between 1 and 3ft. Above 3ft and you’ll
start breaking the sensors.’ He adds, ‘The
aircraft is happy up at altitude.’
While deployments away from
the U-2 eet’s home base at Beale
AFB, California, are frequent, they
are limited to a few months to help
mitigate the in uence of the regular
high-altitude ights. ‘The longer you’re
deployed the higher your chances are
of decompression sickness. The more
you y high on a regular basis, the more
you are susceptible. Back home we only
y around one high ight per month.
Back here it’s a more rapid pace — we’re
ying high much more frequently.’The U-2 is a valued, but clearly labor-
intensive, beast. ‘We have contractors who
have been around the jet for 30 years,’ says
‘Kip’, adding, ‘they are the top knowledge
experts and historians. It takes a huge
amount of teamwork and e ort for a
mission — it’s a well-oiled machine and it
works exactly the same every single day.
After we launch, the maintainers set to
work on another aircraft and directly after
we land the intelligence folks are poring
over our ndings to see how they can
exploit them.
‘We y the jet by hand until about 50
minutes into the ight. Then we select the
autopilot. For the most part we sit backand monitor things, but the operating
margins are close — we’re typically ying
at around 110kt indicated airspeed.’
The U-2 pilots don’t tend to plan their
own missions. They arrive at work, get
ready and then go and y. Asked where
their routes from Al Dhafra take them,
‘Kip’ replied, ‘If it’s in the news we are
usually there.’
Any major news in the CENTCOM
region could see air assets from Al Dhafra
being called into action. The 380th
AEW is an impressive and in uential
air power organization, and one that
looks to remain a stabilizing force in the
Middle East.Above:
Back on the
fl ight line,
maintainers
swarm over
the U-2 to pull
the recording
and data-
gathering
devices.
This image: A
U-2 with the
ASARS-2A
nose. The
detachable
mission
noses have
earned the
nickname ‘Mr
Potato Head’.http://www.combataircraft.net // August 2018 39
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