The KC-135 Stratotanker that left Grand Forks Air Force Base on Monday evening was the last one to deploy from the base to aid in the war in Afghanistan, according base officials.
It was another milestone in the dissolution of the 319th Air Refueling Wing that had been a base tenant in some form -- it once had nuclear bombers -- since 1963.
"It's the end of a legacy of the KC-135s," Capt. Scott Morrison, the lead pilot for Monday's deployment, said in an Air Force release.
Base officials declined to reveal where the deploying aircraft was headed. Many of Air Mobility Command's tankers in the Afghanistan theater are based at the logistics base in Kyrgyzstan.
Those tankers that remain and those that return from abroad will be transferred to other bases starting next month. The last aircraft is scheduled to depart in December.
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The aircraft that deployed Monday is a part of the 905th Air Refueling Squadron, the only remaining squadron out of the four that once made up the 319th.
As part of the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure round, the base is shifting to a new mission hosting Predator and Global Hawk unmanned aircraft.
