Boeing E-4 Nightwatch Advanced Airborne Command Post 1977 US Air Force, from "Aerospace Power"

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Aircraft playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL23A1203602337689 more at: http://scitech.quickfound.net/aviation_news_and_search.html Overview of the Boeing E-4 NEACP-NOAC aircraft. 'This film covers activities in research and development tests, evaluation, and procurement during 1977.' Public domain film from the US National Archives, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and one-pass brightness-contrast-color correction & mild video noise reduction applied. The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_E-4 The Boeing E-4 Advanced Airborne Command Post, with the project name "Nightwatch", is a strategic command and control military aircraft operated by the United States Air Force (USAF). The E-4 series was specially modified from the Boeing 747-200B. The E-4 serve as a survivable mobile command post for the National Command Authority, namely the President of the United States, the Secretary of Defense, and successors. The four E-4Bs are operated by the 1st Airborne Command and Control Squadron of the 55th Wing located at Offutt Air Force Base, near Omaha, Nebraska. An E-4B is denoted a "National Airborne Operations Center" when in action... Development Two of the original 747-200 airframes were originally planned to be commercial airliners. When the airline did not complete the order, Boeing offered the airframes to the United States Air Force as part of a package leading to a replacement for the older EC-135J National Emergency Airborne Command Post (NEACP). Under the 481B NEACP program the Air Force Electronic Systems Division awarded Boeing a contract in February 1973 for two unequipped aircraft, designated E-4A, powered by four P&W; JT9D engines, to which a third aircraft was added in July 1973. The first E-4A was completed at the Boeing plant outside Seattle, Washington in 1973. E-Systems won the contract to install interim equipment in these three aircraft, and the first completed E-4A was delivered to Andrews AFB, Maryland in December 1974... The "A" model effectively housed the same equipment as the EC-135, but offered more space and an ability to remain aloft longer than an EC-135. ...On 21 December 1979 Boeing delivered the first E-4B (AF Serial Number 75-0125), which was distinguished from the earlier version by the presence of a large streamlined radome on the dorsal surface directly behind the upper deck. This contains the aircraft's SHF satellite antenna. By January 1985 all three E-4As had been retrofitted to E-4B models. The E-4B offered a vast increase in communications capability over the previous model and was considered to be 'hardened' against the effects of electromagnetic pulse (EMP) from a nuclear blast. Hardening the aircraft meant that all equipment and wiring on board was shielded from EMP. Additional steps were taken to block radiation from the aircraft's cabin air management system and cockpit, including the novel use of the same screens used to cover the windows of microwave ovens placed over the flight deck windows. The E-4B fleet has an estimated roll-out cost of approximately US$250 million each.[citation needed] In 2005 the Air Force awarded Boeing a five-year, US$2 billion contract for the continued upgrade of the E-4B fleet. The E-4B is designed to survive an EMP with systems intact and has state-of-the-art direct fire countermeasures. Although many older aircraft have been upgraded with glass cockpits, the E-4B still uses traditional analog flight instruments, as they are less susceptible to damage from an EMP blast. The E-4B is capable of operating with a crew up to 112 people including flight and mission personnel, the largest crew of any aircraft in US Air Force history. With in-flight aerial refueling it is... designed to remain airborne for a full week in the event of an emergency. It takes two fully loaded KC-135 tankers to fully refuel an E-4B. The E-4B has three operational decks: upper, middle, and lower. The E-4 is the most expensive aircraft in the Air Force inventory to operate, even more than the B-2 stealth bomber, costing $155,000 per flight hour... The E-4 fleet was originally deployed in 1974, when it was termed National Emergency Airborne Command Post (NEACP) (often pronounced "kneecap")... Early in the E-4's service, the media dubbed the aircraft as "the doomsday planes". The E-4 was also capable of operating the "Looking Glass" missions of the Strategic Air Command (SAC)... With the adoption of two highly modified Boeing 747-200Bs (Air Force designation VC-25A) to serve as Air Force One in 1989 and the end of the Cold War, the need for NEACP diminished. In 1994, NEACP began to be known as NAOC...