B-52 Mass Launch Jun 09

Minimum interval take-off of 15 BUFFs.

Taz
Terry Phillips

http://www.fark.com/cgi/vidplayer.pl?IDLink=4632948

 

That was neat Terry thanks - the B-52 is magnificent.

The YouTube link has some interesting comments from aviators
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJ7niLYSVFo[/ame]

 

This is where I work... I have seen 2 of these so far but they were not as well executed. Oh and they don't allow video cameras or any personal electronics on the line so this is a rare look at an operating B-52.

On a side, that looked like a nice day. Summer needs to get here!!!

 

Summer, indeed. I remember landing at Minot in mid-June in the 70s and it snowed on us. Guess that is where you have to be located to be 15 minutes from the coast for an SLBM launch, though. Sure pay for it in the winter. Especially if you are working on the line. At least no more V alert. Did that myself at RAF Lakenheath in the early 80s, and it was a pain, even if not so cold.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

Pretty cool.. Had a B-52 flyover at Arlington Cem yesterday. My office looks right out at the flight line for these and we get 2-3 a week, but this is only the 2nd time I've seen a B-52 flyover in the 7 years I've been there. Heard it way before I saw it... certainly leaves an impression.

 

And here's the same sort of action from the 1962 movie "A Gathering of Eagles". The planes here are J57-powered B-52Gs using water injection, so there's rather more smoke. Note that the aircraft are in their nuclear-bomber paint scheme, with Hound Dog cruise missiles under the wings.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cq6Hpxyrhyo[/ame]

 

And while it's slightly off-topic, here's the B-36H takeoff scene from 1955's "Strategic Air Command". The B-36 is one aircraft that I wish that I could have seen fly in person.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wvEzhyY9F4[/ame]

 

Jim- My father was stationed at Lackland AFB in 1954-55 and we saw mass overflights several times. They took forever to go by because they were so big, you saw them a long ways out, and they were only doing about 200-250 knots. The roar was unbelievable with 10 engines, like a tornado overflying. Still easy to remember from 50+ years ago. I was in the 2nd and 3rd grades there.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

6 turbo props and 4 jet engines... I thought maintaining 8 engines was bad.

Is that how the inside of B-36H really look? It has a lot more room than the B-52.

 

They weren't turboprops -- instead, R-4360 Wasp Major 28-cylinder "corncob" radials.

From what I've read, engine fires were commonplace because the engines weren't designed to run as pushers. Mounted this way, the carburetors were in front of the engines and thus didn't get the benefit of heat from the engines. They tended to ice over and that began a sequence of events that led to engine fires. I'm guessing that the B-36 was a maintenance nightmare and that the mechanics were glad when the B-52s replaced them.

 

Those takeoff intervals are short! No doubt someone did some hard calculations of wingtip vortex, etc. to keep the intervals to a minimum. Thanks for posting.

 

I saw this operation at Larsen AB , Moses Lake, Wa. in 1962 with a lot more aircraft that included a bunch of KC-135's leading the pack. After the first few tankers departed, the following aircraft were taking off into a thick cloud of black exhaust smoke. The B-52's were fighting wake turbulence and as soon as they were off the ground they were changing their headings to the left and right from the runway heading and bursting out of the smoke many times up on one wing. The film clip of the hollywood version of this that was posted would not be possible. The noise from 8 J-57's at 100% power with water injection is actually painful and deafening. Even if they were yelling at one another they wouldn't be heard. The ear splitting shriek from the KC-135's was just as bad. The smoke and blast drifting off the runway would have engulfed those guys. That Minimum Interval T.O maneuver was a masterful display of skill and guts.

 

Here is a video of the testing involved with finding the MITO for the B-58.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbYATGZrJss[/ame]

 

Rob- Actually, you held it on the ground longer, just like you would for a gusty wind take-off, to make sure you had flying speed over the entire wing at rotation. Notice, too, that takeoffs were kind of starburst, so that you could find some clean air.

N4S- No tools back them for easily calculating wingtip vortices. Someone just picked a number and they went with that. In general the time chosen allowed for an abort in front and enough time for the aircraft behind to get slowed down, taxi back around and reenter the stream for take-off.

All the aircraft on alert were set up with cartridge starters for each engine. When the klaxon went off, the crew chief would run out to the aircraft and hit a single start button. That button fired off all the cartridges and started all the engines. All switches were set up to start equipment when the power was turned on using another switch, so all the nav gear, instruments, etc came on line when power was applied.

V Alert was a 15 minute status, and the aircrews were allowed to be in several locations on base, usually including the base theater and O'Club. The crew chief or his representative, obviously, had to be very close to the aircraft to throw the necessary switches.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

Very interesting comments, they say that is a watered down version, one in which Curtis LeMay would not approve.

You thought the video above was short intervals, these are SHORT! Stacked BUFF's and tankers one right after the other..
(pre-Soviet collapse)
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCnCXAhPDts[/ame]

 

As Taz mentions there are big cartridges that provide pressure for engine start.... a B-52 guy I talked to said they are like really big shotgun shells....... the pressure they produce spins up the starter which spins up the engine.

 

They only cart start 4 and 5 but all 8 can be cart started. Something about saving money and the environment. But as far as I have witnessed, engines do not go on until air crew is aboard. I could be wrong but I can talk to some of my crew chief friends.

Cart starts are really cool. I just wish they would let us engine troops test the out .

 

Steven- That is the way it is done now. I am not sure any of the chiefs were around back then, but you can ask. All the engines can be cross-bled, as you know, so they may have done it that way in the past, too. I am an F-111 guy, so have only done it the TAC/USAFE way. Never flew after the change to ACC in 1992 or so. USAFE alert birds were carted, but we always started with air and the carts were back-ups.

I assume you still have exercises where the crews are put on 15 minute alert? Not like the old days, though, because everybody knows they are going to have at least an engine start. Since we do not fly with live nukes at all anymore, and have not for decades, that is about as far as you can take it until they are downloaded and you can fly simulated missions.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

After looking at those videos of the Minimum Interval TO's it was interesting to see the visible lift in the blankets of condensation on the wings and the down wash of the exhausts. It was noticeable that the conversations of the officers during the take offs was dubbed in. You can detect a studio-type echo when they speak.

 

When I was in high school (78-79) I was playing miniature golf with a friend at a Putt-Putt golf place about 1.5 miles off the south end of the runway at Carswell AFB in Ft. Worth when they did a MITO run with what must have been everything they had that would fly (B-52's and KC-135's). It went on for what seemed like forever. The ground shook and the sky got dark from all the exhaust plumes. We had to stop playing because the golfballs wouldn't roll straight and stop talking to each other because we could not hear anything except the aircraft. To say it was impressive is a colossal understatement. Unreal. The videos above don't do it justice.

Also the B-36 TO sequence above was filmed at Carswell.

It was fun growing up in FTW watching all the different aircraft come and go. My Dad worked at General Dynamics on the B-58 program and F-111 program as a test engineer. He got to break what the other engineers built so it would break when the flight crews' lives depended on it.

 

I remember going to Shilling AFB to watch the B52s taking off. The Smokey Hill range was between where I lived (Kanopolis) and Salina so we'd get the flyovers quite frequently as well. Cool stuff.

 

I grew up at the N end of the N/S runway at Kirland AFB (Sandia Base) in Albuquerque.

The B-36 noise was defening... unbelievable. They flew often, so I saw them a number of times a month. You could look out our living room window and see them coming in.

Even when landing, our kitchen cabinet doors would vibrate open and dishes somtimes fell out. Pictures fell off the wall. The whole house vibrated.

There was a road perpendicur to the end of the runway, right at the end. Had a traffic signal controlled by the tower to stop cars. There was a 6' high wooden fence at the end to separate the base from the civilians. Not unusual for the B-36's to take out the fence with their landing gear.

 

Paul- I flew F-111Ds to Smokey Hill often in the 1970s timeframe. It was a ways from Cannon AFB in Clovis, NM, and we used it mostly for checkrides. I saw it more than most because I was a SEFE at the time. The good old days.

I remember a few mass take-offs at Walker AFB near Roswell, NM in 1965/66. They closed it just before I graduated from NMMI in 1967. It was also a former B-36 base.

Not too many heavy bases left. A mere shadow of what SAC once was.

Taz
Terry Phillips