Texas night becomes aerial classroom

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Katie Spencer
  • 459th Air Refueling Wing Public Affairs
JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO-LACKLAND, Texas --  From 22,000 feet in the air it's dark and there is nothing but a black wall of never-ending sky. The moon's reflection off a few stray clouds provides the only bit of light.

Suddenly, a huge, grey object appears from seemingly nowhere and positions itself in the back of the airborne KC-135 Stratotanker. The boom operator takes to the chair and prepares for the job at hand; refueling a Lockheed C-5 Galaxy aircraft with a pilot who has never done an aerial refueling mission at night.

The KC-135 pilots keep the plane steady, while the boom operator carefully watches the movement of the C-5. He waits for the right moment to make a connection into the fuel tank.

The pilots of the C-5 take a little longer to get into place as they are learning the procedures of aerial refueling, but after a few tries, the positioning is perfect and the two planes are ready to connect.

As the boom makes contact, the C-5 jerks to one side in the air. The boom operator quickly removes the boom and aircrews on both planes re-adjust and try the process again.
For members of the 756th Air Refueling Squadron at Joint Base Andrews, Md., this was the scenario as they supported the 356th Airlift Squadron here, during a business effort training mission in San Antonio, June 25 through 30.

From the front of the KC-135 flight deck, to the boom in the back and all the way to the front of the C-5 flight deck, all aircrews work together to ensure a successful and safe aerial refueling mission; especially at night.

"Night refueling missions are one of the more of the challenging things we do in a C-5," said Air Force Maj. John Grady, flight instructor for the 356 AS C-5 Formal Training Unit. "Some of the challenges are not having the peripheral references we get during the day. Also, being able to see the movement from our plane to the tanker during limited visibility makes it challenging to keep the airplane in position."

While the C-5 crew has their challenges, the tanker team also has obstacles when doing night refueling.

"Depth perception changes a lot during the night hours," said Tech. Sgt. Dana Fernkas, a boom operator for the 756 ARS and business effort. "Because it is night time and we are not working normal hours, we can get tired; especially when we are helping to train new receiver pilots because the missions are longer."

Night refueling poses challenges for both aircrews, but the mission in general tests the patience of the KC-135 crew.

"Pilots new to refueling are more unpredictable to train," said Fernkas. "We are constantly repositioning the boom and assisting them with proper positioning. It can get frustrating, but we draw from our own experiences when we were new at the procedure and make sure we are on-top of our game to ensure the pilots get the best possible training."

In addition to the tanker team getting a lesson in patience, the C-5 pilots learn to deal with their nerves.

"There are a lot of ground lessons before we actually become airborne," said Air Force Capt. David Franck, an air refueling student for the 356 AS. "Once you're up in the air, the nerves hit and I just tell myself to wiggle my fingers and toes so I don't grip the handle which can cause the plane to move unexpectedly. My training really helps to ease the nerves when I pull up to the tanker."

Both units have different challenges and lessons learned, but they share a similarity in that they are both U.S. Air Force Reserve components.

The 356 AS is the Air Force Reserve's only Formal Training Unit which gives active duty, guard and Reserve aircrews training and flight qualifications for the C-5. For this mission, the pilots going through the aerial refueling portion of training are active duty members. The reservists from the 756 ARS provide support for these pilots as part of a total force concept.

"A significant portion of the Air Force's assets comes from within the reserves," said Grady. "Without being able to tap into those resources and use the reserves to help augment active duty, it would be very challenging to accomplish our training."

As the boom operator removes the boom from the C-5 gas tank, and the receiver pilot pulls away from the tanker to disappear back into the night, both aircrews breathe a sigh of relief as the training mission was safe and successful. The wheels touchdown on the hot pavement of the runway, and the teams go home to rest before the next night's mission.