When Is Nightwatch Coming on Again
It'south midsummer 1964 and the unthinkable has just happened.
Radar picket stations aimlessly clog up the airwaves with congruently dire letters. The USSR has launched a massive nuclear strike on North America and Europe. Scores of intercontinental ballistic missiles, deployed from silos in the Soviet Union and from surfaced submarines in the Atlantic and Pacific, are well on their way to reaching their apogee. In less than an hour, entire metropolises will be wiped out and replaced with charred ruins of twisted metal and melted concrete. Everybody'south worst nightmare has come to life.
As NATO-members including the United kingdom of great britain and northern ireland and the United States answer in kind with devastating fury, the business organisation suit-clad members of the U.s. Secret Service's aristocracy presidential protective division accept shifted into high gear with a mission of their own. The President is unceremoniously hustled out of the White House and into an ascetic Lincoln limousine, while National Guard jeeps with mounted machine guns sweep the roads ahead of all traffic. The presidential motorcade zips out while klaxons blare and civilians scurry to bunkers and shelters beyond the metropolis. Shortly, the motorcade arrives at Andrews Air Force Base of operations, the gates having been opened in accelerate with a cleared path directly to the tarmac. The motorcade stops in front of a parked grey and white Boeing 707, and the President is yanked out and and then shoved up the airstairs attached to the side of the airliner amidst the incredibly loud howl of the iv turbojet engines underneath the wings of the shipping.
The stairs are pulled away, the doors are shut and the pilots taxi out to the nearest runway, disregarding traditional procedure and ignoring the demand to request clearance for departure. After entering a steep climb, the 707 will bank onto a heading which will take information technology to the American Midwest, where a fully-stocked bunker and command and control center awaits the President's arrival. Though by now, information technology is an established custom to hail any USAF aircraft carrying the President as "Air Force Ane", this modified 707 carrying the leader of the free world is actually called "Nightwatch". It is the Air Forcefulness'southward not-so-hugger-mugger doomsday jet, an airborne command center from which the President and other high-ranking members of authorities and the military can control and coordinate rescue, response and retaliation efforts in the result that our nightmares come truthful, and global nuclear Armageddon comes to fruition.
Looking Glass and the Early Days of Nightwatch
Back when the Cold War notwithstanding posed the threat of going "hot", the US government decided that it would be prudent to stand upwardly a fleet of special missions aircraft which would serve as insulated aerial command centers, all operated past the Air Force. The aircraft selected as the base of operations platform of the fleet was the C-135 Stratolifter, the armed services transport version of the Boeing 707 airliner, the first commercially successful jetliner in history. Eleven C-135s were ordered and re-designated EC-135Cs for the "Looking Glass" fleet, a group of command and command jets which would function as a link to America's nuclear arsenal if always ground command centers were destroyed or unable to communicate with silos and warships with nuclear weapons commitment capabilities.
Each Looking Glass jet was rewired and outfitted with the latest and greatest in communications gear, countermeasures and range-extension modifications. Specialized ac and modulation systems were installed to prevent radioactive air from penetrating the pressurized cabin and poisoning everybody inside. Radiation shields that would cover the windshield drinking glass in the cockpit were custom-fabricated and kept within easy reach of the pilots and flight engineer. Looking Glass EC-135s were crewed similarly to land-based command posts, with specialized personnel trained in communicating and controlling American nuclear delivery vehicles and weapons. In fact, Looking Drinking glass was officially designated a weapons system, though it couldn't itself burn a shot; it could withal direct hundreds upon hundreds of launches and attacks from American military elements in the air, on the basis or at body of water. From 1961 onward, the Air Force kept a minimum of ane EC-135C airborne at any given time somewhere in the world, 365 days a year. Programs similar to Looking Glass were also implemented, including "Nightwatch", "Silk Bag", "Scope Light", and "Blue Eagle", each providing emergency airborne command centers for important military machine officers, such as
This practice of having an EC-135 airborne at all times carried on till 1990, having accumulated a whopping 281,000 combined flight hours with not a unmarried accident to report. Arguably the nigh successful Air Force flying program in history. Subsequently 1990, Looking Glass EC-135s were still kept on duty, albeit on constant footing alarm. These aircraft, as well as those in sis programs like Blue Eagle and Silk Purse, remained serviceable and prepare equally command posts, but were all eventually retired and replaced.
The Nightwatch fleet'south mission was similar to that carried out by the EC-135C jets, simply with a slightly unlike purpose. The fleet's special callsign was indicative of its unique mission. Information technology would be the platform for a national airborne-based communications network that would be operated should a nuclear war break out; the network was also codenamed "NIGHTWATCH". Once again, the aircraft of choice was based off the C-135, this time designated the EC-135J. Instead of providing 4-star generals and admirals the ability to stay in touch with America'southward nuclear arsenal during a hypothetical nuclear war, the EC-135Js would exist used exclusively for the President of the United states. If the Cold War went hot, the Commander in Main would take an unparalleled adequacy to stay in command of the military, and would exist able to manage various assets (including the nuclear force) while on his mode to a secure bunker, which independent communications gear of its own. 3 EC-135Js were kept at Andrews AFB, Maryland, inside shut proximity to the White House. All 3 jets were placed on a permanent rotational standby country, fix to take to the air at a moment's notice, the flight crews nearby on alert.
A New Era for Nightwatch
Fast forward to the early 1970s.
The 747, more than popularly known as the "Colossal Jet" was soaring into widespread use with Pan American World Airways. The first e'er widebody airliner in existence, the 747 was gaining in popularity with other carriers and in no time, Boeing was already developing the upgraded successor to the 747-100, the first of the series. Dubbed the 747-200, it featured better range and improved engines built by Pratt & Whitney. Orders poured in for the aircraft from around the world. Thank you to an airline reneging on its contract, Boeing wound up with a pair of 747-200Bs without a customer to deliver them to. Seeing a potential opportunity to sell those ii aircraft to the military, Boeing executives shopped the jumbo jets to the Pentagon as prospective replacements for the EC-135C Looking Drinking glass birds. The 747-200Bs, after being refitted, could do more than the EC-135C, and grant a higher chapters and improved capability to the Strategic Air Command (which managed the EC-135 fleet) when flying a mission analogous to Looking Glass. Boeing decided to focus their offer specifically towards replacing the EC-135J Nightwatch jets still based at Andrews AFB. The Air Force accepted Boeing's offering and ordered up the completion of the beginning 747 in the package, with the intention of ownership a total of 7, 1 of which would be used solely for enquiry purposes.
Boeing finished the commencement Nightwatch replacement jet in 1973, officially given the designation E-4A by the Air Force. East-Systems, now known as Raytheon Intelligence and Information Systems, was given the contract to rewire and refit the E-4A with all of the improved versions of the various computers, communications and control gear which its predecessors used, and the Air Force took delivery of the first Eastward-4A in 1974, likewise basing it at Andrews. Officially, it was called the National Emergency Airborne Command Post (NEACP), colloquially known as "Kneecap" via the phonetic pronunciation of the acronym.
By the stop of the 1970s, the Air Strength had in its possession iii E-4As and 1 improved E-4B. The kickoff two Nighwatch aircraft were powered past four standard Pratt & Whitney JT9D loftier-featherbed turbofans, while the latter two used General Electric F103 (CF6) turbofans as their powerplants. Eventually, the JT9Ds were replaced with F103s besides, and brought upwards to the same standard of equipment as the East-4B by the mid-1980s. The
Though the East-4B ostensibly looks similar a harmless Boeing 747, such an appearance belies what's actually under its hood, and then to speak. Since they were, after all, the Air Strength's doomsday jets, the Eastward-4Bs were tooled accordingly. They were hardened to withstand the effects of a astringent electromagnetic pulse (EMP), like one emitted from the detonation of a nuclear warhead, allowing functionality and operability even after a debilitating nuclear attack had commenced. The cabin air-conditioning and filtration systems were modified to block and expunge radiations for lengthy periods of fourth dimension, and special screens with wire mesh similar to the doors you find on your boilerplate household microwave oven were created to shield the cockpit windows from absorbing radiations into the aircraft. Though digital flight decks and glass cockpits were quickly gaining in popularity past the late 1980s and early on 1990s, the Air Force left the E-4B's instrument panels with their original analog configuration, as the dials and gauges are less probable to be affected by an EMP than digital displays.
Now, non just is the Due east-4B capable of resisting the effects of a nuclear detonation, information technology'due south also designed to fly for a hell of a long time. According to Jim Winchester's Encyclopedia of Modern Aircraft, the Eastward-4B could hypothetically remain flying for upward to a calendar week. Thus far, information technology'south estimated that the Air Force has pushed its E-4Bs to a max of 35 hours in testing and preparation, though they have the option to profoundly exceed those fligh hours if necessary. An in-flight refueling receptacle, located below the cockpit windshield, allows for Due east-4Bs to exist refueled while airborne, using a probe organization. To account for the possibility of extended operations, a number of crew qualified to serve on the E-4B are cross-trained and so that tin can non only work their regular assigned stations, but can besides often troubleshoot and fix technical issues with the systems they're assigned to, while in-flight. A typical mission flight roster on an E-4B does include dedicated technicians and crew chiefs, though.
Probably the nigh important component of the E-4B is its advanced communications suite. The aircraft comes equipped with various antennae, some of which tin be trailed backside the airplane up to five miles while in-flight. A big blister on peak of the fuselage, just backside the cockpit, houses the aircraft's satellite communications assortment. The unabridged suite allows personnel aboard the ability to stay in continuous contact with every American (and allied) military asset available, including nuclear submarines, carrier strike groups, and even land-based missile silos.
Today, the US Air Force refers to Nightwatch equally the National Airborne Operations Center (NAOC, pronounced "Nay-Och"). In the years following the collapse of the Soviet Matrimony and the "cease" of Mutually Bodacious Destruction, Nightwatch has essentially get the sitting US Secretary of Defense force'south command post away from the Pentagon. All four E-4Bs still retain their extensive shielding, computers and communications systems, admitting updated to more modern standards. LCD screens have replaced older cathode ray tubes (CRTs) and projectors, and the shipping has been outfitted with latest and greatest in top-level encrypted gear. Newer transport/receive satellite links allow for higher fidelity connections with the American defence force network across the globe. The Eastward-4B's cockpit, even so, hasn't changed much. The aircraft's flight instruments, for the most role, remain a mix of dials and vertical tape gauges. A modern NAOC coiffure contingent consists of pilots, navigators and flight engineers, flight attendants (yes, the US Air Force has those) communications specialists, and battle staff from the various military branches of the United States.
America'due south fleet of 3 NAOCs are available to the Secretary of Defence force for official travel outside the country, simply are nevertheless kept in the alert emergency rotation should the worst believable result, man fabricated or otherwise, occur. Should the President of the United States take to travel exterior mainland America for whatever reason, an E-4B will usually tag forth for the ride, set to serve as a command center and a backup Air Force Ane, should something happen to ground the aircraft the President commonly flies on. NAOC crew maintain the aircraft with food and provisions, typically big stacks of Meals Ready to Consume (MREs), the same meal packs issued to ground combat troops. When a NAOC is scrambled, its pilots and crew have just minutes to go into the Due east-4B and buckle into their stations and the aircraft up in the air. The US Air Force ensures that all personnel attached to the NAOC mission are constantly trained and prepare for any mission they might be faced with. Security personnel, armed with M9 sidearms and M4 carbines, also travel with the aircraft to safeguard it and its sensitive gear whenever it's on the footing. All through the aircraft, you'll observe bunk beds and reclining seats, ready for crew rest on especially long missions that could concluding days. Yous could probably say that NAOCs are amid the most prepared and warning posts in the entire United states of america military!
The Eastward-4A's original project/conference room. (National Archives)
The Eastward-4A'due south original projection/conference room. (National Archives)
Only all of this does come at a price, and not a very modest one at that. Modern armed forces planes are typically very expensive pieces of hardware, and the more than specialized they are, the costlier they tend to be. That's partly why shipping like the Northrop B-2 Spirit, the United states of america Air Forcefulness's super-stealthy long-range bomber, rang up massive price tags, numbering in the hundreds of millions per unit of measurement produced, not to mention the price of parts, testing, outfitting, etc. The B-2, actually, is ane of the costliest aircraft to operate in the Us Air Force's inventory… but not THE costliest. That dubious title goes to Nightwatch. A Boeing 747-400, the nigh popular iteration of the 747 Jumbo Jet series, in service today with airlines around the world costs around $24,000 to $29,000 USD per hr to operate. An East-4B, on the other hand, costs the USAF a staggering $159,529 USD per 60 minutes to fly. Big divergence.
Today, Nightwatch'due south original mission doesn't actually exist anymore, merely all iv aircraft are still extremely useful assets to maintain. The terminal fourth dimension an East-4B flew during a national crisis situation was during the September 11th attacks of 2001. Thankfully, the aircraft hasn't had such a mission since. In 2007, then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld brought out a program to retire the Eastward-4B fleet altogether, only this was quickly nullified the following yr, when it was determined that at that place was no suitable replacement for the E-4B. The aircraft so specialized and uniquely equipped for the range of duties it was congenital for, that no other aircraft in Air Force service could possibly come shut to fulfilling the Due east-4B'due south mission and office. By 2039, however, all four E-4Bs will have reached their maximum lifetime operational limits, and volition need to be retired. Information technology'due south not out of the question for the Air Forcefulness to explore a replacement for the E-4B, though it'due south non very likely that the follow-on will be another 747 Jumbo Jet, unless Boeing keeps its 747-8 (the latest version of the 747) production line open up. Decades upon decades after the commencement concept of a doomsday plane took to the skies, these powerful aircraft have still however to fly the mission they were originally designed for… and that's a good thing. But in the event that the worst does happen, the US Air Forcefulness stands prepared with its modest but strong fleet of Due east-4B NAOCs, ready to execute the Nightwatch mission as before long every bit the Klaxon warning sounds.
Source: https://tacairnet.com/2017/03/02/nightwatch-the-air-forces-doomsday-jet/
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