Lakenheath B61 Deployment Scenarios

A few things to think about during the period leading up to when RAF Lakenheath becomes ready to host B61s again.

Purpose

The purpose of the current preparations may be to use Lakenheath as:

• permanent host - B61s stored long-term on the base
• standby host - the base is prepared to host B61s at short notice, but the weapons would not ordinarily be present
• temporary host for a specific period - for example, weapons might be removed from another base during development works

Scenarios

In the following, Notice is how long before the loaded plane arrives at Lakenheath that we know that it is coming. If good ACARS data is available, this could be two or three hours more than the flight time of the inbound leg. Here, good means the destination is revealed and is accurate (there have been instances where the destination was changed during the flight, or shown as a base where it wasn't possible to land).

Aircraft roles are abbreviated thus:

• P = Primary
• E = Eurospare
• U = USAspare

It's assumed all aircraft start from McChord, as is usually the case, and that the Eurospare will be in its usual position at Lakenheath.

• double header with dummy first leg:
  • P & E fly to Lakeneath
  • U flies to Kirtland
  • P flies to Kirtland (empty)
  • P flies to Lakeneath (loaded)

  Notice: several days

• double header with first leg from another deployment base
  • P flies to Ramstein, E to Lakenheath
  • U flies to Kirtland
  • P flies to e.g. Volkel, then Kirtland (possibly loaded)
  • P flies to Lakeneath (loaded)

  Notice: with ACARS data, flight time (9.5 hours) plus; otherwise we don't know it's coming to Lakeneath until it starts to descend into the airfield, and even then, that might indicate a diversion

• single header from Kirtland
  • P flies to Kirtland, E to Lakenheath
  • U flies to Kirtland
  • P flies to Lakenheath (loaded)

  Notice: several days but with uncertainty of destination as previous scenario

• single header from another deployment base
  • P to other base, E flies to Lakenheath
  • U flies to Kirtland for deception
  • P flies to Lakenheath (loaded)

  Notice: with ACARS data, flight time (45 minutes to 8 hours, depending on the other base) plus; otherwise there is uncertainty of destination as previous scenarios

  Variations: if other base is northern, P may be initially at Ramstein; if other base is Ghedi, P may be initially at Aviano

  Remarks: if U is sent to Kirtland, the setup looks like a regular double header for the other deployment base; what may give it away is absence of tankers and refuelling reservations required for trans-Atlantic flights; if there is no U, we can deduce that the destination is within Europe