This is American air power at it's finest

This "Minimum Interval Take Off" ( MITO ) was always a very serious test of
our quick response capability. If you never seen a MITO , you have really missed something. Listen to the tower controller's comments particularly the very last one!

If you are an aviation buff and, if you have ten minutes, watch this.

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

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KLK, MCSE

1990 500SL

I was always taught to respect my elders.
I don't have to respect too many people anymore.

That was a pretty awesome display of mobilization! I was impressed!

Couldn't help thinking however, with the economy the way it is, and the sheer amount of money the military goes through regularly, the amount of fuel expended having 15 of those behemoths launching at fill tilt to perform an "exercise"...not to mention the other astronomical costs involved in the entire drill!

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2009 ML350 (106K) - Family vehicle
2001 CLK430 Cabriolet (80K) - Wife's car
2005 BMW 645CI (138K) - My daily driver
2016 Mustang (32K) - Daughter's car

Yep, that's pretty impressive. I assume they would have 10 minutes to get the BUFFs up before the missles struck?

"Let's get this thing on the hump. We got some flying to do."
(Sorry, I just couldn't resist)

Impressive!

Yes, those buggers burn a LOT of fuel, but either way, those pilots need flying hours, maintenance crews and ATC's need to have a handle on how to choreograph such a launch, etc... It needs to be practiced. It's always impressive to watch a SIOP or any other alert drill, for that matter. At our unit (and others, I'm sure), they don't fool around. You'd best be well away from the road that the alert crew is using to get from ops to the jets! The exercises can be very revealing for those of us in maintenance, as it can reveal likely red ball conditions (last minute issues with the aircraft that prevent it from taking off), among other things.

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1992 300D 2.5T
1980 Euro 300D (sadly, sold)
1998 Jetta TDI, 132K "Rudy"
1974 Triumph TR6
1999 Saab 9-5 wagon (wife's)

Those cartridge starts are fun to watch. Not sure about B-52's, but on our tankers, the air crew can hit a start button at the crew entry door, so the APUs are actually spooling up as the crew is climbing up the entry ladder. Presumably the bombers have a similar system.

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1992 300D 2.5T
1980 Euro 300D (sadly, sold)
1998 Jetta TDI, 132K "Rudy"
1974 Triumph TR6
1999 Saab 9-5 wagon (wife's)

What I thought was really cool was the way the wings load up when the aircraft is about 2/3 of the way down the runway - you can see the wings literally rising up from the lift being generated, but the wheels stay on the ground for some distance beyond that. That is an awful lot of weight to be moving up into the air.

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Jonathan

2011 Mazda2
2000 E320 4Matic Wagon
1994 C280 (retired)

Nice, very nice. Those 15 planes could carry enough fire power to bring just about any country to its knee's.

Now imagin them doing that with B17's except dozens of them, 1k+ ships overhead must have been a sight!

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2016 Corvette Stingray 2LT
1969 280SE
2023 Ram 1500
2007 Tiara 3200

But only about 1/2 of the max takeoff weight of a B747.

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Never a dull moment at Berry Hill Farm.

Which is something very interesting when you consider how long the B-52 has been in service and how much longer it is stated to stay in service.

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1982 300GD Carmine Red (DB3535) Cabriolet Parting Out
1990 300SEL Smoke Silver (Parting out)
1991 350SDL Blackberry Metallic (481)

"The thing is Bob, its not that I'm lazy...its that I just don't care."

Indeed. The KC-135 has been around a good while, too!

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1992 300D 2.5T
1980 Euro 300D (sadly, sold)
1998 Jetta TDI, 132K "Rudy"
1974 Triumph TR6
1999 Saab 9-5 wagon (wife's)

The B52 only has a little over half the thrust. The B52 has 134,000 lbs of thrust (8 x 17,000) versus about 248,000 lbs for the B747 (4 x ~62,000).

I always wondered why the 2 engine pods weren't replaced at some point along the way with single engine high bypass turbofans at each hard point. Way more thrust, way less gas. Use all four to get off the ground, cruise on two and light the other two back up when you approach the bad guys. Or keep all four burning and carry way more bombs, still use less gas.

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Jonathan

2011 Mazda2
2000 E320 4Matic Wagon
1994 C280 (retired)

We've saved a ton of money by sticking with the B-52's over the last half a century or so. They have been provided with plenty of steady upgrades over the years. Unfortunately, there's no getting around the thousands of hours on most of their airframes. They burn lots of fuel, need lots of downtime, and kick lots of ass. Sounds kind of like something else we adore on this forum...

The B52 is the least expensive way to to drop a lot of explosives. Also I think their ready rate is about 80%..B2 is in the 20% range...

Just look at the B2...

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2016 Corvette Stingray 2LT
1969 280SE
2023 Ram 1500
2007 Tiara 3200

According to my rough calculations* you'd need 200 B17s to carry the same bomb load as those 15 B52s.

* Bomb load of 80,000 lbs for the BUFF, vs. 6,000 for the B17; former figure I remember from a book I read a long time ago, latter appears in a WWII book I'm reading now.

15 x 80,000 = 1,200,000

1,200,000/6,000 = 200

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83 300D Turbo with manual conversion, early W126 vented front rotors and H4 headlights 401,xxx miles
08 Suzuki GSX-R600 M4 Slip-on 26,xxx miles
88 Jaguar XJS V12 94,xxx miles. Work in progress.
99 Mazda Miata 183,xxx miles.

I'm not sure but I think it has to do with the weight of the engines VS the strength of the wings and that the bigger engines would hang so low that they would hit the ground or suck up debris.

OR it would simply cost more then it's worth.

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1982 300GD Carmine Red (DB3535) Cabriolet Parting Out
1990 300SEL Smoke Silver (Parting out)
1991 350SDL Blackberry Metallic (481)

"The thing is Bob, its not that I'm lazy...its that I just don't care."