Can the crew of a KC-135 bail out if needed?

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FF_in_MN@reddit

135s had a nickname back in SAC: TOAD (TakeOff And Die). Unlike the -10, 135s could give ALL their fuel to BUFFs loaded for bear. So if SHTF and the BUFFs needed more fuel to get closer to/into the USSR, -135s could pass gas until they were dry.

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jimbozini@reddit

My dad was a boomer on 135s during the SAC era. I'm not sure how common the sentiment was, but he told me that at least one of the air crews he flew with had an understanding that they would give the 52s as much as they could but that they would keep enough to land somewhere. At least in theory.

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HamsterZestyclose127@reddit

Tankers off-loaded until reaching bingo fuel, ie, enough to reach home station, and an alternate if required. We weren't suicidal.

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mikenkansas1@reddit

There's probably somewhere they could set a 135 down. And maybe find some people (Canada's a big place). And start over hoping airborne radiation doesn't get them. Knowing their wives and children are gone. As in GONE.

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Jester3696@reddit

Right after the B-52 leaves; "Control, you're not gonna believe this but we just found some 5 gallon gas cans in the back!"

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zoonewsbears@reddit

Now you’ve got me thinking how far 5 gallons could take that thing 🤔

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LurpyGeek@reddit

[__________________] That far.

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tea-man@reddit

Come on now, given that it's travelling at more than 200 metres a second, it should at least get it a few bus lengths further!

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Vandruis@reddit

All the way to the scene of the crash

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sardoodledom_autism@reddit

Honestly you are fueling the b52s while heading over the north pole heading into Russia. If the b52s don’t end all like in Russia in the first wave you are still going to crash land in Siberia so not much else to do

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bumbumpopsicle@reddit

My uncle was a 135 Aircraft Commander during ‘Nam and told me bailing out was a joke and there was a slight chance that after bouncing along the bottom of the fuselage you’d be conscious enough to pull your ripcord and make it to whatever surface below intact only to freeze to death in the water or drown. Same story about the SAC missions - make circles over Greenland until you got called by a BUFF and unload all of your fuel, then glide to an ice patch and “land”. Apparently there were some strategic ice runways in Greenland with prepositioned fuel drums for just this eventuality

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FF_in_MN@reddit

Also, ask him if he ever did the wifferdill with a BUFF

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eidetic@reddit

[For those who might be wondering....](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/USAF_B-52_refueling_with_a_KC-135.jpg)

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Royal-Al@reddit

Umm.. Why?

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FF_in_MN@reddit

Why not?!?!

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DeTiro@reddit

Dunk on the Warsaw Pact.

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FF_in_MN@reddit

Oh I’m sure those guys were like “yep, that’s it we gave ya everything (wink)”. Thanks for sharing!

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bilgetea@reddit

> …pass gas until they were dry. Sounds like a girl I once knew.

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FencingNerd@reddit

If the scenario came to that, there's not much to go home to.

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gbfk@reddit

And wouldn’t the refuel and ejection point be somewhere over Northern Canada/Alaska? Even if you do survive the ejection, you might not be lasting very long anyway.

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twostripeduck@reddit

Tankers are not equipped with ejection seats

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Kjpilot@reddit

As a matter of fact, we carried chutes and the front entry hatch had a device that would block the air to help you gain separation from the aircraft so there was a means to abandon in theory. We flew with chutes in the back of our seats but then we just left them in the back of the jet since we decided it would be a fools errand. I flew SAC and we would indeed plan to dump until empty and figure it out as needed. Luckily it was never needed and we never decoded the mission that would necessitate that action, but we were ready!

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ZICRON1C@reddit

That's terrifying

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Kjpilot@reddit

MAD!

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dan_tank@reddit

The RAF Victor tanker was equipped with ejector seats for the pilots. Not so much for the rest of the crew,though. I think if you saw your two pilots eject it would not be a good day.

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kalahiki808@reddit

But They'll have to throw all the tool boxes and other things out of the hatch to destroy the antennas so they don't shred themselves when they bail

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singled-out-7979@reddit

You're the guy the throws the whole egress rope out the window, aren't you.

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Barbed_Dildo@reddit

> -135s could pass gas until they were dry. Surely they'd have to keep enough to stay flying long enough for the B-52 to fly away? Having a tanker connected to you have it's engines unpredictably die of fuel starvation can't be that safe...

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FF_in_MN@reddit

Sure it was unsafe, but if it came to a nuke exchange, wouldn’t you want your shooters to have all the fuel they can get…even if it meant you had to sacrifice you and your crew? Those tanker dudes knew the risks and their mission and they would have done it no questions asked. I’m sure they might have kept a little to make it to a safe landing spot if it ever came to that. But just to clarify, that is not practiced at all today.

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Barbed_Dildo@reddit

I'm just talking about the brief period of time when the last of the fuel is coming down the boom, and one of the tankers engines die, so it starts veering to one side, then another one dies and it starts veering harder, then it looses all thrust and is slowing down and hard to control, while still connected to the bomber with a rigid boom. Even if you disconnect quickly enough, you've still got a dead KC135 feet ahead/above you and slowing down.

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EliteEthos@reddit

Parachutes have been removed from the 135 for over a decade. The bailout procedure is sketchy AF anyways.

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Fact0ry0fSadness@reddit

I mean, I'd take sketchy AF over certain death if it came down to it.

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crewdog135@reddit

If we are facing a certain death scenario, its probably so bad that the plane isnt stable enough to bail out. If the plane is stable enough, im still flying it.

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burnerquester@reddit

But it was a procedure from an era with a different strategy. The bailout scenario was no gas.

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Mac-Daddy-63@reddit

It was a very different time back during the Cold War. I remember listening one evening to a 3-star Air Force general say that if the bombers (B-52’s) on their way to attack the Soviet Union needed ALL the gas your plane carried, they got ALL the gas in your plane. You then flamed out, pulled off to the side to get out of the way and the bombers pressed on.

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neoshijr@reddit

Yep they put the sac in sacrifice. But back then, there was a bail out plan. Now, it's take off and die.

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The_dog_ate_my_work@reddit

If you're flying a tanker and run out of gas, you are bad at math.

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qalpi@reddit

So possibly stupid question but can tankers draw from the stored fuel onboard to power their own engines?

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YearPlane3713@reddit

Yes, all of it.

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Blackhawk510@reddit

It's the other way around, actually. Tankers draw from their own fuel they're already using to give to others.

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qalpi@reddit

Really? So as a last resort they can push their own fuel to fighters and bombers etc?

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Blackhawk510@reddit

Strictly speaking yes, but it's *all* their own fuel. They have extra fuel tanks, yes, but all of them feed their own engines.

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qalpi@reddit

Really interesting! Thank you for replying

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shortname_4481@reddit

V/R Mr Xi.

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TK-329@reddit

if WW3 broke out, they were expected to give ALL of their fuel to bombers

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JT-Av8or@reddit

That was the best part of being in a SAC base for operational readiness inspections: once the bombers launched the inspection ended as it was assumed to be the end of the world. At fighter bases we had to launch and recover and defend the base, all in various scenarios.

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Antares987@reddit

We keep tankers in the air 24/7 since 9/11

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TK3754@reddit

AMC tanker bases were similar. Pretty much just don’t let these specific tankers break so they can take off at X time.

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Kjpilot@reddit

AMC came after SAC and MAC were gone. We said AMC was MAC misspelled and they never understood us tanker toads

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TK3754@reddit

Ha, AF is about to re-org back to something akin to the Cold War organization.

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Kjpilot@reddit

Always something like that so the top brass get recognition!

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flyboy130@reddit

They used to call them tanker TOADs. Stands for Take Off And Die because they were expected to launch, give literally all their gas to the bombers enroute to nuke Russia and crash in the ocean/Arctic. Their job was a suicide mission.

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shaun3000@reddit

So was the entire SAC war plan. 🤷‍♂️

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GreatScottGatsby@reddit

Some might say that MAD was just a silly suicide pact.

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Stopikingonme@reddit

That’s mad!!!

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BrownGypsy@reddit

Negative, research the reason the kc-135 ess developed... thier inital purpose was to pass all the gas to a bomber so it could make it to target.

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prancing_moose@reddit

Ah no that was the mission under SAC. Well, only under the most urgent circumstances of course. But when nuclear war erupted, the KC-135s, which has scrambled together with the B-52s on nuclear alert, would give all their gas to the B-52s going over the ice cap to hit the Soviet Union. And with all, I mean everything. Very last drop. And then it would either be bailing out or trying to land it on the ice. There would be no returning to base - which would probably have been hit by a nuclear warhead anyway at that point.

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Pitiful-Sandwich-750@reddit

This took me out

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girl_incognito@reddit

but did you die?

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JasonWX@reddit

There’s a reason for the nickname Tanker TOADs… Take Off And Die. Their job was to run out of gas

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burnerquester@reddit

Nah Hut in Greenland.

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burnerquester@reddit

It’s intentional

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motor1_is_stopping@reddit

> The bailout scenario was no gas. You had one job!

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800mgVitaminM@reddit

A plane can still land sans gas.

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burnerquester@reddit

Needs a runway though. And to have runout of fuel within gliding distance of one. In this aircraft I’m definitely bailing out.

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IwillBeDamned@reddit

what if gilbert godfried is you co pilot an he's yelling over the radio the whole way down

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WhippetGud@reddit

"Ey, Captain!!! What's long, hard, and about to wind up in the frigid waters of the Arctic? Y*our wife's dildo, that's what!!*"

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DimitriV@reddit

Do KC-135 crew carry sidearms?

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ReasonableDonut1@reddit

I don't know about KC-135s, but my dad was issued a S&W Model 10 by the USAFR in 1957 as a flight engineer on C-119s and later C-130s and was never once issued cartridges over the course of twenty years.

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Brown-Tail@reddit

Agreed. I’m an old Herk driver. If it was stable enough to bail out of I figured it was stable enough to land it. It all comes down to finding the longest flat piece of earth to line up with and running into the least expensive piece of property at the lowest airspeed….

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Battlemanager@reddit

This 👆

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jeremy9931@reddit

Pretty much every single 135 crash that had fatalities in the last 4 decades were instantaneous, a parachute would have never help. You’d never have a chance to use it. I’m actually fairly certain they were never actually used in the time they were on the jet, which was why they got removed.

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800mgVitaminM@reddit

Same as other dash 80 and 707 airframes, it was determined that if the pilot can keep the airframe steady and controlled enough for the crew to bail out, they had enough control for an emergency landing, which would be safer for all involved.

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SpaceLemur34@reddit

Technically the KC-135 it's the 717. It was only later that Boeing reserved the 7x7 numbering exclusively for airliners. When airliners wanted an updated MD-80 derivative after the merger, Boeing resurrected the 717 designation, as it had never been used for an airliner.

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800mgVitaminM@reddit

Yes, the Dash 80 went into production for the military as the 717, but that was really only internally, because they were all delivered as C-135s. Everything got flipped upside down at Boeing Bill Allen demanded the 707 be widened by 4 inches weeks before they began production. Most people don't know the 717 designation unless they've turned wrenches on or flew 135s.

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dfb1988@reddit

Found Trevor Jacob!

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Metal_Icarus@reddit

It is wild to read this thread after the report of a KC-135 going down due to a aerial mishap.

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EliteEthos@reddit

Yup… I’m busy telling people on X right now that it isn’t a “rescue” as it is a “recovery”

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Metal_Icarus@reddit

Something something human factors something 2 billion dollar contract to add an ejection sustem.

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EliteEthos@reddit

I honestly don’t even know it’s possible in 135s… doesn’t help the boom operator much as they have more than one duty station on the aircraft. Presumably this was an air refueling mishap… so, ejection seats wouldn’t save them in the back. I’ll be curious about the details of this. I have friends that had some wild mishaps that could’ve gone this way if it went any further… but this was nightmare fuel for me when I did this job.

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anomalkingdom@reddit

What about the B52? They still have the option to drop through that hatch?

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usmcmech@reddit

The BUFF still has downward firing ejection seats. The navigators can’t eject till they get enough altitude.

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Desperate__Desperado@reddit

The min number for downward ejection is shockingly low.

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ancientblond@reddit

How low?

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bustervich@reddit

0 if you don’t care about the outcome.

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ancientblond@reddit

..... you got me there But I'm curious about the "Living without major spinal/internal injuries" I know you're always gonna be injured upon ejecting somehow, it's a violent process.. but at what height do they have to be to do it safely? :P

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bustervich@reddit

Got me googling. [This site](http://www.ejectionsite.com/downwardseats.htm) claims a B-52 downward firing ejection seat required a minimum of 250 feet in level flight for a safe ejection.

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Derp800@reddit

Fuck that shit. How the hell does a canopy open in 250 God damn feet??

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kona420@reddit

Drogue pops immediately as the seat leaves the aircraft, the parachute opens following a pyrotechnic actuator that tightens the seat webbing and separates the occupant from the seat. Lots of charges have to go off in the right order. I assume they are interlocked. Or you get forced through your tray table by a cannon. Sounds unpleasant. Somewhat surprised they didn't use a static line but I guess that could fail and you end up still attached to the aircraft.

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WillyBeShreddin@reddit

There was an incident 30-40 yrs ago with an F4 running off the runway, front nose gear collapsed and bent the ejection seat, sent the pilot spinning like a jumping jack firework.

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ancientblond@reddit

On the B52, it's not really the canopy as a whole, but rather sections of the canopy/bottom of the fuselage

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Desperate_Hornet3129@reddit

On the upward seats they upgraded the seat and the chute so all you needed was 90 knots AS to blow the hatch off. They put webbing behind the chute and survival kit that tightened and threw you out of the seat. Then the chute had an explosive charge to deploy the parachute. That allowed you to eject at 0 altitude AGL. We flew a bird down to have it retrofitted for that in 1978.

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AgnewsHeadlessBody@reddit

It's called a zero/zero ejection seat. The B-52 seats will actually turn and shoot upwards for a bit, and then the chute opens. Theres plenty of videos of a fighter jet ejecting while on the ground, and the pilot is fine. Fighter jet ejection seats can eject sideways, upside down, vertical, or whatever other direction, and the seat will correct and point you upwards. Naturally, you need the clearance to go down for a bit first, though.

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cawvak@reddit

With a shock ring

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shemp33@reddit

With major downward force exerted, too…

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flightist@reddit

I thought *falling* from 250 feet was about the bare minimum for a parachute to open. You weren’t wrong about the shockingly low bit.

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fuishaltiena@reddit

Normal ejection compresses the spine. Would these ones make you taller?

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continuallylearning@reddit

Would just compress your spine from your head down.

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FF_in_MN@reddit

250’ agl to get one good swing

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Somhlth@reddit

> and probably broken legs Do they break as they puncture your eardrums?

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KathiSterisi@reddit

You watch too many RoadRunner cartoons. Great visual!

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Ricerat@reddit

Downward firing ejection seats. That's some Bond villain level shit!!!

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Gwenbors@reddit

It’s the two-level flight deck they have. Some go up and some go down.

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Somhlth@reddit

> It’s the two-level flight deck they have. Some go up and some go down. If Boeing built B-52s today, they'd get those mixed up.

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octoreadit@reddit

Not true, to save the development cost and for simplified inventory management, it would be one SKU, all firing sideways.

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kyrsjo@reddit

And installed swapped left/right?

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refinedtwist925@reddit

I was thinking that If Boeing built them today, they would have more lateral ejection seats…Straight into the engines….

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deftoneuk@reddit

At least it would be the nice shiny Rolls-Royce engines and not the old Smokey coal burners!

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Strangebird03@reddit

If Boeing built them today, the seats would fall out on rollout.

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Crafty_Ad2602@reddit

I know the reality of this is not funny but my head generated a cartoon of this, where everyone pulls their ejection seat levers and bonks their heads while making faces like Wile E. Coyote.

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AscendingNike@reddit

That’s what you get for using an ACME ejection seat!

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Somhlth@reddit

I was way ahead of you on that. I'm a bad person.

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Crafty_Ad2602@reddit

Insert here a GIF of a box with "THIS SIDE UP" printed upright with the arrows pointing down. Or however you would best portray a character confusing the instructions in order to install something upside down.

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prancing_moose@reddit

It’s two down (lower deck) and four up (upper deck) if I remember correctly.

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Tazziedevil04@reddit

F104 had them… until they realised that F104 pilots need to bail when they are on final approval…..

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Spin737@reddit

Stardust 19, turn right heading 290, maintain 6,000 until established, cleared APPROVAL TACAN 33.

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girl_incognito@reddit

You're very fast and definitely pretty Stardust 19!

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Spin737@reddit

That’s a rog, Stardust 19.

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erublind@reddit

To be fair, the 104 was probably vertical at that point anyway...

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oFFtheWall0518@reddit

F-104 had them because standard ejection seats couldn't clear the tail.

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CotswoldP@reddit

Designed to cruise at 20kft plus - who cares which way you seat ejects? Of course when suddenly low level ingress becomes standard, it becomes an issue.

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Porkyrogue@reddit

Yea dude at like 250 mph

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anomalkingdom@reddit

Are you serious? That sounds absolutely terrifying. Then again I guess you wouldn't have much time to contemplate.

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FF_in_MN@reddit

There was a BUFF that went down in 84 in AZ doing a night low level training mission. The radar didn’t paint the approaching mesa correctly and at the last second the pilots saw the wall and applied full power...the right wing tip caught the mesa and the BUFF ended up in a 90 bank...all crewmembers in ejection seats essentially ejected sideways. The IP (who unfortunately does not have an ejection seat) didn’t make it out.

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NotJeff_Goldblum@reddit

Sadly he wasn't the IP, he was the new Wing OPs commander. He was just there as an observer since he recently joined the unit. He was an IP for the individual telling the story in the article you linked.

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Crafty_Ad2602@reddit

>"Before ejecting, the copilot reported Col. Ivy had begun a mad scramble to get out of the aircraft." This sounds like a guy with survivor guilt. Not saying the copilot was in any way at fault or should have done differently, but just knowing that the observer was trying to get out whereas you just pulled a handle and left and he didn't make it. There was nothing the copilot could have done at that point to save him, but it doesn't change the fact that it's human nature to think that you should have done something anyway.

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Temporary-Prior7451@reddit

Damn, imagine being the ip in his last minutes…

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NotJeff_Goldblum@reddit

Sadly he wasn't the IP, he was the new Wing OPs commander. He was just there as an observer since he recently joined the unit. He was an IP for the individual telling the story in the article linked.

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anomalkingdom@reddit

wow ..

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limeburner@reddit

IP?

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FF_in_MN@reddit

Instructor Pilot

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MyFavoriteLezbo420@reddit

Remember sketchy AF > certain death *ejects you downward and makes notes on clipboard.. for science*

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FF_in_MN@reddit

250’ agl will get ya one good swing in the chute. If you’re in t/o or landing hopefully the pilot is a good dude and zooms the airplane for ya before ejection.

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mikenkansas1@reddit

https://www.historylink.org/File/9857 I was home from school in base housing, playing outside when this one went in. Seems I've heard or read the Nav was in the ground, not on it. Fairchild had a bad year 57-58

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Desperate__Desperado@reddit

Bomb bay as well

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Desperate_Hornet3129@reddit

Manual bailout was first the holes left when the Nav and Radar Nav ejected.

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Desperate__Desperado@reddit

I know. I'm just saying it's an option too which I find funny

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Desperate_Hornet3129@reddit

I knew very well it was an option also. The bomb bay was a bit too far back to be reached easily. You had to go over the front gear to get to it.

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Desperate__Desperado@reddit

Nice name you copying me or something

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Desperate_Hornet3129@reddit

Just the original assigned name. 😅

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FF_in_MN@reddit

It was an option but there is a lot of crap to crawl around to get out. Any crewmember not strapped to an ejection seat (IP, IR) would have had a parachute at their location, climb down to the lower deck, and jump out a hole created by the N or RN ejection seats.

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DavidPT40@reddit

B-52 is equipped with ejection seats.

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Desperate_Hornet3129@reddit

And back in the '70's ejection was the recommended method over crash landing.

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constantstranger@reddit

I saw an old training video about this once, made in the 60s. The "hatch" is actually just the bomb bay doors, and the "ejection seat" is actually an H-bomb that they have to straddle as it falls away. Sounds scary af but the dude demo'ing the technique looked like he was having an absolute blast.

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cleverkid@reddit

Did it hairlip everyone on bear creek?

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constantstranger@reddit

Yes. [Thanks! I never knew what that line meant until I looked it up on the internet just now. First I tried asking the Bear Creek-ians, but they were hard to understand.]

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anomalkingdom@reddit

The guy enthusiastically waving his hat to his friends? Yeah that looked kinda fun.

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AshleyPomeroy@reddit

He was probably looking forward to using some of his sweet survival kit. A fella could have a pretty good weekend in ~~Dallas~~ Vegas with all that kit.

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SUKHOI-FOR-LIFE@reddit

The top deck crew eject up and the bottom deck crew eject down.

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cdbz28@reddit

It's easy; you just drop out of the nose hatch on the bottom and float away.

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patogo@reddit

I assume they removed that big ass thing that dropped down to divert airflow on exit?

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ddcboys@reddit

The escape spoiler is still installed, the the bottle the blows it is deactivated and not charged

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FailedCriticalSystem@reddit

its like parachutes for shuttle astronauts. Astronauts knew they either made orbit or didn't come home.

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Cocomorph@reddit

Transoceanic and once around aborts don't seem that bad—correct me if I'm wrong. RTLS aborts, on the other hand . . .

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FailedCriticalSystem@reddit

TAL has always been an interesting concept to me. If the Space Shuttle ever made a "Transoceanic Abort Landing", it would've been the fastest that man has traveled across the Atlantic by a huge margin. If I remember correctly it involves a roll with the External Tank flying a bit with the tank under it. While it could have been possible, who really knows. NASA considered making the first mission an RTLS abort. However, STS-1 commander John Young declined, saying, "let's not practice Russian roulette" and "RTLS requires continuous miracles interspersed with acts of God to be successful."

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MaulForPres2020@reddit

What makes it sketchy?

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EliteEthos@reddit

If you notice the 135 door, it hinges to the bottom of the fuselage and you need a ladder to get into the cockpit and a grate that covers that hole, once you’re inside. For egress there is a bar that sits above the grate and against the roof of the cockpit. If you pull it, it deploys a spoiler. That will remove the hinge on the door and stick out a few below the surface of the plane. You’d then hang on the chinning bar, center your ass over the hole beneath you, and let go. The spoiler is supposed to allow you to fall far enough away from the aircraft before hitting the airstream… but good luck.

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Rough_Function_9570@reddit

Seems less sketchy than the WWII bomber bail-outs

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Blackout_AU@reddit

Masters of the Air has recently highlighted for me just how much I wouldn't want to be a WWII era bomber crewmember 😳

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LurpyGeek@reddit

Like the Bell AFM-1 Airacuda. "Our rudder's jammed. Bail out!" One crew member bails, hits the tail, breaks both legs and miraculously unjams the rudder. "Nevermind. We're good." Plane lands safely. This actually happened.

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Miserable_Law_6514@reddit

Just wait until someone you don't like jumps first. They'll remove all the antennas on the belly for you.

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jyguy@reddit

Aircraft can glide a really long distance at altitude

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ianisymfs@reddit

A lot of the heavies removed or reduced chutes a long time ago. I was so happy when C17s went from like 7 to 2.

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charlie_sierra_tango@reddit

There bailout procedures. Those are written for the sake of the crews' mothers.

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Taptrick@reddit

This is the correct answer for most multiengine military airplane.

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GurthNada@reddit

I guess that in case of emergency these type of aircraft are either flyable enough to land or simply in such a dire situation that safely parachuting from them is almost impossible.

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pjlaniboys@reddit

And there were only 7 chutes back in the day.

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BraceIceman@reddit

That’s still 2.33 chutes pr. crew member.

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Drenlin@reddit

Assuming there are no pax though. Most of the upper level of that plane is cargo and passenger seating. They're basically a normal airliner configuration with the under-floor cargo compartment replaced by fuel tanks.

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pjlaniboys@reddit

No, it was an empty cabin with strap seating along the walls. We either had basic crew or where way past the 7.

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Drenlin@reddit

What I mean is the configuration of the airframe itself, but if you were aircrew I suppose you know that. 135s do (did?) absolutely have a configuration with airline style seating though.

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MadForge52@reddit

We do. It's typically just a few seats and not throughout the cargo compartment and it's almost never used though. The seats basically just bolt into the tie down fittings in the floor.

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mikenkansas1@reddit

Former mumbling cargo in the passenger seats.

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fargenable@reddit

How hot are the hostesses?

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MadForge52@reddit

Considering I would be the makeshift steward in this situation not very lol

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fargenable@reddit

Was it all you could drink?

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pjlaniboys@reddit

Fuel was in three body tanks under the floor and the standard wing tanks.

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Drenlin@reddit

Correct, yes. The under-floor fuel tanks occupy the space normally used as a cargo hold, as seen in the C-135 and basically every commercial airliner.

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Justuse4All@reddit

Tool box. Crew chief. Something has to remove the antennas.

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AceCombat9519@reddit

That is one good question maybe they can

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eazymoneyracing@reddit

Not anymore, they took our parachutes out 😒

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PanaviaGrey@reddit

On the French C-135FR (same purprose as KC-135), you can unlatch the crew entry door, drop it, and use the escape soiler to jump outside the plane with your parachutes.

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Amanda_Lorian18@reddit

I was a crew chief on KC-135A’s back in the eighties and we used to pull alert duty along with the aircrew. We used to refer to the A models as “steam jets” due to the water injection, and “cartridge starts” were really fun to watch. After engine start, the crew chief boarded the airplane and would fly the SIOP mission if it ever happened. We all knew the doctrine and realized the chances of returning from an alert launch were not good, but i figured that if they bothered to have me get on the airplane, there must be at least a remote possibility that we could land somewhere and regenerate the airplane. I felt sorry for the FB-111 crew chiefs who had to watch their jets fly off into the distance and wait for the bombs to fall. Of course, i was young and naive at the time…

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IndependentMess@reddit

Only once.

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ZedZero12345@reddit

Didn't KC-135s have a stand pipe in the tank to prevent sucking out the last drop?

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SubieDom@reddit

If you can enter it, you can bail out of it. What happens after that is between you and the earth.

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cecilkorik@reddit

The air itself, not to mention the aircraft's various moving surfaces, might have a lot more to say about it than the Earth does, especially at first. Depending on the aircraft and its speed, the (eventual) Earth landing could be relatively uneventful when you're a baloney mist cloud.

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SnooSongs8218@reddit

Stick your head out the car window at 60mph, now imagine the airflow on your face at 350 mph...

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EducatorIntrepid4839@reddit

My brother at nellis was a combat/arial photographer and was getting shots of the refueling process. They couldn’t get the boom shaft back up into the hold so I guess fire trucks and everyone came out to the run way just incase they had to land. They circled around a few and manually had to bring the shaft up. He said the younger airmen were freaking out and it was hard trying to crank the boom up.

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Doc_Hank@reddit

Well, they have parachutes....

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boardfrq@reddit

No, no we don’t.

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Doc_Hank@reddit

Not any more?

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Shyronnie135@reddit

Not for over a decade now.

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Doc_Hank@reddit

Huh. We had them on Trash Hauling Air Guard Hercs...

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omega552003@reddit

No, from my understanding they don't have parachutes.

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SpaceMarine33@reddit

They have parachutes.

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Bmpsgp@reddit

They don’t. Removed around 2009-ish.

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philzar@reddit

Can crew bring along gear on a mission? You know, like a box lunch, maybe a "personal bag" that is suspiciously the size and shape of a small 'chute... :-)

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Johnny-Cash-Facts@reddit

There would be no reason to. You physically can’t open any doors in flight and the only way to break a door open is made inoperative.

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MadForge52@reddit

I mean you can just depressurize the jet and open them. Still a bad idea and safer to just try and land the plane, but technically if a crew wanted to have their own parachutes and use them they could.

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Johnny-Cash-Facts@reddit

You can’t open any doors in flight, I pinky promise. Even if you depressurize (very dangerous), the doors won’t open. The mechanism for jettisoning the crew entry door is made inoperative. Have you ever tried to open a car door while going 60 miles an hour? Imagine that but an order of magnitude harder.

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hphp123@reddit

an passenger opened the doors in flight recently, The crew can as well

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Johnny-Cash-Facts@reddit

On a completely different jet that isn’t close to 70 years old.

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hphp123@reddit

atmospheric pressure is not influenced by aircraft type

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Johnny-Cash-Facts@reddit

You’re right, but comparing modern jetliners with a KC-135 is apples to oranges. They function entirely differently.

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MadForge52@reddit

The overwing and aft hatches open inwards.

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Johnny-Cash-Facts@reddit

Whether it opens inwards or outwards, you won’t be able to open it in flight. Faulty cargo doors have opened in flight, but that’s because they were broke af.

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MadForge52@reddit

During normal flight yes the pressure will keep you from opening the emergency hatches. But if you depressurize there is nothing that will stop you from opening them in flight. There's even a checklist for it.

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ancientblond@reddit

I think like... you could But the likelihood of a kc145 being in that position, like at minimum 2 f16s were taken out first, if not F22's or 35's

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anarchisturtle@reddit

Also, you’d have to pony up for the gear and training needed for a HALO/HAHO jump. Which is extremely expensive

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tiexodus@reddit

Aim for something special and hit it hard.

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SleepNowintheFire@reddit

That’s what those 9/11 guys did and bullseye

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TUEB0R@reddit

If you need to bail out of a KC135 you dead.

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JimNtexas@reddit

They used to carry parachutes, but they took those away years ago.

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1forcats@reddit

No

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Igor777777777777@reddit

Надішліть це, щоб допомогти Україні

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ManicChad@reddit

Those tankers have one job. Refuel the bombers on their way to Russia to drop nukes. There won’t be any runways to return to.

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Dasadles@reddit

Ooo it the 100th that's dope

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alpha-987@reddit

Yes. Anyone can bail out of anything. The whole survival part is a different question though.

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Moot72@reddit

When we flew down range in the C5 they gave us 8 parachutes. There were 14 crew.

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SyrusDrake@reddit

Do you have to keep saying "no homo" while clinging to your buddy on the way down?

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HotRecommendation283@reddit

Realest trust fall

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alpha-987@reddit

RHIP in action

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God_Damnit_Nappa@reddit

> it: this was heavily downvoted until my actual aircrew boys turned up Ya because OP wanted an actual answer not your stupid snarky joke.

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alpha-987@reddit

Cry behind your desk, ground peasant.

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Robinsonirish@reddit

> Edit: this was heavily downvoted until my actual aircrew boys turned up. It's because it doesn't answer the question and provides nothing to the discussion. It's silly one liner reddit puns/qips that often garner upvotes but are annoying to scroll past to get to the real answer. It's like someone asking "How many rounds can you fire from a GPMG without changing the barrel, before it melts?" Answer: "You can fire as many rounds as you want without changing the barrel, as long as you cool it sufficiently". This is technically true, you could somehow continuously cool it with water, but it's still a shitty answer.

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-burnr-@reddit

It’s not the bailing out or falling that kills you, it’s the sudden terrestrial arresting at the end of

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moosehq@reddit

Catastrophic lithobraking.

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StrugglesTheClown@reddit

Decelation sickness.

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MyFavoriteLezbo420@reddit

Not with that attitude

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superbcheese@reddit

Not with that... altitude?

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MyFavoriteLezbo420@reddit

*wait for it wait for it… OMG WE’RE GONNA DIE! calm down wait for it waiiiit… bank angle bank angle “NOW GO GO GO MOVE!”*

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Mobius_Penis@reddit

Or more precisely, that altitude

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keno-rail@reddit

I play hockey with a bunch of 128th Air National Guard guys... They said the parachutes were taken off of their R models years ago...

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Morto27@reddit

once

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steve626@reddit

Is anyone watching Masters of the Air? Thosev guys bailed out by cannonballing right out of the bombay doors

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Holiday_Parsnip_9841@reddit

Apparently getting stuck in the ball turret happened a lot. That’s pure nightmare fuel.

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safeforworktim@reddit

They took the parachutes out right as I was going through training in 2012- Went into the first phase of fundamentals with orders to go play under a parasail in Florida, completed training frumpy that all my buddies on other airframes got to go and I didn't. Like others have said - it would have been sketchy trying to get out without getting sucked through the #2.

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Revolutionary-Home13@reddit

We were always told the first guy out was the sacrificial lamb because he would take out all the under belly antennas on the ec

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HotRecommendation283@reddit

Jesus, I laughed at that, as someone that has stood up too fast under an antenna. Can’t imagine hitting one bailing out!

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DavidPT40@reddit

Even with escape packs, there was a crew of a KC-135 that broke up in flight over Afghanistan. None were able to make it out alive. I don't recall the actual cause, but I think it was turbulence from nearby mountain winds.

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Jayhawker32@reddit

Dutch roll caused excessive stress on the vertical stab separating the the empennage from the fuselage.

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SubarcticFarmer@reddit

That plane broke apart midair and they didn't realize what was happening.

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DOUBLE_DOINKED@reddit

It used to be an option but not anymore. This story about 61-0313 had multiple crew members bail and survive but it was rare. https://ss.sites.mtu.edu/mhugl/2019/10/30/k-i-sawyer-afb-410th-bomb-wing-and-the-kc-135a-glider/ Fun fact, that jet is still flying despite the flameout story. I flew it a couple years ago and it’s a great jet!

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SubarcticFarmer@reddit

I hope that instructor was no longer an instructor after that.

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DOUBLE_DOINKED@reddit

Yeah I’m sure he was removed from flying status. It would be crazy to be on that crew

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castman_2020@reddit

Unfortunately, the KC-135 does not have an ejection seat system or parachutes for in-flight egress. In emergency situations, crew members cannot bail out using these mechanisms. Despite the absence of traditional egress options, the Air Force conducts egress exercises to prepare crew members for emergency scenarios. These exercises involve configuring the plane differently each time, considering cargo and passenger loads.

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SubarcticFarmer@reddit

This isn't really a fair explanation since the kc-135 is actually built to allow it, they just don't carry parachutes anymore.

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MattVarnish@reddit

Dunno a few years ago at oshkosh the kc135 had.. open.... The slide door left and down from the pilots seat. So theres a way out for sure.

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wenoc@reddit

You don’t “bail out” of a jet.

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longstrokept@reddit

I'm pretty sure you can bail out of any plane.

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keenly_disinterested@reddit

Yes. You can read about an actual bailout from a KC-135 here: https://www.safety.af.mil/Portals/71/documents/Magazines/FSM/1960s/196411%20-%20AerospaceSafety.pdf

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KINGbetterNAME@reddit

The Air Force would rather save money on parachute inspections than provide the crew with the ability to bail out. I’m happy to say the aircraft I operate on still provides enough for the crew. 🪂

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cms116508@reddit

So bailing out of a KC-135 is not an option? Damn! I am so happy I didn't take the offer to do in-flight refueling when I was in basic training. I stayed with on-the-ground refueling.

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dareal5thdimension@reddit

Wait till you find out you can't bail out of commercial flights either

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Squirrelherder_24-7@reddit

Tell that to D.B. Cooper…

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Lopsided_Laugh_4224@reddit

They def used to have them. I stopped flying them in late 1993 so don’t know what happened after that. They were a cold-war relic of the give it all then bail out/try to survive scenario. Otherwise know as “suck ‘em dry and watch ‘em die.”

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moosehq@reddit

Jesus. Did you have an independent air supply at least?

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RBeck@reddit

Once you're out of gas you're going to be coming down to thicker atmosphere anyway.

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Lopsided_Laugh_4224@reddit

Nope. As another poster has mentioned: the procedure was very sketchy.

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moosehq@reddit

I mean I can imagine - the altitude (and useful period of consciousness), the speed, the aero around such a huge beast.

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RBeck@reddit

Once you're out of gas you're going to be coming down to thicker atmosphere anyway.

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CharacterUse@reddit

Presumably they would at least try to glide down to lower altitudes and try to reduce speed once lower. In this scenario the KC-135 isn't in immediate danger, it's just out of fuel.

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circlethenexus@reddit

Thank you for all that you did! Son-in-law is crew chief at Barksdale, so we’ve visited many times. It’s amazing to see how many people it takes just at one base keeping this country safe.

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itchygentleman@reddit

aim for the bushes

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Lopsided_Laugh_4224@reddit

How it was supposed to happen: the crew would normally enter the aircraft via a ladder from below the flight deck. That climbing space/cavity also had a metal panel on the forward side that could be released to drop down into the airflow and provide a shield from the windblast. This would, in theory, allow the crewmember to drop cleanly about 6’ below the airframe and engines before being whipped away behind the jet.

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Previous_Shopping_75@reddit

Pretty much, but one of the biggest issues, was dropping out of the crew entry ladder-way while wearing a parachute. The crew entry ladder was cramped enough with no gear on. I flew on KC-135s while they had parachutes still, but I was also still in when we removed the parachutes and deactivated the bailout system.

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gefahr@reddit

I wonder how much larger the average crew member is now, vs when they designed those.

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LateralThinkerer@reddit

Go look up the bailout procedures from WWII bombers - all kinds of crazy stuff there. Bomb bays, wheel wells etc. [This is a B-24](https://freepages.rootsweb.com/~webermd1/family/Bail-out-2-web.jpg)

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flightwatcher45@reddit

P8 has bailout door, with air dam that folds out. Nobody wanted to test it as the horz stab is directly behind it. Hopefully its never needed but its there, with procedures.

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MyFavoriteLezbo420@reddit

WtAf

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Morganater123@reddit

When I raze the 135 because I can’t refuel in DCS they always bail 🤷🏻‍♂️

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burnerquester@reddit

Used to carry chutes and easily could again if the mission required it as it did in the prior era. The procedure isn’t that sketchy I was pretty confident in it.

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Pilotfrog@reddit

https://www.safety.af.mil/Portals/71/documents/Magazines/FSM/1960s/196411%20-%20AerospaceSafety.pdf

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forgottensudo@reddit

Cool, thanks!

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xXXNightEagleXXx@reddit

Is this BMS?

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st3alth247@reddit

Didn't knew that. No Ejection seats are one thing, but no parachutes are something different

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Teppy-Gray@reddit

I don’t think they can and anyways I can only think of a few scenarios where a KC-135 would be in so much danger where they would actually need to bail

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Rescueodie@reddit

Not anymore. They removed the chutes for ‘cost savings’. Statistically though you are safer riding it in rather than bailing out because of the aerodynamics around the jet. I think there has only been one or two successful bailouts in the ~70 year history of the jet.

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SpaceMarine33@reddit

The crew chooses if they want them or not

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CapeGreg767@reddit

When I flew them in the '90s we had parachutes on board.

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