Things that make you go hummmm……….

[jjmaccrimmon]

Today, the USAF announced that a B-52 flew across the US with 5 “live” cruise missiles mistakenly loaded onboard. When we say live, we mean carrying 5 150 kiloton nukes on the 5 mistakenly loaded missiles. Oh btw the missiles were being flown to Louisiana to be scraped. Before anyone thinks the freak-o-meter is pinging, remember that the Buff was made to um.. carry nukes, safely.. most of the time.

Important B-52 Articles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-52_Stratofortress
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20427730/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_B-52's

Comments

[argentla.livejournal.com]

Well... in the 50s and 60s Buffs used to fly Chrome Dome, with a certain number of bombers in the air 24/7, carrying live bombs (four megaton-yield B28 gravity bombs, if memory serves), so at least this was an anomaly, rather than routine practice. But... there was more than one Chrome Dome accident, including at least one crash that created a real mess (bomb casing scattered fissile materials, but didn't detonate), so it was never a good idea.

And how exactly do live nuclear weapons get loaded ACCIDENTALLY? I thought there was supposed to be a whole complex set of security precautions to prevent that.

[jj-maccrimmon.livejournal.com]

I sat SIOP (Nuke) alert in 1993 as a KC-135 navigator. In fact, it was one of the last alert tours. In reading the article I was struck by that same point. How does one accidentally load hot weapons and not know it? There was multiple levels of surity and protection involving the carriage of any nuke equipted aircraft. I therefore can't believe it was done without the express knowledge and direction of at least the unit commander and aircraft commander. This is probably the reason the squadron commander was immediately relieved.

I expect there's much more than meets the eye here.