B-1 BOMBER LOST IN THE INDIAN OCEAN!!

Fox News

[Walkin Man]

I bet you are right BoT! Or they will sat allah brought it down to strike the infidels!!!

[Robe]

CNN reports kc-10 has rescue beacon of at least one crewmember.. ship on the way

[Tommyjo]

A similar incident occurred during 1991 (February 3rd.) A B-52G returning to Diego Garcia from combat over Iraq experienced a technical fault. Three of the crew of the B-52 ejected safely, but the rest of the crew perished. Let's hope that the B-1B Lancer crew are recovered safe and well.

[Poohbah]

All four crewdogs have ejection seats.

[Henchster]

I sense a conspricay already! {;^)

Seriously though, they're talking about it possibly being a refueling incident but what would a long-range (3,000+ nm) bomber be doing mid-air refueling 30 miles from Diego?

[strela]

He was there for a couple days afterward & said it was, hands down, the most boring place on earth!

And he would be right. Messrs. Daniels, Bacardi, and Stolichnaya helped me survive my tour, and I got VERY good at fishing and running.

[RedBloodedAmerican]

This sucks. A friend of mine from college - ERAU - is a Cap on a B1B. They can get out, but I would be surprised if they didn't stay with it trying to save her. Crap.

[Mark17]

The Taliban will be claiming that they brought it down with small arms fire.

Either that, or they will claim Allah destroyed it.

[Tree of Liberty]

Look, as bad as friendly fire is, it happens. No matter how much we try to avoid it, it will happen. And just for comparison, we lost about 130 people to friendly fire in the Gulf War. So far, I believe we've lost 3 due to friendly fire (the errant JDAM last week), and I think 10 overall in the campaign (presuming the B-1 crew is lost).

[SamAdams76]

With the thousands of sorties we have conducted since the start of this war, it's amazing that we haven't lost an airplane up to now (other than helicopters and drones). I mean, we lose planes on a regular basis during peacetime on training missions.

Hopefully the crew was able to eject safely.

[r9etb]

Michael Rivero bribed the CFR to exert pressure on Jewish Bankers who ordered you to write that.

And they probably sent JFK, Jr. in a Ryder truck to his house (all the way from a secret location in Oklahoma, stopping off at McDonald's along the way to pick up a few Bilderbergers) to make sure he didn't mess up.

[Charles Martel]

There was a B-1 at the Chicago Air Show in the summer of 2000. The show was on the weekend, but during the week, the planes would practice over the city. (The Blue Angels skimmed buildings during the work day...very cool.) Anyhow, when the B-1 showed up, it came screaming in over the city, just cleared the John Hancock building, and banked out over Lake Michigan...and let out the loudest roar I had ever heard from a plane. It was gone in a few seconds. In my opinion, it was just as cool as the Blue Angels.

There was a B-1 doing fly-overs last Friday in New Orleans, in concert with the veterans parade celebrating the opening of the new Pacific wing of the national D-Day Museum. I was expecting the F-15s and A-10s from the nearby ANG base, but the B-1 was a real surprise. The B-17, B-24, P-40 and Dauntless were all great to see, but the B-1 really pegged the "Cool!" meter! It pulled those violent banking turns that torture the water vapor out of the air, just like the fighters can. Prayers going out for the downed air crew.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

"The B-1B differs from the B1-A with revisions in offensive avionics, defensive avionics, weapon payload, range, and speed. Major changes include improved avionics and systems, strengthened landing gear, optional weapons bay fuel tanks, external under-fuselage hardpoints for fuel and weapons, ejection seats rather than a crew escape capsule, fixed, rather than variable air inlets (limiting top speed to Mach 1.25 rather than the B1-A's Mach 2.3) with ducting masking the engines from radar."

[ken5050]

I seem to rememeber that the pilot and co-pilot seats shoot up, but the other two crew seats shoot DOWN to eject....there was some consternation when the design was revealed, because if the plane is in erractic, or uncontrollable manuevers, then it could be real tough for half the crew.

[Jerry_M]

I would guess that you have never served in the military or around complicated equipment.

Heck, the 3rd ACR wasn't able to train at McGreggor Range during peace time without killing a couple of troopers each time when they were stationed at Ft. Bliss.

My military career was cut short by an M-60 tank accident at Ft. Hood that broke my back and hospitalized me for six weeks, so I know just a little bit about what I am talking about.

Military service is all about "killing people and breaking things". You can't do this without subjecting your troops to some risk of death and injury.

[r9etb]

Seriously though, they're talking about it possibly being a refueling incident but what would a long-range (3,000+ nm) bomber be doing mid-air refueling 30 miles from Diego?

I'd guess it increases the bomb load: take off with minimum fuel, and use the weight savings for bombs. Then, once you're airborne, top off the tanks and go to war.

[Baseballguy]

Is this really relevant! Hell we are at war!!! People die. If there is some crewman crying that they where scared and had to go swimming I will puke.

PC is for the birds. Lets Roll and move on to Iraq there is nothing the Air Force has left to do in Afghanistan....

[ken5050]

Thanks for the info......

[Blood of Tyrants]

Maybe not. Pilots are constantly training to recognize which situations are recoverable and which are time to bail out.

[Vets_Husband_and_Wife]

I respect and appreciate your service during WWII, but do NOT blame our servicemen and women for "friendly" fire incidents. (per your comments **to shooting ourselves, or bombing ourselves***). The modern military knows those things will happen. The technology we possess is NOT perfect.

Incidents like the ones you mentioned are EXTREMELY rare. Considering all the flights, all the actions we are involved in, I'd say our military is doing a pretty damn good job.

Right now, lets not point fingers, but support our commrades in arms?

I'm hoping that your just reacting emotionally (as we all are) to the news that some of our service members are in trouble. Perhaps they have even just given the ultimate sacrifice. So let us respect the moment and not write things like that. It doesn't serve them very well. Historically, even in WWII, we took friendly fire. The stats are much less these days then they were during other conflicts. So with all due respect, lets not go there?