It's all too common--there's very little money allocated corporate-wise for preservation of any kind. Old equipment hits the scrappers almost as a matter of course. Think of the hundreds of thousands, if not millions of reels of 1/2" magtape stashed away in government warehouses. It's a big problem for archivists--some of the data on the often unmarked tapes gives no clue to its relevance and may, in fact, be covered by security and privacy laws. Easier to send it to be shredded or incinerated.
In fact, Massachusetts passed a privacy law a couple of years ago that made it illegal for businesses to accept or send media containing third-party personal information. This put one media conversion outfit out of business as they had no way of ascertaining beforehand what was on media sent for recovery.
With defense and space contractors, there's usually nothing in the budget allocated for preservation or archiving. When the contract's up, materials go for disposal.
The US doesn't want to remember its history, it seems.
Your government at work.