Compass Call's Turboprop Era Ends at the Boneyard

The EC-130H flew its last taxi at Davis-Monthan. Its successor, the EA-37B, is already in the air.

By The Defense Desk

18, 2026 — with tail 1590 reassigned to the 309th Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group and slated to enter the Boneyard on Sept. 21. [1][2]

The aircraft entered service in 1983, a turboprop built on Lockheed Martin's C-130 and modified with electronic attack equipment by BAE Systems and L3Harris. [1] Its final flight came on Sept. 2; the retirement ceremony followed weeks later, closing out a record that included initial stages of combat operations against Iran earlier this year in Operation Epic Fury. [1][2]

The EA-37B — built on a Gulfstream G550 and carrying the same Compass Call name — is the direct replacement. It can operate at 51,000 feet, more than double the ceiling of its predecessor, and cuts through the sky twice as fast at speeds up to 600 mph. [2] The first EA-37B was delivered in August 2024, and the fleet is planned to reach 22 aircraft; Italy has already signed on as the first export customer. [1]

The transition marks something bigger than a hardware swap — it is the electromagnetic spectrum growing teeth it never quite had before, traded from propellers to jets, from analog brute force to high-altitude digital precision.

"We are retiring the EC-130; we are not retiring Compass Call," Col. Aaron Gray, 55th Wing commander at Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska, said at the ceremony. "The mission continues with the EA-37B." [1][2]

This closes the door not just on my time in our squadron, but on an entire chapter of my life.Staff Sgt. Justin Franko