Hawkeye pride: E-2C continues mission as new model rolls out

To the casual observer of carrier flight operations, the Navy’s E-2C Hawkeye aircraft may seem like the ugly ducklings of carrier air wings. But to those who’ve made careers of flying and fighting these early warning aircraft, they’re swans.

Those who fly them call them “Hummers,” a nickname derived from the distinctive sound of their turboprop engines.

Hawkeyes have been in the fleet for more than 50 years; the E-2 is the oldest airframe serving on U.S. carriers, outliving venerable aircraft such as the F-14 Tomcat, which became operational in 1975 and left the fleet 30 years later. The current variant of the E-2, which makes up most of the fleet, is the “C” model, which entered operational service in 1973.

Read more