Air Force One’s little-known sister aircraft the ‘Doomsday Plane’ – designed to protect high-ranking government officials from a nuclear attack – was sent on a four-hour training flight after Vladimir Putin placed Russia’s nuclear forces on high alert.
Military flight tracking sites showed the modified Boeing 747 had departed from the US Air Force base in Lincoln, Nebraska, on Monday evening.
The E-4B carried out a training flight with other specialist military aircraft, reports the i newspaper.
The planes are outfitted as complete command centers for the president and his top officials including the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the case of nuclear war or national emergency.
These aircraft have unique capabilities that cannot be duplicated by any other aircraft that the Air Force uses.
The US Air Force Boeing 747 Doomsday plane parked on the apron in Brussels, Belgium, in 2010
The planes are outfitted as complete command centers for the president and his top officials including the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the case of nuclear war or national emergency
Monday’s training flight, which lasted four-and-a-half hours, headed towards Chicago before returning to the Nebraska base. It appeared to be an unusual training flight as it was joined by two ‘Cobra Ball’ jets, which can track the trajectory of a ballistic missile, as well as other military aircraft.
The Pentagon did not respond for a request for comment on the purpose of the exercise.
But the Doomsday flight came just a day after Putin said he had placed Moscow’s nuclear forces on a ‘special regime of combat duty’ in response to ‘aggressive statements’ from members of the NATO defence alliance.
Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov went further on Monday and blamed the escalation on UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss.
E-4B Doomsday planes follow the President of the United States during his travels, whether domestic or international.
The aircraft, slated to have reached their service life by 2039, have been in operation since 1980.
The craft carry special equipment and have the capability to communicate with anyone, anywhere in the world, and support analysts and strategists in-flight.
The planes can also be refuelled in the air and have remained airborne and operational for as long as 35.4 hours in one stint.
The Doomsday planes can also be refuelled in the air (as pictured) and are able to remain airborne and operational for as long as 35.4 hours
However, the craft were designed to be able to operate in-flight for a full week without needing to land.
The planes, also called ‘National Airborne Operation Centers’ when they are in-flight, have special equipment and have the capability to communicate with anyone from anywhere in the world and support analysts and strategists on the flight.
The E-4Bs are operated by the First Airborne Command and Control Squadron of the 595th Command and Control Group, are coordinated by the United States Strategic Command and are stationed near Omaha, Nebraska, at the Offutt Air Force Base.
When the president is in the US, a Doomsday plane is kept with its engine running at all times and ready at the Offutt base 24 hours a day.
If the President goes abroad, the E-4Bs follow and are known to the crews as ‘Air Force One When It Counts’, according to Politico.
Should an emergency occur, one of the four craft is thus able to rendezvous with Air Force One almost immediately.
The design of the plane is meant to survive an electromagnetic pulse with all the systems intact, even down to the fact that they still use traditional analog flight instruments because they are less vulnerable.
A Doomsday Plane is capable of operating with the largest crew of any aircraft in US Air Force history, at 112 people, both flight and mission personnel. The planes all have three decks
Four specially modified Boeing 747s — dubbed the E-4Bs or ‘Doomsday planes’ (pictured) — carry high-ranking members of the US Government around the world. This image shows an E-4B aircraft is towed out of its hangar June 17, 2009, at Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska
The planes also have in-flight refueling and has been able to remain airborne and operational up to 35.4 hours. Though it has been designed to be able to operate in-flight for a full week.
The planes are outfitted with special equipment including a wire antenna that can keep the president in communication with the nuclear submarine fleet, even if ground-based communications had been destroyed.
The E-4 fleet were first operated in the 1970s during the Cold War.
Through to the end of the war, one of the flying war rooms were kept constantly on alert at Andrew’s Air Force Base, ready to lift off with the president on board in just 15 minutes.
It was believed that these planes were the best way to keep the president safe in the case of nuclear attack.
In 2006, there was talk that the E-4B fleet would be retired in 2009 under then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.
Instead, just one of the fleet was retired in the February of 2007.
When Robert Gates took over as Secretary of Defense in May 2007, he reversed the decision and the plane, with its unique capabilities, returned to the fleet.
