iscover
Boeing KC-135 (actually a research aircraft as indicated by the array of windows along the fuselage) refuels a Lockheed C-141B Starlifter. The 23 ft fuselage stretch of the standard C-141A model plus addition of an air-refueling capability have added the equivalent airlift potential of an additional 90 A model Starlifters to the USAF transport inventory
Tankers tor the RAAF?
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According to information leaks from the Russell Offices current at time of writing, the RAAF has already made its choice of tankers. In the absence of low-time commercial 707s, the service apparently will request permission to approach the USAF for the release of half a dozen KC-135s, which would then be brought up to the standard now planned for SAC use, with fatigue modifications, winglets, and GE/SNECMA CFM56 engines. However, to place this deal in perspective, it may be worthwhile to outline how flight refuelling operations have developed over the past 60 years, which services use it today, what tankers are on offer, and how flight refuelling will enhance Australia’s defence capability.
Flight refuelling is generally agreed to have begun in 1921, when a can of petrol was passed between two aircraft as a stunt. However, the first major step in what is now variously referred to as in-flight refuelling (IFR), air refuelling (AR) or air-to-air refuelling (AAR) is credited to Major H. H. Arnold (later to win fame as General “Hap” Arnold) of the US Army Air Service in a 1923 flight that lasted over 37 hours, with one DH-4 refuelling another of the same type.
Six years later the US War Department funded a series of long-endurance flights, in the course of which a three-engined Fokker C-2 “Question Mark” commanded by Major Carl Spaatz (later General “Tooey” Spaatz) stayed aloft for 150 hours, refuelled 43 times by two Douglas C-1 tankers. In the following year various US civilian pilots increased the record by stages to a figure of over 647 hours, using something in the region of 400 contacts to transfer fuel, oil, and food.
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