We wait whilst the crew are briefed on today’s mission which will take us over German air space, firstly towards Dresden in the East of the country and then back towards the West of Bremen. The first refuelling track in use for the mission is known as ‘Saxon’, which is 25 Nautical Miles (NM) by 10 NM with a flight level block for ‘other’ traffic of between 14,000 and 19,000 feet, with a minimum flight refuelling level of 16,000 feet. The area is controlled by Munich Radar and the magnetic course of the ‘racetrack’ is 033’/213’. The second refuelling track in use for the mission is known as ‘Rosy’, which is 30 NM by 14 NM with a flight level block between 9,000 to 23,000 feet, with the minimum flight refuelling level determined by traffic within the area at the time. This refuelling area is controlled by Bremen Radar and the magnetic course of the ‘racetrack’ is 019’/199’.
July 17th 2012, it’s 4.45AM local time when we arrive at the main gate to RAF Mildenhall, Suffolk. Having completed our medical requirements and obtained our base passes the previous day, getting on base is a relative formality. Through the vehicle search area and we head towards the 100th Air Refueling Wing operations building with our escort from Public Affairs and hope that we have another good day with our friends at the ‘Bloody Hundredth’. We had arrived at Mildenhall the previous day expecting to get some Royal Norwegian Air Force F-16’s in front of our lenses, but having been told their mission had been scrubbed we looked forward to some Luftwaffe Tornados to shoot instead. This gave us a great opportunity to obtain some images of the KC-135’s utilizing the USAF’s Multi-Point Refueling System (MPRS), colloquially known as “Mippers” by the mission crews.
With the crew briefing over we’re good to go, so we board the crew bus and head out to the aircraft. Our KC-135R for today is tail number 58-0016 or “Quid 65” as she is known as today, the Quid call-sign being a familiar one to air-band listeners around Europe. Our ride is some 50+ years old and has 23,000 hours on the clock, but with an expected lifespan of 39,000 hours there are a few more years left in the old girl yet! Showtime is scheduled for 06.15Z (Zulu) or 07.15 local time. Zulu time is used by air forces to eliminate any confusion relating to different time zones encountered within a mission and is based on Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). Ironically our routing today is one that would have been familiar to 100th Bomb Group B-17 Flying Fortress air crews carrying out bombing missions over Germany in WWII, but thankfully that is history and the USAF is now supporting the German Luftwaffe in its peace-