United Parcel Service (UPS) retired its last Douglas DC-8 aircraft after a water cannon salute in Louisville KY where there final flight touched down. The company operates now a fleet of Airbus A300-600F, Boeing 747-400F, 757-200F and 767-300ERF, it was also considering ordering the A380-800F but it decided not to. UPS flies to numerous destinations around the world. It had at one time a fleet of 49 DC-8's and had 44 remaining in service up until recently, the first one arrived in 1988. Most, if not all of the DC-8's at UPS, arrived second hand and flew previously for major airlines in passenger version as DC-8-60's or 70's. The DC-8's at UPS were DC-8-70's powered by CFM power plant, some were converted from older 60 variants.
The DC-8 (Douglas Commercial type 8) was designed and built by the then Long Beach based Douglas company in the late 1950's at the dawn of the jet age as a response to Boeing's 707, at the time the two main rivals of the industry were Boeing and Douglas. Douglas merged with Mc Donnell in the 1960's and remained Mc Donnell Douglas until the late 1990's when it was absorbed by Boeing. 556 DC-8's were built and today (2009) less than 100 of then remain airworthy, most of those are still flying as freighters for small companies around the world. The DC-8 was a popular long haul aircraft during the 1960's, along with the Boeing 707, but it became a popular freighter in later years when the major airlines began replacing those with Boeing 757's and 767's in the 1980's. Freight companies that flew the DC-8 for a long time include, but are not limited to, Cargolux, UPS, and Airborne Express. Many pilots who flew the DC-8 for those companies now fly the Boeing 747 or 767.
