Sometimes aerial refueling doesn’t go so well.

I was shown this exact video during my initial boom operator training on the KC-10 back in ’92. It was on VHS, and it didn’t look nearly this good. The problem started when the F-14 engaged the drogue basket at too high a closure speed. The takeup reel couldn’t react fast enough, so a sine wave formed in the hose, traveled up it, and came back with a vengeance. It was a known issue. After the F-14 disconnected, the KC-10 kept flying with the hose whipping around violently. It started smacking the tail. The boom operator doesn’t control the fuel pumps, the Flight Engineer does, so he had to get on the interphone and tell the FE to shut them off. That delay is why the hose kept spewing fuel for a while. They eventually found a safe spot to guillotine it. You can see the severed hose falling to the ground in the video. You definitely would not want to get hit by that thing. It’s heavy as hell.

Imagine getting killed by a refueling hose 😱

You mean you can just pump the fuel directly into the engine?

Isn’t there a way to turn it off?

I think usaf needs a valve in the tanker😅

I work in-flight refueling shop for Air Wing 13 and then back at AIMD at Oceana too. We were an Intruder squadron and had dropped the KA-6Ds and only had the E-Trams with D-704s. (Coral Sea Concept) I've seen hoses come off on either end and and accidental hose-jet on launch when a malfunction cause an instant auto-hose-jet as soon as there was weight off wheels. I've also seen a jet beat to death with the hose and the fragments as the hose disintegrated. You have to clear the deck because that hose (or what's left) will be a huge hazard when trapping back aboard the carrier.

Drogue work was always fun

Is there no off button?

So much for that right engine. It's probably going to need an overhaul after inhaling fuel like that. Not supposed to pour copious amounts of atomized JP-5 down the intake.

Could there be like a tee handle or a ball valve that someone could "turn"

What's the boom operator doing? Cut flow!

@boomers_ass @RSE_VB why does the F-14 hold position for so long after the break? Why not an immediate break away?

I find it strange that there is not emergency switch to shut off the fuel flow when this happens. Seems like a very simple fix.

I think dumping lots of fuel down the engine intake (if it happens) is a bad thing. Glad that was not during Blue Water ops. Sucks for the Tomcat flying home with that stuff stuck to its probe.

matching speed and direction midair like this can't be easy. I wonder how often this happens, and when it does the impact it can have on whatever mission needed refueling or even other missions in the region that needed that fueling tanker as well.

Years ago I saw a video of 4 A4's transpacing to Japan. They were on a C130 with only one basket reel working. They are in blue water and this happens. They find a ship and do a four plane ejection over the ship. The video is great, especially to a seat mech.

Crew member on the kill switch caught sleeping.

Ka Thump!

RIP the guy taking a smoke break down below

No valve on the start of that hose huh? Would have been a good safety feature

I feel personally attacked. I'm not a pilot

How much does that basket weigh? What's the current price of brass? Asking for a pilot friend.

Nice compressor stall (the fireball). Also from the smoke trail they had some other non-optimal behavior going on on #2

I haterd when our aircraft did IFR with Air Force tankers. I had to replace several IFR probes because of them.

WTF, 3 business days of noone shutting off the feed, then, just cut it loose and hope it doesn't land on the motorway.

thats absolutely terrifying I'm amazed the drenched plane (with very active and hot jet engines) didn't fireball on the spot. 🔥🔥🔥

We had one of our birds (F-14B) come back early from a mission with the basket still attached. Don’t think it was the same one. Different markings. We also had two different birds come back missing the ifr probe.

Good thing the alpha probe wasn’t right beside the fuelling probe. That would be an idiotic design choice (*cough* Hornet *cough*).

Nah...dey washin de plan

Whoever was the controls man was fire after this.

How did that fuel not get ignited by thr engine after being pulled into the intake?

The panel over the probe was removed during blue water ops…. USN 89-95