Original subtitles

[Narrator] A Military KC-135 is on a dangerous refueling

assignment over a war zone in the middle East

0-5 level.

They told us that 15% of us could possibly get shot down.

[Beeping] What the? What the...

[Narrator] when suddenly the mission goes wrong.

-No good, I'm losing it. -[Man] Okay.

We went 110 degrees of bank in both directions.

What the heck is happening?

It's beyond the capability of the airplane to do that.

Go get the parachutes and helmets.

Roger.

Became apparent pretty quickly that we weren't gonna be able

to complete our mission.

[Narrator] The question is why?

Mayday, Mayday, Mayday, this is Whale 0-5.

[Narrator] Investigators must quickly determine

if it was a mechanical failure.

So this control cable snapped.

[Narrator] Or enemy fire.

[Stokes] Was this intentional?

It's very critical to the entire operation

to really figure out what happened.

[Woman] Ladies and gentlemen, we are starting our approach.

[Man] We lost both engines.

[Woman] Put a mask over your nose. Emergency descent.

[Man] Mayday! Mayday!

[Woman] Brace for impact!

[Dramatic Music]

[Man] It's gonna crash!

[Suspenseful Music]

[Narrator] It's late afternoon

at King Abdulaziz International Airport

in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

Dozens of U.S. Air Force KC-135 aircraft prepare

for late night missions during the Gulf war.

Today more than 90 large tanker jets are preparing to refuel

combat missions over Iraq and Kuwait.

Ninety knots, so I'll hand it over to you.

Roger.

[Narrator] Major Kevin Sweeney and the crew

of U.S. Air Force flight Whale 0-5

review the final details of their mission.

Start switches.

[Narrator] He's the commander.

Flight start.

[Narrator] Sweeney has over 20 years

of Air Force flying experience.

It's his job to know the mission and his plane.

The aircraft commander is just like the captain.

You have to make any tough decisions,

it's your responsibility.

Although, it's very important to take input

from the rest of your crew members and listen to them.

Set take off thrust at 1.82 EPR.

[Suspenseful Music]

EPR set for takeoff.

[Suspenseful Music]

90 knots.

My airplane.

[Narrator] Jay Selanders is Sweeney's trusted co-pilot.

Your airplane.

The aircraft commander and is always responsible

for the airplane so you can't trade that

but specific duties we would trade back forth.

[Plane Engine Whirring]

[Narrator] At 5:25 p.m.,

Whale 0-5 lifts off from Jeddah.

[Plane Engine Whirring]

Coalition forces are two weeks into Operation Desert Storm,

one of the largest bombing campaigns in aviation history.

Hundreds of daily bombing runs drive

Saddam Hussein's invading Iraqi Army out of Kuwait.

The size of the American air power,

the contribution if you will, in Desert Storm

just can't be overstated.

It was quite astounding.

[Narrator] Sweeney and his crew

are flying a Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker.

The aircraft is similar to Boeing's commercial 707

but it's specially designed for mid-air refueling.

[Selanders] It really began the jet era

and it is a great airplane.

It's true, it's fast, it's strong.

It's one of Boeing's best products and once

you become accustomed to a few of its idiosyncrasies,

sweet airplane to fly.

Will take you a long way and bring you home.

Steve, are you gonna transfer from the center tank?

Affirmative.

Two units of trim should keep us within the limits.

[Narrator] Senior Master Sergeant Steve Stucky

is the boom operator.

He's critical to the refueling operation.

During refueling, he guides the fuel boom

to the receiving plane.

Once he is within three to five feet of the boom

from the receptacle.

Got them at 1.0.

[Stucky] I'll guide that boom into the receptacle,

then we can transfer fuel from the boom into his airplane.

[Nance] The amount of fuel that you can carry

whether in a bomber or a fighter

becomes critical in terms of being able to get

to the place that you need to go and bring them back.

There simply isn't any other substitute for air refueling.

[Narrator] Tonight's mission

takes them along a tanker corridor,

an aerial highway for tanker cruise

heading North from Jeddah.

When they reach way point Rita,

they'll turn East before making their final turn to

the rendezvous point,

less than 180 miles from combat zones

near the Kuwaiti border.

Transition altitude,

set altimeter 2992.

[Narrator] Navigator Greg Mermis is in charge of keeping

the mission safely on course.

[Mermis] We were primarily responsible

for running the rendezvous,

joining up with the other aircraft

to complete the refueling.

I knew that Greg was gonna do everything to put us

in the right position at the right time.

[Narrator] Tonight there'll be refueling an AWACS plane,

a radar surveillance and control unit.

A prime target for enemy fire.

[Mermis] I don't think any of us had any idea

what to really expect.

You know, they were estimating that 10% of the air refueling

fleet was gonna probably be shot down.

So it was a little bit nerve wracking.

[Narrator] The crew faces Iraqi surface to air missiles

and more than 700 enemy aircraft

including the dreaded Russian MiG-25.

[Sweeney] We had F-15's up there, F-16's

and their primary mission was air to air,

looking for enemy airplanes

to come and possibly try to attack an American airplane.

To be flying any sort of airplane in a war zone

is surreal.

I don't care how much you prepared for it.

The ability to think in a volatile environment

and to stay very calm

is absolutely a requirement of the job.

0-5 is level.

[Suspenseful Music]

[Narrator] Whale 0-5 reaches cruising altitude.

As they get closer to enemy territory,

the pilots reduce radio contact to avoid detection.

The only other plane in sight is another American KC-135

flying ahead in the same flight corridor.

Heading 088.

[Stucky] Altitude hold, on.

Altitude hold, check.

[Narrator] The crew will keep this course for 45 minutes

until they rendezvous with the AWACS plane.

[Mermis] That was our time to maybe relax a little bit,

nothing really kinda happening except cruising at that point.

So I always used to take the opportunity to go ahead

and make my dinner.

[Narrator] Stucky reviews his mission brief

which involves delivering 125,000 pounds of fuel.

There's times when desert air is very stable

and it's like, you're flying on glass.

But while I'm working on the paperwork,

I felt a little bounce.

[Narrator] Selanders feels an abnormal movement

in the yoke.

[Selanders] The autopilot was on,

but I saw the yoke deflect about 30, 35 degrees

to the left and it was shaking just a little bit,

which is very odd.

And just about the time I put my hands on the yoke

thinking I was gonna punch the autopilot off,

it came back to neutral.

It had some anomaly.

[Narrator] Moments later,

things go very wrong.

[Plane Engine Whirring]

[Warning Alarm Buzzing]

I got it.

[Narrator] It takes just a second for the plane

to roll 110 degrees to the left.

What the heck is happening?

[Nance] The first thing to think about is fly the jet.

The second thing is, what the devil just happened.

We really had no idea what was going on to the aircraft.

I thought perhaps a missile had hit us.

Did we get hit?

[Nance] Because it was violent.

I can't tell.

I've been flying for probably ten years at that point

and been on a lot of missions but never experienced

anything like that.

[Narrator] The crew can't tell

if there's some kind of malfunction

or if they're under attack.

We're gonna lose her.

Listen, we gotta get her level.

[Narrator] Just as it seems the plane

is in an unrecoverable left bank,

then it snaps hard to the right.

The airplane literally flipped, this is clearly unusual.

It's beyond the capability of the airplane to do that.

[Sweeney] I mean, we're just totally out of control.

We went 110 degrees of bank in both directions.

[Narrator] In the gully, Stucky is in trouble.

I didn't know what was going on,

it seemed like I would get to my feet

and then I'd fall down again.

It wasn't good.

Now, that's too much stress.

The airplane is very resilient but it isn't resilient

enough to overcome the stressors that would be put on it

if you rolled it in the wrong direction

and tried to get out of a high-speed dive.

[Narrator] If the aircraft banks much further,

it will be impossible to recover.

[Sweeney] If we didn't get this under control

and out of these wild gyrations very quickly,

this airplane was gonna come apart

and then we're just history.

[Plane Engine Whirring]

[Narrator] The pilots of Whale 0-5

are facing a crisis over the Saudi Arabian desert.

[Warning Alarm Buzzing]

The plane is rolling violently.

It's no good, it's no good, we're losing it.

I have got to focus on what I'm doing

and I don't have any time for any extraneous thinking.

[Narrator] Just when all seems lost,

Major Sweeney plays a hunch.

Speed brake.

[Narrator] Speed brakes are devices on airplane wings

designed to increase drag during descent and landing.

Sweeney deploys the speed brakes on both wings

hoping that it'll level the airplane.

What happens is when the speed brakes come out,

it gives you more roll capability that is manually

at your command and less capability for the airplane

to go off and do something on its own aerodynamically.

[Plane Engine Whirring]

[Narrator] It's a procedure Sweeney remembers

from his training.

[Suspenseful Music]

It works.

I remember leveling out, just amazed that

the airplane was still flying and you know,

everybody's still there.

[Narrator] Incredibly, the pilots have managed

to level the plane

but they're not out of trouble yet.

All right, I have lateral control

but we're losing altitude.

[Fire Alarm Buzzing]

We got fire lights on engines one and two.

[Narrator] The pilots discover a problem

with the two left engines.

Jay and I looked at the engine instrument

and they're all over the place.

These instruments make no sense.

[Nance] Both engines on the left wing have fire lights on

and why that would happen to both of them at the same time

is also going through your head.

[Narrator] The plane is fully loaded with fuel.

Steve, how bad are the fires on engines one and two?

Checking.

[Narrator] If there's a fire on the engines,

it could lead to disaster.

Oh my God.

The only thing I could see was torn sheet metal on the wing

where the engines were

and fuel being vented over at the top of the wing.

They're not on fire, they're gone.

No fire?

Affirmative, no fire,

the engines are gone!

Roger.

There was a moment where that sentence

didn't make a lot of sense to us.

Wait a minute, they're gone?

It takes just a moment for your mind to catch up to that

because now you've got really important pieces

of the airplane not there.

[Narrator] Even with no fire,

the crew faces another urgent problem.

We really gotta get some fuel off here.

Let's start dumping. Jay, you fly, don't fight it.

I have the aircraft.

[Narrator] The two remaining engines can't provide

enough power to keep the heavy aircraft airborne.

Well, we had no time to relax but I knew that we were

in serious trouble and we had to come up

with a lot of different procedures

to keep us in the air.

Close, open, dump, pump.

Close, open.

[Narrator] The fuel dump checklist is one of many

emergency procedures embedded in Sweeney's brain.

He conducts it from memory.

Sweeney, start shedding fuel.

[Sweeney] We had had to get lighter

so this baby'd start to fly.

Jay and I can kinda start to feel at 16,000 feet like

she could start flying again.

[Suspenseful Music]

Okay, I got the airplane.

[Jay] Holding steady at 16,000.

[Narrator] By dumping 50 tons of fuel,

Sweeney has succeeded in stopping their descent.

Good, can halt the fuel dump.

[Narrator] Even though the plane is maintaining its altitude,

there's no guarantee it can make a safe landing.

Go get the parachutes and helmets.

If anything else goes wrong, we'll need to bail.

Roger.

[Narrator] Ditching over the desert at night

is a terrifying option

but there may be no choice.

[Sweeney] No air crew wants to bail out

but I gotta get my crew back safely, that's my job,

is to get my air crew back safely.

The final methodology is to get everybody to jump out

but you may lose a crew member or two just in that process.

So this is not a decision to be taken lightly.

[Suspenseful Music]

Greg, you get on the radio with AWACS,

call in the Mayday.

Roger.

[Narrator] Looking for help, the crew contacts

their rendezvous aircraft to advise them of the situation.

It became apparent pretty quickly that we weren't gonna

be able to complete our mission.

Mayday, Mayday, Mayday, this is Whale 0-5.

We've had an inflight upset, number one and two engines

have departed the aircraft.

I say again, Mayday, Mayday, Mayday.

[Suspenseful Music]

[Narrator] There's no response.

It's no good, I think our high frequency radio is down.

It should have worked but it didn't.

We couldn't reach anybody.

[Narrator] Alone with no radio contact,

the crew will have to find their own way back to Jeddah.

[Nance] We like our radios,

especially when something goes wrong

but they're not going to provide necessarily a hook

to come out of the sky and save you,

you've gotta do that for yourself including

getting back to an airfield.

Greg, are your NAV instruments working?

Yes, INS is functional, radar is still up.

Well, give me a heading back to Jeddah.

Two, four, zero, 55 minutes, that's a long time to fly.

Copy.

Jay, take us to 240.

[Narrator] The crew relies on the navigator's skills

to find a safe route back.

[Mermis] It's just under an hour to get back to Jeddah.

It just seemed like an awfully long time to be

in an airplane that you were very unsure of.

-[Jay] Your airplane. -My airplane.

[Narrator] With great efforts, Sweeney and Selanders

wrestle to keep the plane on course to Jeddah.

Without the weight and drag of the left engines,

the plane wants to bank right?

The ailerons and elevators on KC-135 are not hydraulic.

That's why I had to fight her back

to keep those wings level.

[Narrator] But even if they make it back,

there's no guarantee they can land the plane.

We have to do a controllability check.

[Narrator] The crew must test their flaps and ailerons.

[Sweeney] Pull her back to idle.

[Narrator] The flight controls used to stabilize

the plane on landing.

[Nance] A big airplane inherently has an ability

to be landed if you can keep it under control.

So the question is, are we safe to go ahead

and try to land this airplane with what we've got?

[Sweeney] If we're gonna do a controllability check

and Jay and I determine that she's not flyable,

we're gonna have to bail out.

[Suspenseful Music]

All right, Jay, I want you to slowly bring them down.

Roger that.

[Narrator] Flying a severely damaged plane

near enemy territory, the crew of Whale 0-5

carefully checks that the control surfaces on their plane

are safe for landing.

There's a moment right before you begin to check

that you don't obviously know exactly what's gonna happen.

[Narrator] If the flaps are damaged.

Flaps 10.

[Narrator] It could cause an imbalance

and make the plane impossible to control.

We didn't know if the flaps would come down symmetrically.

We didn't know if they'd come down at all.

Nice and easy.

[Sweeney] We're gonna start milking the flaps down

and we see if we can maintain control of the airplane.

Jay is an integral part of this so, he's gonna slide

the flaps down to like 30 degrees and be watching me

and watching everything.

[Jay] Flaps 30.

I'm gonna do a small turn left and right.

If I start to lose it, I'll say up and you slam them back up.

[Nance] You're a test pilot at this particular point in time.

And you don't wanna be testing on the actual approach

because there can be no recovery

if you made the wrong move.

[Suspenseful Music]

Hell, I can land this airplane.

Okay, bring the flaps back up to zero.

We're gonna go home.

It was a big deal because at that point we thought

we could actually land the airplane.

[Narrator] The pilots now know they can slow

the plane down enough to get it on the ground

but they need to get it to a runway first.

130 miles to Jeddah, we might be in range now.

Jeddah Whale 0-5, how copy on Victor?

[Narrator] They attempt to contact the controller

for assistance.

Whale 0-5, Jeddah.

[Atc] You're on clear, go ahead.

Ah, yes, sir, this is Whale 0-5 inbound to Jeddah

declaring an emergency.

Engines one and two are out.

Whale 0-5, say souls on board and fuel remaining.

We have four souls on board,

currently 55,000 pounds of gas.

Roger, we are preparing the airport for your arrival now.

0-5, thank you, sir.

[Narrator] With the airport on standby,

the crew begins its lending preparations.

Let's look at two engines in operative landing.

[Nance] One of the things that I always loved about

Air Force flying was our operations manual

covered literally everything.

Every procedure that you could possibly

think of in an emergency and including in this case,

the loss of two engines on the airplane.

[Narrator] One step will pose a big challenge.

Allow time for manual landing gear extension.

When you lose two engines like that,

it affects a lot of the hydraulics as well.

We lost left side hydraulics which means that the gear

has to be lowered manually.

[Narrator] Without hydraulic power

to lower the landing gear,

Stucky will have to do it manually.

It's a complicated task.

It's a real emergency situation and you have to do

each step in the checklist right.

[Jay] All right, we need to lower by final descent.

Can you do it?

Yes, sir, I'll get them down.

[Narrator] It's a procedure he's only done in training.

I'm relying on him to do a stellar job of getting

the landing gear down.

This is a tight mission.

[Sweeny] One more thing.

[Narrator] Sweeney has an important realization.

You gotta pull the anti-skid

or we lose our brake pressure.

Steve, should be on the TR Bus two behind you.

[Narrator] There's only enough hydraulic pressure left

to apply the brakes once.

Sweeney decides to disengage the anti-skid braking system.

The anti-skid system which is similar

to the automatic braking system on today's modern cars

that don't allow you to lock up the brakes,

they'll release, brake, release, brake.

And that's what that anti-skid system is.

Got the anti-skid, confirm?

Confirmed.

[Narrator] Disengaging the system will ensure

that the remaining hydraulic pressure...

It's pulled.

...is used to keep the brakes applied.

If I pull that circuit breaker and just put the brakes

on once and hold them,

I'm gonna have full braking power.

Without the anti-skid, you're gonna blow a few tires

but that's not gonna take you off the runway

and that is gonna be a safe methodology of bringing

this airplane back to the surface.

50 miles.

[Narrator] The crew is ready to begin the final approach.

Steve, get into position.

Roger.

[Suspenseful Music]

[Narrator] The longer they struggle with the controls,

the more tired the pilots become.

Jay, it's your turn, I'll take comms.

[Jay] Okay, I got the airplane.

Your airplane.

[Narrator] Sweeney takes one last break

to save his strength for landing.

Jeddah approach. Whale 0-5.

Whale 0-5, go ahead, sir.

Jeddah approach, 0-5, we have the city in sight.

We're gonna fly in South of your field from the East here

and come into runway three four left.

No other traffic for the airport at this time,

it's all yours.

Alrighty, we'll use it and we'll get out of your way shortly.

[Narrator] Sweeney briefs the team on his plan

for the approach.

Okay, we're gonna start high and fast, 210 knots.

Jay, you start, just slowly.

Don't drop the flaps unless everything is looking good.

Any questions?

No questions.

Okay Steve, drop the nose gear.

Extending nose gear.

[Narrator] Whale 0-5 is less than eight minutes

from landing.

Nose gear down and locked.

Roger, showing down.

Switching to right and left main gear.

Throughout the flight, it seemed like we just continually

had these dragons come over the hill

and the last one is this landing gear.

Unless we put the landing gear down, we're going down.

We're committed to land, we don't get it going

'cause we're not gonna have enough thrust on two engines.

[Narrator] With all three lending gear down

the crew of Whale 0-5 now has no option

but to try landing the severely damaged plane.

[Jay] Six miles, speed 210.

Flaps 20.

[Narrator] Minutes from touching down,

all their skill and planning is about to be tested.

I mean, it was very important that each one of us

clearly knew what we're gonna do.

We're gonna have one shot at it.

[Suspenseful Music]

Minimums, runway in sight.

[Narrator] With two engines missing, Whale 0-5

is about to attend a landing at King Abdulaziz Airport.

Runway in sight.

[Selanders] It was one of his best approaches probably ever.

He was on center line,

he was exactly on the glide slope.

100 feet.

Coming back to idle.

Flaps 50.

Flaps 50, looking real good.

50, 40,

30, 20.

[Suspenseful Music]

Reverse thrust interlock.

[Narrator] Major Sweeney begins to deploy

the reverse thrust on the inboard right engine

to help slow the plane.

But it has an unintended outcome.

As soon as he did that, the left wing started to rise.

[Narrator] The powerless left wing is lifting,

the right wing could scrape the runway

and cause the plane to cartwheel.

Not now. Not now!

And I remember thinking I'm not gonna lose it now

and slammed it down.

[Narrator] Without the braking action

from full reverse thrust,

the plane is quickly running out of runway.

He immediately put it back down and we relied on the brakes.

Brakes.

Jay was gonna put his brakes on too

and we were gonna blow a couple of tires.

[Wheel Squealing]

[Narrator] The crew of Whale 0-5

is safely on the ground.

We did it. [Laughs]

I think we blew three or four tires before it was over

because of the lack of anti-skid but extraordinary job

really under the circumstances.

[Crew Laughing]

He had a sense of "Oh my God, we managed to get back here

and lived through this."

Who would've thought that.

[Selanders] There was that one moment

when you actually stop moving

and feel like we've made it.

And I think we enjoyed that for maybe a second

and then get out of the airplane.

Whoo!

[Sweeney Laughing]

[Suspenseful Music]

I remember looking back at the wing and, ooh,

that was just a shock.

I mean, they're gone and there are big holes in the wing

and parts hanging out and wow.

[Narrator] Within a day, the US Air Force launches

an investigation.

Lieutenant Colonel Ike Stokes is the lead investigator.

The fleet of KC-135's

is indispensable to the war effort.

Did the plane malfunction?

Did it come under enemy fire?

There was truly more external pressure

than I've experienced in the past

because they're flying 90-100 missions

out of Jeddah on a daily basis.

So it's very critical to the entire operation of the war

to really figure out what happened.

Hard to believe both engines are gone.

[Stokes] You're gathering the information,

you're analyzing the information,

it was just a wonderment to see something like this.

[Narrator] Stokes checks for scorch marks

and residue from explosives.

One thing investigators always consider,

was this intentional?

Did someone shoot at the plane?

[Narrator] If this was an enemy missile,

it could mean the threat from Iraq is escalating

putting the entire refueling fleet

and the outcome of the war at risk.

Let's face it, we're fighting a war.

We have a critical asset.

These are combat air refueling missions so,

if the fighters and bombers do not get the fuel,

they can't complete the mission.

[Narrator] But evidence of enemy fire

is not what Stokes finds.

There is no scorch marks or explosive residue.

There's no evidence of an enemy attack.

These engines were ripped right off.

[Narrator] Stokes wonders what kind of force

tore off the planes left engines?

[Stokes] One of the things that we really wanted to do

was to find the engines

but at the time we had no idea

as to where to exactly look.

We're gonna need those missing engines.

Although the navigator did record

where the mishap occurred,

those engines could be spread over quite an area of desert.

[Helicopter Rotor Whirring]

[Narrator] Fortunately, a group of veterans discover

the engines and report the find.

[Stokes] They said, what do you want us to do with them?

And we immediately say, get a truck,

flatbed and a crane and go out to the desert

and let's get the engines recovered.

Accident investigation can do incredible things

by piecing together from very small bits of evidence,

what happened but it's so much easier when you can actually

go out and get these things and thank goodness

they were able to find them in the desert.

Nice work.

A big thing that helped us out in the investigation

was getting the engines back to the location.

[Narrator] Stokes notices something unusual.

They found it like this?

[Narrator] One of the thrust reversers

is partially deployed.

Of course we need to explain or understand

why that was open.

[Narrator] Thrust reversers change the direction

of exhaust air flowing from the back of the engine

to slow the plane down.

The idea that the thrust reverser could come open

in flight at cruise speed of over 80% of the speed of sound

is a very important consideration because

that could create an upset situation.

[Narrator] Did the thrust Reverser deploy mid-flight

and cause the engines to rip off the plane?

This control cable snapped.

[Stokes] But in looking at it,

you could see how the cables

that operated the thrust reverser ripped out

as the engine was departing from the airplane.

There's nothing wrong with the engines.

[Narrator] Deployment of the thrust reversers

didn't rip the engines off the plane.

See what the crew has to say.

[Suspenseful Music]

[Narrator] Investigator Ike Stokes wonders

if the crew can shed some light on why a KC-135

lost two engines mid-flight.

[Stokes] Okay,

so tell me what happened when the event started.

Knowing in this case that we had a crew that survived

the mishap,

it was invaluable because you really do need

the initial inputs of what those crew members experienced

to put the whole story together.

Well, the yoke moved for a second

then it corrected itself.

And then out of nowhere, it cranked itself left.

At what point of the flight was this?

Shortly after reaching cruising altitude

and another KC-135 passed us.

Wait, so another plane was passing you?

Yeah, he was on the same flight path

but it had further to go so, we let it pass through.

It felt like we hit heavy turbulence.

[Narrator] It's a significant clue.

How far away was the other aircraft

when it passed your plane?

Oh, I'd say 1/4 of a mile, 1/2 a mile to the left of us.

[Narrator] Heavy aircraft leave powerful

wake turbulence behind them when they fly.

Stokes wonders if Sweeney's plane was close enough

to get caught in the other KC-135's wake.

We're talking about very strong circular wind

coming off of this airplane wing

and it can cause the upset of another airplane

regardless of its size, if it hits it just right.

And how far away was the other plane

when the turbulence started?

Well, they were at least two miles ahead of us.

[Narrator] If this was indeed wake turbulence,

investigators wonder why only the left engines or effected.

Thank you, Major.

[Sweeney] Thank you, sir.

[Narrator] An examination of the right engines

might help to reveal what happened.

Right engine bolts.

[Narrator] Each KC-135 engine is attached to the wing

with three large bolts.

[Suspenseful Music]

These four are completely severed.

[Narrator] Stokes discovers that two bolts

on each right engine were sheered in half.

How did those engines stay attached?

They were one bolt away from actually losing the engines

of the right wing, which would have made them nothing

more than high-speed glider.

[Narrator] With wake turbulence looking more and more

a likely cause.

The Whale 0-5 is at 25,000 feet.

[Narrator] Investigators compile the critical data needed

to calculate the forces that Whale 0-5

may have passed through.

Whale 0-5 is at 25,500 feet.

[Suspenseful Music]

That's everything.

[Narrator] But they need help from the plane's manufacturer

to analyze the data.

Let's talk to Boeing.

[Stokes] Understanding how the two airplanes

affected their separation gave us the data necessary

to talk with the engineers at Boeing.

[Suspenseful Music]

Wow, the left wing G-forces...

were 2.88.

That exceeded the structural capability of the pylons

and so, they separated from the airplane.

And the right wing, 2.61.

Let's see what that looks like.

[Suspenseful Music]

[Narrator] The extreme lateral G-forces on the left side

of the plane were enough to tear the left engines off

but not quite strong enough to rip them off the right side.

0.14 more G's on the right side,

this plane would have been nothing more

but a massive glider.

They were very, very close to coming off.

The G-force loading was just not enough

to swing them off of the airplane.

It was said that we had one more gyration

and we might've been a high-speed

heavy-weight glider...

but we made it.

[Narrator] This leaves investigators

with one burning question.

These guys train for lead changes,

why did this mission go sideways?

[Suspenseful Music]

[Narrator] U.S. Air Force investigator Ike Stokes

tries to understand how wake turbulence nearly destroyed

a gigantic tanker aircraft.

Separation between the two plane is by the book.

That's it,

wind was 85 knots from the West.

[Stokes] The wind was blowing enough at altitude to push

the wink of vortices from the preceding airplane

into the flight path of the mishap aircraft.

I mean, they accounted for everything.

They were following the direction of the wind.

Perfect storm.

[Narrator] But Stokes still doesn't know

how this perfect storm ever got a chance to form.

When you're taking off between 90 to 100 airplanes

on a daily basis, arrival and departure from the base

is very critical.

And in this particular case, the mishap aircraft was parked

in such a way that it had to go first and be followed

by the second airplane,

the one that had further to go.

[Nance] The solution that they came up with

was a perfectly responsible solution

and that was we're gonna take off individually

and then you're going to pass me.

[Stoles] Had the number two plane been parked

to the left of the mishap airplane,

the mishap never would have occurred.

[Narrator] Investigators finally understand what happened

to Whale 0-5.

0-5 is level.

[Narrator] On a wartime mission over the Saudi Arabian desert

two KC-135's switch position mid-flight.

[Jay] Altitude hold, on.

Altitude hold, check.

[Narrator] The wake turbulence generated by the passing plane

is blown into the path of Whale 0-5.

It creates a tremendous force

that flips the plane so violently,

G-forces rip both engines off the left wing.

[Stokes] Often heard flying described as hours and hours

of sheer boredom followed by moments of stark raving terror.

In this case, the crew experienced that

stark raving terror.

Ah, there's too much stress.

[Narrator] The oscillations almost push

the right engines and the aircraft beyond

the point of recovery.

[Sweeny] Speed break.

[Narrator] But with the quick thinking

of a seasoned wartime commander,

the plane levels off.

[Stokes] Coming back to the level flight

was the true feat of airman ship.

Great, are your NAV instruments working?

Yes, INS is functional, radar is still up.

Well, give me a heading back to Jeddah.

[Narrator] The coordination of a well-trained crew.

Nose gear down and locked.

Runway in sight.

[Narrator] Brings Whale 0-5 back home safely.

[Nance] Aircraft commander was an excellent airman

but the fact is he had every brain in that airplane

working in tandem with him side by side

to make sure they didn't miss anything.

-Brakes. -[Tires Squealing]

I was very fortunate to fly one of the best crews

in the Air Force in my humble opinion.

They did their job in a critical situation

and it wasn't just me getting back the airplane,

it was the team got back the airplane.

We did it.

[Narrator] Whether it's a refueling plane in war time,

[Sweeny] We did it.

[Narrator] Or a routine domestic flight in a 747,

the importance of teamwork can never be overstated.

Why this crew succeeded is because they were thoroughly

imbued with the idea that they had to talk to each other

seamlessly and all of them put their minds to the task

of what are the proper procedures,

what are we facing,

what do we need to do?

And that I think is still one of the many lessons

that comes up out of this.

[Selanders] Kevin and I have gone through this

numerous times over barbecue and beer

and tried to figure out,

is there anything we could have done better?

There are steps that we missed

and we're pretty satisfied that as a crew,

we took the actions that needed to be taken,

when they needed to be taken

and probably wouldn't change a thing.

[Narrator] The crew's handling of the crisis earn them

each the distinguished flying cross for heroism

or extraordinary achievement

while participating in aerial flight.

[Selanders] It's like a Purple Heart almost you don't want it

because you're in a situation you probably don't wanna be in

but we're very thankful, very, very happy with that.

The Air Force trains you that every day

is not gonna be a perfect day.

There's gonna be a day that you're gonna get in the bucket.

And when that day comes,

if you've done your homework,

you'll be good enough to make it.

And I think the Air Force does an outstanding job of this.

[Narrator] Amazingly, the same KC-135

went on to fly for another 13 years.

I do remember seeing the airplane sitting over by itself

thinking, "Yeah, that will never fly again."

As it turns out, Boeing came out,

put a laser on it and said it was still straight,

it hadn't been bent.

It was repaired, flown back from Jeddah

and flew a number of missions.

It soldiered on for quite a while.

[Plane Engine Whirring]