Ellsworth AFB’s crews and maintainers information us trough an unprecedented tour of the BONE.
Final month we reported about our good friend Erik Johnston’s video of the loading process of the B-1B’s Rotary Launcher System, the primary of a sequence devoted to the “BONE” (from “B-One”, because the plane is unofficially nicknamed). This week, the second video of the sequence has been launched, displaying the B-1’s most detailed walkaround tour ever recorded.
The video was recorded in certainly one of Ellsworth Air Pressure Base’s hangars, housing the eighth Bomber Wing’s flag ship (AF serial 86-0129, nicknamed “The Black Widow”), with the 34th Bomb Squadron crews and maintainers explaining the options of the bomber, each inside and outdoors. The walkaround is 2 and a half hours lengthy, with tons of details about this supersonic, multirole heavy bomber.
The plane within the video was simply washed and, due to this, all surfaces of the wing (flaps, spoilerons and slats) were deployed, permitting to understand the complexity of the variable-sweep wing. The wing could be swept in a number of positions whereas flying, nonetheless this can be a delicate course of because it places plenty of stress on the airframe, leading to a 1.4 G restrict whereas the wing is shifting.
A pilot and a Weapons Programs Officer additionally talked extensively concerning the bomber’s three weapon methods, displaying the ahead one fitted with an infinite 20,000 lb gas tank that’s used to offer between 45 minutes and 1 hour and quarter-hour of further endurance. Later within the video, a specialist from the twenty eighth Munitions Squadron defined the completely different weapons employed by the B-1B, displaying on the trailers the CBU-103 WCMD, GBU-31 (each Mk-84 and BLU-109 warheads) and GBU-54 JDAM, AGM-158B JASSM-ER and AGM-158C LRASM. By the way, through the present BTF, two B-1 bombers launching from RAF Fairford, employed stay GBU-38 Joint Direct Assault Munitions, in addition to a stay AGM-158A Joint Air-to-Floor Standoff Missile, in what was the primary time AFCENT flew multiple weapons types and practiced employment in opposition to a number of simulated targets throughout a single bomber process power mission.
An extended a part of the video is devoted to the “workplace” of the pilots and the WSOs, the place they present the myriad of switches and gauges that may be discovered within the cramped area reserved to the crew. In reality, as many say (together with the WSO within the video), the B-1B’s area is all used by weapons and fuel, with only a tiny little bit of area left for the 4 crew members.
Stefano D’Urso is a contract journalist and contributor to TheAviationist primarily based in Lecce, Italy. A graduate in Industral Engineering he is additionally learning to attain a Grasp Diploma in Aerospace Engineering. Digital Warfare, Loitering Munitions and OSINT methods utilized to the world of navy operations and present conflicts are amongst his areas of experience.
