Military folks?: If the military wanted to decommission a cruise missile

[Flabbergasted]

would they fly it across the country to do it?

I'm just curious? It seems like an awful lot of effort for six missiles?

[Kagemusha]

1. Uh, how else would they move the stuff?

The number of people cleared to handle cruise missiles isn't exactly high. I imagine a few less people are cleared to do it at the moment in the wake of this scandal. But since B-52 crews are cleared to handle the stuff in the first place - the B-52's are capable of firing the missiles after all - why wouldn't they be the ones to fly them around?

What, we're talking about EFFORT where actual honest to god nuclear cruise missiles are concerned?

[Kelly Rupert]

2. What else are they going to do with it?

Fire it into the ocean? Knock it apart with hammers?

[Flabbergasted]

3. For example:

Decommission it where it is?

Render it safe and transport it with something other than a bomber?

Why take it to an air force base?

[Kelly Rupert]

4. That "rendering it safe" process

is also known as decommissioning. It's somewhat expensive, and requires a good deal of specialized equipment, especially for disposal. Flying it in is cheap as free, given the Pentagon's budget--and certainly cheaper than building dedicated facilities everywhere anything might ever need decommissioned.

Why not transfer in a bomber? Bombers fly. They have the cargo space for it. They're reasonably fuel-efficient. You don't need to install special layers of security, as you would if you were transporting them on C-130s or something. The crew is already known to be trustworthy, competent, and totally qualified to transfer nuclear weapons.

Air Force bases are reasonable places to build facilities capable of decommissioning Air Force munitions, wouldn't you agree?

[Flabbergasted]

5. Yes Thanks.

[Phrogman]

6. cruise missile are weapons, not weapon platforms, they would be transported in boxes with guards

not loaded on the wings of their delivery vehicles.

[bananas]

7. FAS: A Brief History of Nukes in the Air

<snip>

Beyond the safety issue of transporting nuclear weapons in the air, the most important implication of the Minot incident is the apparent break-down of nuclear command and control for the custody of the nuclear weapons. Pilots (or anyone else) are not supposed to just fly off with nuclear bombs, and base commanders are not supposed to tell them to do so unless so ordered by higher command. In the best of circumstances the system worked, and someone “upstairs” actually authorized the transport of nuclear cruise missiles on a B-52H bomber.

<snip>

A Brief History of Nukes in the Air

The last time the Air Force is known to have flown nuclear weapons on a bomber was during the so-called Chrome Dome missions in the 1960s when the Air Force maintained a dozen bombers loaded with nuclear weapons in the air at any time. The program, formally known as the Airborne Alert Program, lasted between July 1961 and January 1968. The program ended abruptly on January 21, 1968, when a B-52 carrying four B28 thermonuclear bombs crashed on the ice off Thule Air Base in Greenland during an emergency landing. The accident followed another crash in Spain in 1966 and several other nuclear incidents.

Between 1968 and 1991, Air Force bombers continued to be loaded with nuclear weapons and stand alert at the end of runways on bases across the country, but flying them was not allowed due to safety concerns. The ground alert ended in September 1991 when the bombers were taken off nuclear alert as part of the first Bush administration’s Presidential Nuclear Initiative.

Although nuclear weapons are not flown on combat aircraft under normal circumstances, they are routinely flown on selected C-17 and C-130 transport aircraft, which as the Primary Nuclear Airlift Force (PNAF) are used to airlift Air Force nuclear warheads between operational bases and central service and storage facilities in the United States and in Europe (see overview here).

<snip>

http://www.fas.org/blog/ssp/2007/09/flying_nuclear_bombs_1.php

[krispos42]

8. The probably rolled it into a training flight

Fly around, practice low-level stuff, navigation, maybe a few emergency procedures, compute a few theoretical bomb runs on the local Burger King, then land.

They didn't know the missiles had nukes on them, after all.


I bet the missiles themselves (sans warheads) will be deactivated and put in storage, so they have to take them apart, preserve all the vital components and electronics, and lock them up in a bunker someplace. Just in case we find a use for them sometimes in the next 30 years or so.

It may sound silly, but the government and the military keeps this stuff around for ages.

The Mark 14 torpedo from World War Two wasn't taken out of service until 1980. And I'll bet the Navy still has them in storage someplace, just in case.