Nasty moment while refuelling a NATO E-3. Fun starts around 24 seconds.

http://youtu.be/A4O8kaKMv_U

Holy crap! That is crazy! Glad it turned out okay, but phew!


As the top rated comment on this video states: "Dude any time a 300,000 pound aircraft separates from the tanker there are aerodynamic forces that cannot be avoided. The AWACS starts down without moving aft, when all that low pressure is acting on the horizontal stab the auto-pilot starts to trim to equalize those forces. That’s what you see. The tanker crew did everything right out of the -1 and vol. 3. Hope that helps. And by the way I was there in the boom pod yelling GO GO GO after clamly performing breakaway procedures." Mr. Philkok

Video was removed by the user....  

Quoting txjim (Reply 2): Video was removed by the user....

Maybe someone higher up in the food chain didn't like that it was getting so much attention...

Quoting moose135 (Reply 3): Maybe someone higher up in the food chain didn't like that it was getting so much attention...

One of the comments sure seemed to reflect that.

Not a great idea to play chicken with a billion bucks of airplane.

Video has been removed by user  

Alternate link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbQ9LXZwJ78&feature=related

Quoting SSTeve (Reply 4): Not a great idea to play chicken with a billion bucks of airplane.

Certainly not the case in the video...and nowhere near a billion dollars of airplane going on there.

The AF throws around a $270 million figure for an AWACS. Not sure about the 135 but it's kind of hard to put a $ value on an out of production, non replaceable asset. I'm not sure how you price the crew. I think I was valued at around $127.50 when I was a grunt.

Having seen many refuelings and even some that went wrong I rather enjoyed all the youtube comments instead of the video itself. Amazing how many people who gave their    who have no clue as to what is going on.

Quoting nomadd22 (Reply 8): The AF throws around a $270 million figure for an AWACS. Not sure about the 135 but it's kind of hard to put a $ value on an out of production, non replaceable asset.

I was thinking replacement value for both... which is a lot. And I of course rounded up to the nearest billion.

Quoting nomadd22 (Reply 8): The AF throws around a $270 million figure for an AWACS.

Good job it was a NATO AWACS then!  

Quoting nomadd22 (Reply 8): The AF throws around a $270 million figure for an AWACS. Not sure about the 135 but it's kind of hard to put a $ value on an out of production, non replaceable asset. I'm not sure how you price the crew. I think I was valued at around $127.50 when I was a grunt.

Two years ago, I was informed (while still working them) that the est (replacement) value was at $53M.

135Mech

Holy that looked scary, was it as close as it looks? Might be the angle it was filmed at?

It's created a bit of a firestorm around here...basically we're all talking about it and using as a valuable lesson on what NOT to do during separation procedures.

Someone should thank that boomer for keeping the boom in one piece saving us a boom change! Look at those reflexes. BTW, for the boom to disconnect and auto-retract like that, the AWACS had to have been within 6ft of the ice shield on the boom. That's pretty close to begin with, then add in that porpoise move there. Close one!

One of my buddies was a former boom opperator, he told me a story that happened to him. He was refulling a fully loaded C-5 with a new pilot at the wheel. After conclusion of the refulling the new pilot didnt do a proper disconnect and decended, sucking the air out from under him and him riding the rollercoster in the back.