Posted on 06/13/2014 7:49:31 AM PDT by sukhoi-30mki
The Boeing B-52 - sometimes known as the Stratofortress - is a long-range, jet-powered strategic bomber which is widely expected to prop up the US Air Force well beyond the year 2045
Before our marathon eight-hour flight Captain Thomas Hyde, the commanding officer of one of the B-52 bombers, briefly describes the mission.
He says we will be doing a number of simulated bombing runs around what he calls "the island". He makes it sound like a short training flight over a remote abandoned outcrop of rock somewhere in the North Sea. But the island he is referring to is in fact Britain.
It is the first time the B-52s have returned to their European "home" for more than a decade.
RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire is one of the long range bombers' forward operating bases - alongside the more exotic islands of Guam and Diego Garcia.
Military muscle
The last time they were in Europe was in 2003 - the year America launched "shock and awe" on Iraq.
Now their arrival is more about flexing America's military muscle.
But it is seen as significant given Russia's recent intervention in Ukraine.
Colonel Leyland Bohannon of the US Air Force says the timing is "interesting" while insisting it is "not connected".
Though he adds wherever you fly a nuclear capable bomber "it does send a message".
The B-52 is a warrior of the Cold War. But it is still a symbol of American power.
The one we are flying in was built in 1961. It has since undergone numerous upgrades.
And while the B-52 was once used to conduct "carpet bombing" now it is more likely to carry cruise missiles and Laser Guided Bombs.
It was a question as I didn't find it myself. But FReepers came to my rescue!
... he'll be fryin' chickens in the barnyard.
Your friend goes back a ways in terms of Buff history; the last “true” tail gunners were in the D models, which were retired in the early 80s. I’m assuming he probably spent some time in the G/H models, where the gunner was moved “up front” with the EWO.
Incidentally, D-model gunners were responsible for shooting down two North Vietnamese MiG-21s during Linebacker II missions in December 1972. The first was credited to SSgt Samuel Turner, the other to Airman First Class Albert Moore. Your friend probably knew (or knew of) both; Turner was a MSgt who was still on active duty when he died of cancer in the mid-80s; I don’t know what happened to Moore.
During one of my Air Force assignments, I worked with a former Buff gunner who became a training manager after the gunners were eliminated from B-52 crews. He began in the D model, but transitioned to the H model. Said he much preferred the D, because his “office” had a window in that model. With the lack of an outside visual reference, he said that low-level missions were tough in the H and even worse for the nav and radar-nav “downstairs”
I'm going to guess that they have a machinist make any part that breaks.
At one point there were over 750+ B-52s of various model numbers in squadron service. Now, thanks to end-of-Cold War force reductions and START Treaty terms, there are less than 100.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_B-52_Stratofortress
http://usmilitary.about.com/library/milinfo/affacts/blb-52stratofortress.htm
When I lived near Wichita back in the sixties, I frequently drove past McConnell AFB and saw the B-52s on alert at the end of the runway.
The image conveyed was brooding birds of prey, you could easily imagine their "eagle eyes".
I felt palpably safer for their presence...
I had the pleasure, and honor, of serving in SAC at Andersen AFB, Guam back in the mid to late 1980’s. These planes were very loud, but wow, what a plane!
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