High Alert - B52 Scramble

High Alert! U.S. Air Force B-52 Bomber Emergency …:

Thanks for posting. I used to work over at Blytheville AFB (later Eaker) in eastern Arkansas part time in the 80s which was a B52 SAC Base. Not sure I ever saw a full alert scramble while I was there but saw a lot of activities. I remember the Civil Engineering guys telling us about an alert where one pilot couldn’t get a couple engines started and refused to take off. It was not a good career move. I also watched the Command have a B52 idle across the Base at low speed with flaps and landing gear down with the engines all on rich blowing out black exhaust, just for a photo op for a visiting Congress member who was on the Armed Services Committee. I forget what the Base Civil Engineer told me that little stunt probably cost. Even back them most of the crewmen were younger than the planes. Those Buffs have had an amazing life span.

That was 4 months ago South China Sea
I don't remember seeing anything about that on the so-called news...

thanks for sharing

seen quite a few scrambles & sorties taking off at either
Castle AFB in Atwater Ca. or Elmendorf AFB in Anchorage Ak.
later 70's & into mid-late 80's, impressive sights to see

After watching the lead in to that video go to 35 seconds in on this video..

And guess why my dad hated it when he was sleeping on the couch & I would play the album.... He was trained to react to a siren... And react he did....

Miss those days. I was stationed at Castle AFB in Atwater, CA for almost 3 years in the late 80's.

Thanks for sharing.

Hikin Mike said:

Miss those days. I was stationed at Castle AFB in Atwater, CA for almost 3 years in the late 80's.

Thanks for sharing.

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My dad was stationed there in the late 60's... I lived in base housing....

Oh, he was stationed at Elmendorf from 61-66..

1 Wild R/T said:

My dad was stationed there in the late 60's... I lived in base housing....

Oh, he was stationed at Elmendorf from 61-66..

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It's sad to see it now. I fixed the Air Traffic RADAR and the shop I worked was demo'd to make room for the prison. Last year the demo'd my dorm.

Yeah, I've driven through a few times.... It's not the same... Few things are..

AR67GTX said:

I remember the Civil Engineering guys telling us about an alert where one pilot couldn’t get a couple engines started and refused to take off. It was not a good career move. ............ Those Buffs have had an amazing life span.

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When you don't crash them I suppose.

How safe is it taking off when fully loaded, with multiple other souls on board, all the while risking a take off runway crash that might prevent anymore departures?

What am I missing here?

When i was in the Air Force, stationed at Mather Air Force Base, in California, they had B-52's stationed on the SAC (Strategic Air Command)
side of the base.
I was on the other, ATC, side of the base working on those little T-37 trainers, after my tour of duty was over, stationed in Germany, on the RF-4C Phantoms.
When SAC would have alerts, 3 bombers would take off in rapid succession, one right after another, and then the 3 tankers would do the same thing.
Boy, were they loud, but something neat to see, what was going on.
I'll always remember that.

Thanks guys for your service!

Richard Cranium said:

B52 Crash Site - Visit Maine

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A very unique and profound Memorial.
Doesn't seem like fire was part of the crash site.
Thanks for sharing.

j-c-c-62 said:

When you don't crash them I suppose.

How safe is it taking off when fully loaded, with multiple other souls on board, all the while risking a take off runway crash that might prevent anymore departures?

What am I missing here?

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As a civilian I don’t know. But I did get a personal chewing out by the Wing Commander General there over a dormitory project in construction that was running late. I suppose when the order is to scramble and you still have 6 good engines I guess the Wing Commander expects you to go and I can vouch that he doesn’t much care for excuses.

Back in 77 while working at the Yakima Training Center in central Washington our on-site elo support crew needed to get some flight time. The crew chief who was a friend of mine asked if I wanted to take a ride and of course I stepped up. Didn’t know we were flying to Spokane, refueling and return. The flight took off late afternoon. The plan was to arrive at Fairchild AFB before dark, refuel the return that evening giving the pilots some night hours.

The flight there was great given the scenery from the air at the altitude we were flying was great. About 30 minutes out the pilot contacted Fairchild ATC to notify them we were inbound. We made the final leg of the flight and upon reaching a point approximately 5 miles from the base he was contacted and instructed not to approach the base and to safely set down which we did in the middle of a field. Lots of dry land wheat fields We sat their engine running for about 15 minutes and finally lifted off. We beat feet to Fairchild where we landed and shut down. The ground crew working that evening got to work fueling the aircraft so I just followed the pilots into the office. They were curious as to why we were instructed to land before arriving at the base.

Since Fairchild was a SAC base apparently they had an alert. I guess the base totally locks down, all vehicle traffic on base is suppose to pull to the side of the road to allow emergency vehicles to pass by. All air traffic is instructed to either leave the traffic pattern or fly to another airport to land. Not sure how they handled the aircraft landing an taking off from Spokane Airport. Given it was an alert the B-52 crews treat it as the real deal, fire up their engines and sit at idle until an all-clear is given. Since they carry nukes they never take off however one AF guy told me of one instance where the aircraft carrying the nukes taxied out, ran down the taxie way then returned to the alert pads which was at the northeast end of the runway.

As a note another AF captain I talked to said they practice their minimal takeoff procedures several times a year where the crews in their training cycle will take off seconds behind each other in unarmed aircraft. He said the noise is deafening.

I was at Minot ND and in SAC comand. I was a crew chief on a KC 135 and we were on alert with the B 52
Did many alert exercises that we would start engines and taxied to the runway. Then taxied down the runway then back to our alert pad to park and top off fuel. That was 1967 to 70.