Minimum interval takeoff
Minimum Interval Takeoff (MITO) describes a take-off procedure primarily developed and used by the United States Air Force during the Cold War , in which the bombers and the associated tankers of a squadron should be brought into the air within a very short time.
description
This procedure was intended to prevent the bomber squadrons and the nuclear weapons on board from being destroyed on the ground by an enemy first strike and thus no longer a possibility of a retaliatory attack. At the height of the Cold War, Boeing B-52 bomber squadrons of the Strategic Air Command (SAC) were therefore kept on constant alert on US air force bases so that they could take off within just a few minutes. For this purpose, the crews were accommodated in the immediate vicinity of their machines and usually remained on standby for several days. In the event of an alarm, the machines, which were always ready to go, rolled in quick succession to the start, which was then carried out between the individual machines with an interval of just 15 seconds. Since the bombers took off almost immediately into the wake vortices of the previous aircraft, the aircraft fanned out immediately after take-off in order to leave the turbulence area as quickly as possible. This starting procedure was very risky, very demanding and not without accidents and losses.
During take-off, water injection was usually used to increase the power of the engines, which led to the typical deep black exhaust plumes of the bombers - a sight that became the symbol of a minimum interval takeoff.
MITO exercises were carried out regularly, and the readiness of the bomber squadrons was often checked unannounced by so-called Operational Readiness Inspections (ORIs), which was feared and unpopular with the squadron members.
After the American forces over time a higher proportion of agricultural and submarine-based intercontinental ballistic missiles could hold and thus possessed strategic alternatives, the MITO procedures became less important. Nevertheless, it was still practiced regularly until the 1990s.
In the media
A film that takes up and portrays this topic quite well is The Commodore from 1963, with Rock Hudson and Rod Taylor in the leading roles.
literature
- B-52 Stratofortress Special: Celebrating 60 remarkable years . In: Airforces Monthly . 2012, ISBN 978-0-946219-28-5 .
Web links
- MITO Takeoffs, Loring AFB, 1984. Retrieved December 19, 2012 .