Super Bowl bomber flyover

[Joe Broady]

USAF public affairs piece on the three-bomber Super Bowl flyover. Planning began in March 2020 and was complex, since three different bases and three different bomb wings were involved. There was also coordination for tanker support from MacDill AFB. And each bomber had a designated spare to avoid the embarrassment of a missing man formation. I would like to have heard the radio traffic from the ground controller who vectored them in. It must be a tough job, as the precise timing of the national anthem is not under the guy's control. I've seen a few Indy 500 flyovers that missed the mark. A few years ago a B-52 (?) came over as the singer was on "bombs bursting in air". Ouch.

Super Bowl LV flyover

 

[ODonovan]

It boggles the mind how complex the Air Force can make a simple operation.

The headline of the article: "Super Bowl LV flyover took months of planning, coordination"
(Hint: It didn't have to.)

The Air Force Way™:
Bring a B-52 in from Minot (North Dakota) when the other two operational units are both at Barksdale (Louisiana), literally right around the corner (of the Gulf) from Tampa.
Bring a B-1 in from Ellsworth (South Dakota) when there is a unit at Robins (Georgia), almost due north and only one state up from Florida.
(The B-2 from Whiteman (Missouri) was necessary, as that's the only unit currently flying the airframe.)
Have KC-135s for in-flight refueling despite the fact the B-1 has a range of well over 3,000 miles, the B-2 has a range of almost 7,000 miles, and the B-52 has a range of over 10,000 miles. Whiteman to MacDill (Tampa) is only about 1,000 miles and the bases they COULD have used the other two aircraft from are a lot closer than that. Why refueling?

The easy way:
Fly a couple aircraft each (one plus a backup) from GA, LA, and MO to MacDill a couple days prior to the Super Bowl. No refueling needed except on the tarmac. Practice a few times over the Gulf. It's not like the pilots have never flown in three ship formations before. DUH! Do the show before the game. Land back at MacDill. Have a beer. Go back to their home bases in a day or two.

What would they have done if they needed an operational aircraft for some type of emergency operation? Would they have said, "Sorry, but we need months of planning and coordination," or would they have just gotten the job done within 24 hours? I know I HAVE personally seen "The Air Force Way™" in action, back in the day, but seeing it put on display for the world to see is just SO inspiring. Then to have the AF News website crow about it, like it was some fantastic achievement, makes me want to facepalm with a brick.



-Irish

 

[Joe Broady]

The easy way:
Fly a couple aircraft each (one plus a backup) from GA, LA, and MO to MacDill a couple days prior to the Super Bowl. No refueling needed except on the tarmac. Practice a few times over the Gulf. It's not like the pilots have never flown in three ship formations before. DUH! Do the show before the game. Land back at MacDill. Have a beer. Go back to their home bases in a day or two.

Doesn't sound like the "easy way" to me. The above plan means deploying six bombers to MacDill, thus requiring deploying maintenance crews to perform the two launches and two recoveries plus postflight and preflight inspections. And it's unwise to assume the birds will land in "Code 1" condition, so the maintainers will have to deploy with spares to cover likely failures, plus support equipment. I wonder how many people know the B-1B has a 230 VAC electrical system, so it can't use a standard power cart like the B-52 and B-2 can. That means the B-1 maintainers have to bring their special power carts. All sorts of niggling details like that cause the logistics of staging through a non-bomber base to quickly spiral upward.

Another problem is that MacDill would have to absorb six aircrews and a gaggle of maintainers. Right now the USAF is locked down as a COVID-19 countermeasure. For instance, at the nearby base retirees like me are allowed access to shop at the commissary only one day a week, and on that day the active duty people are encouraged to stay out of the commissary. Before COVID I could go on base any day of the week. I'm sure there would be great reluctance to send a big group of people on temporary duty if it's practical to fly the mission from home stations.

The plan of recovering and launching twice at MacDill makes no sense. These bombers (I have worked on all three) are somewhat like light bulbs. The systems are most likely to fail when turned on, and then the maintenance crew has to deal with the "red ball" (discrepancy found by aircrew before flight). Thus, after the flyby don't return the bombers to MacDill. That eliminates one launch.

Better yet, fly the bombers from home station to the flyby then home. That eliminates two launches and two recoveries, and if a red ball occurs you're in a much stronger position to deal with it. The logistics are so much easier if you don't stage through another base.

Regarding the tankers, I have been out of the picture for many years, but in my day a sporting event overflight was only one special item in a lengthy training mission which would include nav legs, a terrain following (low level) segment, aerial refueling hookup practice for both pilots, a run on a radar bomb scoring site, etc. If you only want to overfly the Super Bowl, then any of the bombers can do that from any CONUS base and go home without refueling. But that's wasteful. If you get one of these birds airborne, then you may as well accomplish a list of training requirements which would have to be done anyway. Flying an airplane is like playing a musical instrument. You have to practice in order to keep sharp.

Here's another perspective on the flyby. The writer hammers CBS for giving it hardly any attention.

Flyover a huge missed opportunity

 

[ODonovan]

Doesn't sound like the "easy way" to me.

If you read the article, you'll see the AF already DID deploy SIX aircraft, , two of each type plus support personnel, and had them on the ground at MacDill for STATIC DISPLAY in addition to the flyover, so they already did everything I mentioned in my post. The major things they would do differently if they did it "the easy way" would be to fly six of the aircraft much shorter distances and eliminate in-air refueling altogether. Sometimes, higher-ups in the AF seem to forget the KISS principle (keep it simple, stupid).

The plan of recovering and launching twice at MacDill makes no sense. These bombers (I have worked on all three) are somewhat like light bulbs. The systems are most likely to fail when turned on, and then the maintenance crew has to deal with the "red ball" (discrepancy found by aircrew before flight). Thus, after the flyby don't return the bombers to MacDill. That eliminates one launch.

The only problem with that is you also have at least six other aircraft waiting at MacDill, the backup aircraft of each type as well as the ones which brought the support/maintenance crews and equipment for each. So, you have three aircraft flying back to each of three different bases. Rather than sending each of the flyover aircraft back to its base alone (night missions), followed later by the others, it makes much better sense to fly them all back the next morning, flying in three ship groups, during daylight hours.



-Irish

 

[FLYBOYJ]

It boggles the mind how complex the Air Force can make a simple operation.

-Irish

It's not as simple as you think. There are dozens of Air Force Instructions (AFIs) and directives that have to be followed. Flying in formation with 3 dissimilar aircraft is not as easy as you think and I bet they had to get waivers to do this. These waivers could take weeks to get and can go as high as the Pentagon. Lastly those aircraft have to be allocated from an operational flight schedule that was probably set up months prior.

No - it's a lot more complicated than it has to be but at the end of the day there's a reason for this. Unless you were in the AF (or worked for them) it's hard to understand.

 

[soulezoo]

I was flying in the AF for 26 years and it's still difficult to understand!! LOL.

On a note, in my experience they probably scrambled at least 3 KC-135's. The reliability is so poor that they schedule 3 so that 1 is sure to make it.

Somewhere a C-5 is saying: "Oh, yeah? Hold my beer..."

 

[Joe Broady]

It must be a tough job, as the precise timing of the national anthem is not under the guy's control. I've seen a few Indy 500 flyovers that missed the mark.

I reviewed the last five races (didn't record the anthem in 2020).

2015: A-10s, 30 seconds late
2016: F/A-18 quartet, on time
2017: B-52, 37 seconds early
2018: B-2, late (still coming when network went to commercial break)
2019: A-10, F-16, P-51, P-40, 25 seconds early

By "on time" I mean dead overhead when singer is on final note. But I don't know if that's what they aim for. As an amateur musician (though not much good) I'd prefer to let the singer finish the note. Then the crowd looks up for the flyby 5 - 10 seconds later.

If it were simply a matter of getting overhead at a specified time I think that wouldn't be too challenging. Even 40 years ago the A-7D had digital displays of ETA and speed required to make good the planned ETA. However, I suspect the Indy 500 ceremonies don't run on a timeline with military precision, so the flyby aircraft must execute a holding pattern and break out at the right time. It's a "behind the scenes" story I'd love to see.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

If it were simply a matter of getting overhead at a specified time I think that wouldn't be too challenging. Even 40 years ago the A-7D had digital displays of ETA and speed required to make good the planned ETA. However, I suspect the Indy 500 ceremonies don't run on a timeline with military precision, so the flyby aircraft must execute a holding pattern and break out at the right time. It's a "behind the scenes" story I'd love to see.

It wouldn't be if the flight didn't have to work within the civilian ATC system which they do. Do you think when these flight occur around major cities ATC is shut down or moving traffic around just to accommodate this activity? Local ATC may attempt to accommodate when they are able.