MCCHORD AIR FORCE BASE, Wash. -- In the first-ever C-17 Globemaster III polar airdrop, McChord aircrews
delivered life-sustaining cargo to National Science Foundation
scientists on the North Pole April 12.
The last polar airdrop was conducted in 2001 by the venerable, but
now retired C-141 Starlifter. This time, two McChord jets made the
12-hour, non-stop flight to airdrop almost 10,000 gallons of fuel to the
scientists.
The NSF scientists are on a six-week mission to collect data on the
effects of global climate change, said Tom Quinn, an international
logistics manager working with the NSF. A network of National Oceanic
and Atmospheric Administration buoys run across the Nares Straight
between Canada and Greenland to measure water temperature, salinity and
the speed and direction of Arctic Ocean currents, he said. The fuel will
power generators, drilling equipment and a helicopter used to reach the
buoys.
The warmer spring Arctic temperatures allow people to work in the
extreme climate zone, he explained. At the same time, the weather isn’t
warm enough to melt the polar ice sheet that the helicopter uses as a
landing platform when it visits each buoy.
Without the fuel delivered by the C-17s, the mission would be dead on
the ice, said Mr. Quinn.
“The C-17 seemed like the perfect aircraft for this mission,” he
said. “It’s a good thing for McChord because it’s never been done
before, and it’s big for us because we’re dealing with very
challenging logistics.”
The logistics were difficult for McChord, too, said Maj. Travis
England, mission director from the 8th Airlift Squadron here.
Along with coordinating with various McChord agencies and the NSF,
Major England also had to coordinate with air traffic control in
Sondestromford, Greenland, and Reykjavik, Iceland, to work out the
flight plan. He also worked with the Central Air Reservation Facility in
Washington, D.C., for the air refueling over Canadian airspace.
“Planning began three months ago,” said Major England. “There
were issues involving navigation at such extreme latitudes, which makes
this flight abnormal for us.” Abnormal, he said, because as the
aircraft flies near magnetic north, the compass needle may actually
point in the wrong direction, leading the mission off the proper flight
path.
He said the flight crews linked two flight simulators together and
flew the mission so they could practice.
The mission required two C-17s to descend over the frozen waterway to
an altitude of about 1,000 feet, said Major England. The pilots visually
identified a small island marked with the letter C. That was the drop
zone.
The C-17 crews then let gravity pull the bundles out of the plane,
which engaged the parachute on each fuel pallet. After the initial drop,
the planes turned back for a second pass over the drop zone. During the
second pass, the loadmasters unhooked the deployment bags from the
static lines, stuffed them into containers and dropped them as well. The
NSF scientists then repacked the parachutes into the deployment bags.
The two aircrews that flew the mission consisted of both active-duty
and Reserve Airmen from the 62nd and 446th Airlift Wings here.