

There were a few, though.

And they've got Northrop T-38 trainers here, too.

Then there were the curiosities--the "one-off" special planes or the old ones that make you wonder just what else you're not seeing.

Here's a YC-14, Boeing's attempt to make a jet-powered STOL aircraft comparabe in size and performance to the C-130.

Only two were ever built before the idea was scrapped. This one is now here, and the other is across the street at the Pima Air and Space Museum.

Here's a Fairchild T-46, a trainer that was intended to replace the again T-37.

Only three were built before the Air Force canceled the project. This one is here, and the other two are at Wright Patterson and the Air Force Flight Test Center Museum at Edwards AFB.

There's this old Martin Canberra bomber back in storage, still here after all these years.

And does anyone want to take a guess as to what this airframe behind the T-38 is?

I saw at least one QF-106 back behind the rows too, but I couldn't get a decent shot of it. And this beautiful F-105G apparently just came out of spraylat for some reason.

I'm thinking that Ed, were he still here, would approve.

They also have two different F-4 Phantoms painted up as Vietnam Ace Steve Ritchie's plane. What's up with that?

The Boneyard tour was a fantastic experience all by itself, but they could make it a lot cooler by just giving us all ATVs and some bottled water and turning us loose to explore.

Think about it, Air Force...I'll even promise in writing not to steal an airplane...O-2As and T-34s excepted, of course.