Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire B52 - BUFF

No. My understanding is it was once a requirement for KC-135 IP candidates. Not sure for the BUFF crew.

The autopilot shop was responsible for maintaining the astrotracker. On Okinawa, we got an oddball writeup that none of the standard troubleshooting techniques could fix. We found that the gyro-stabilized tracker unit above the bomb bay had a damaged wiring harness. A sheet metal guy had managed to hit our wire bundle with over 50 wires in it 13 times with a 1/8" drill bit while installing a scab patch over some flak damage. It took us 3 days, working 24/7 to splice all the wires back together. We were working in the crawl space below the wing root. Okinawa in the summertime, on a flight line with no shade, right under he skin of a black-painted airplane, is not a nice place to be!

I was an engine mech at Fairchild 87-91. 92nd FMS. Worked in shop for a year rebuilding the j-57 and tf-33 That got boring so went to the test cell. being underneath a Jet engine at MRT while adjusting the fuel control Is indescribable. After that I spent the rest of my time in phase dock. One week a 135 g model. the next week A b-52 h. Lots of memories.

A bunch of F models ended up at Castle as trainers. "Worn out" is a good description! During a routine phase inspection a 10 foot long crack was discovered from the wing root going down the side of the fuselage on one plane. When they called Boeing to ask how to repair it, the answer was "Scrap it!" The wing commander had to ask for a volunteer crew to make one last flight to the boneyard at Davis-Monthan.

Usually the best pilots in our Squadron were given the opportunity fly the broken planes back to Boeing.
A lot of times it was the late Texan Gary Easton & my AC Borkowski. Gary retired and ended up as a personal pilot for a large Texas ranch.Not sure on the ranch. I loved flying with him. Cowboy hat and all just like Slim Pickens. He had the ability to navigate visually on clear days across the entire North American continent. He knew practically every crossroad, highway, diner, etc Just amazing.

I watched them practice flying below the mountain tops in the Boone NC area. I remember being on top of Howard’s Knob and looking down onto the top of one flying up the valley over Boone right at dawn. I’ll never forget it ! Looked like filled the valley.

Sometimes they did not make it over Mountain Tops. My 1st Gunner was killed just after he moved from GFAFB, ND down to Robins AFB. They took out the top of Square Top Mountain on a descent to a low level run out West. Another Gunner I knew that just left GFAFB died in a low level crash into a butte near LaJunta. Entire crew killed on both crashes. Early 1980’s had quite a few crashes & accidents. Also had one blow up on the ramp refueling at GFAFB & a bomber fire on Nuke alert there too.

First cousin piloted two tours over Viet Nam ( out of Otipau Thailand. Think I spelled it wrong), then came home and piloted a BUFF for SAC. Love hearing his tales about flying nukes. The most intriguing point, to me, was his description of how small the nuke is on board. I figured it would be some monstrosity but no…about 10’ x 3’ diameter if I remember correctly.

Good things come in small packages.

i worked in the 8th AF HQ back in the early 80's. barksdale had a schit ton of bufs. during ORI they would take off one after the other with about 30 seconds in between. the roar was constant. pretty impressive except when they did it when i was trying to sleep. our barracks was an old, bolted together metal box that sat a few hundred yards off the flightline. the whole friggen building would shake when those things took off.

Outboard of #1 engine (far right of picture).

Couple years ago I was in Minot on family business and made a drive up north to the base for old times' sake. About 8 B52's decided they would fly around just for me, so I headed west toward Lake Darling, stopping every once in a while to get out the glass. Man, you can see (and hear) those things a long way away.

I spent a few months at U-Tapao working with a detatchment that didn't exist- - - -fixing C-130's that didn't exist- - - -which were air dropping food and ammo to people who didn't exist- - - - - -in a southeast Asia country where we "didn't have any military presence". Of course it didn't happen- - - - -the "complete" USAF records I requested and received a year ago said I was in the Philippines at the time!

Knew a bit about them, just that they were important in Vietnam.

Used to see big planes over Western Ohio, near Dayton.
The flew over 70 a lot as I drove through. No big deal.

Then one day I was running with an older guy, possibly
a Vietnam Vet. He mentioned that we were near Wright-patterson,
And that B-52s flew over the road. Pretty low. "AND HERE COMES ONE!"

Well, with my new information I was impressed.
And mentioned the 4 big engines.

"Look again, there's two engines on each of those pods."


Then, I was really impressed.
He went on to talk about the raids in Vietnam.


After that, I became a fan, and always looked forward to seeing them.

Man I sure do miss ND! I had a lot of great times hunting & fishing up there.

Flew on EC-135s with an airborne radio maintenance type that had flown secret squirrel schidt on C-130s out of UT. He had some interesting stories...

Grew up down the road from GFAFB and as a kid it was an impressive sight all the B-52s along highway 2 heading west.

Happy Thanksgiving Brian... me and the wife hope this finds you well.