The Lockheed C-130 Hercules celebrated 50 years of service with the Royal Australian Air Force at the weekend.
The stout transport aircraft, affectionately dubbed ''Fat Albert'' by crews, is familiar to many Australians from media images of war zones and natural disasters.
It is the sturdy workhorse with the distinctive Snoopy-dog snout that flies wounded diggers and terrorist victims home, evacuates refugees and delivers emergency humanitarian aid.
Australia's first Hercules arrived on its delivery flight from the United States at the RAAF base Richmond, north-west of Sydney, on December 13, 1958.
In the half century since, the RAAF has operated 48 Hercules in four versions .
Australia was the first country outside the US to operate the Hercules and the aircraft is now flown by the air forces of more than 60 nations.
Since its first flight in 1954, more than 2400 have been built at the Lockheed-Martin factory in Marietta, Georgia, in the world's longest, continuous military aircraft production line.
The four-engine turboprop Hercules was named after the mythical Greek hero known for his great strength. It has lived up to its name, proving one of the most successful aircraft designs of all time.
Capable of short takeoffs and landings from unpaved runways, the go-anywhere Hercules was originally designed for troop and cargo transport. But its versatile airframe has been adapted for use in a multitude of roles, including as a gunship, aerial refuelling tanker, drone carrier, aerial ambulance, fire bomber and crop duster; for photographic survey and reconnaissance, search and rescue, electronic warfare and weather reconnaissance; and as a commercial freighter and civilian airliner.
The Hercules has recovered space capsules and worn skis in Antarctica, and dropped massive bunker-busting bombs in Vietnam and Iraq. It is also the biggest aircraft to operate from an aircraft carrier.
Australia's Chief of Air Force, Air Marshal Mark Binskin, said, ''Various models of Hercules aircraft have been the backbone of many of the Australian Defence Force's most important operations in the past 50 years.
''The Hercules have provided combat airlift capability, including tactical transport of troops and cargo, as well as special-forces insertion, parachuting and air drops. In recent years our C-130 Hercules have seen more active duty than any other aircraft in the RAAF.''
The introduction of the Hercules in 1958 boosted RAAF airlift capacity. In the immediate post-war years, the RAAF had relied on the Douglas C-47 Dakota, the military version of the twin-engine DC-3, to fill most of its transport needs.
With the arrival of the Hercules, the Canberra-based No36 Squadron relinquished its World War II-era Dakotas and moved to Richmond to take delivery of the 12 C-130A aircraft. The powerful 56,500kg Hercules could fly twice as fast, higher and further than the piston-engine Dakotas and carry 100 troops four times the load of the 11,500kg Dakota. Its four engines delivered 16,000 horsepower against the Dakota's 2000.
In 1966 the RAAF took delivery of 12 C-130E models to supplement the A models and service the demands of Australia's growing involvement in the Vietnam War. Twelve C-130H models arrived in 1978 to replace the 20-year-old A model, and the latest version, the C-130J ''Super'' Hercules with a stretched fuselage, replaced the E model in 1999.
Some of the more memorable achievements of RAAF Hercules include extensive service in Vietnam in the 1960s and 70s, and the emergency response to Cyclone Tracy at Darwin in 1974-75.
In 1989, prime minister Bob Hawke used the RAAF as a strike buster to fly 172,000 civilian passengers during the four-month domestic pilots' dispute.
Air Marshal Binskin said, ''In 2005, the C-130s delivered humanitarian assistance to the hundreds of thousands of people affected by the Boxing Day tsunami and they brought home the Australians injured in the Bali bombings in 2002.
''Today, three RAAF Hercules are based in the Middle East, and continue to provide vital airlift support to Australian and Coalition forces.''
The RAAF has a fleet of 24 C-130s, comprising 12 H models and 12 J model stretched Super Hercules. Fifty years on, the ever reliable Hercules has flown millions of kilometres in RAAF service without a serious safety incident.
The rugged workhorse and jack-of-all-trades is likely to soldier on for at least another decade or two before being replaced, most likely by an updated version of the Hercules not even on the Lockheed-Martin drawing boards yet.
Mick Seale is Foreign Editor. He first flew in a Hercules as an air cadet in 1961. Since then as a journalist, public servant and diplomat he has flown in Hercules on four continents, including mercy flights to Darwin in response to Cyclone Tracy in 1974.