That takes me back. As an Air Force Satcom Ranger got a lot of time in C-130, C-5, C-141 and C-17. Funny story, Talking with the Flight Engineer going over to SW Asia during Desert Shield, he was looking at the wings of the C-141 and making tick marks on a tablet (pencil type). He was counting the cracks in the wings as they would gently flap up and down. Imagine over the North Pole and your FE is counting cracks in wings.

I was an Air Force Project Officer in the early nineties for the C17 Systems Program Office at Wright Patterson AFB. I remember the stress trying to get congressional budget approval for the first production block to be on the assembly line at McDonnell Douglas in Long Beach. That was 35 plus years ago. First flight: September 15, 1991