Have you ever heard of theDoomsday Plane? Imagine a true “Flying Pentagon,” designed to withstand a nuclear attack and allow the US government to continue operating even in the worst possible scenario. This is theE-4B Nightwatchknown by most as Doomsday Planeand in this article we will see what its characteristics are, what’s inside it (or at least, what we know about it) and its history.
What is the American Doomsday Plane
The doomsday plane it’s there super-militarized version of a classic passenger plane, the Boeing 747-200. Its official purpose is to act as a National Airborne Operations Center (NAOC), i.e. a mobile command, control and communications center capable of surviving even in the event of a national emergency or destruction of ground centers. It would house not only the President of the United States, but also the Secretary of Defense and the main military leaders.
To ensure the survival of the vehicle, numerous safety measures have been implemented, starting with shielding against impulses electromagnetic, thermal And nuclear. The vehicle is also capable of refueling in flight: in fact, despite having an autonomy of 12 hours, it can continue to fly for days if refueled gradually. On the upper part of the fuselage there is a conspicuous “hump“, call radome: in here, according to a Business Insider report, they would be crammed approximately 67 satellite dishes and antennas to ensure uninterrupted global communications to every part of the globe. Clearly all this technology has a cost: we are talking about something around $160,000 an houreffectively making it the most expensive aircraft to maintain in the entire US Air Force!
What’s inside the Boeing E-4B Nightwatch
Knowing exactly what is inside this plane is practically impossible: as you can easily imagine, this is about information classified for national security reasons. However, over time some information has also been revealed to the public: for example, it is known that the main deck can accommodate over 100 people in six different functional areas, which we briefly report here:
- Command area
- Conference room
- Briefing room
- Area for the operational team
- Communications area
- Rest area
When was the “doomsday” plane born and what is it for?
The idea of creating a vehicle of this type has its roots in the Cold War: at the time the fear of a Soviet nuclear attack was very strong and for this reason it was decided to create a vehicle capable of guaranteeing the survival of the nation’s military leaders, so as to be able to launch a hypothetical counterattack.
Consider that the very first E-4A model took to the skies between 1973 and 1974 and the first President to test it was Jimmy Carter in 1977. In the 1980s the fleet, made up of only 4 aircraft, was converted to the current version, theE-4B. From 1975 to today, it has always been there at least one plane on alert 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Because the E-4B is aging and uses hard-to-find replacement parts, the Pentagon awarded a contract to 13 billion dollars to develop a new fleet, theE-4Cwhich will replace current aircraft by 2036.
Attention, it is worth specifying: the plane of the apocalypse it has never been used. However, it played a crucial role in a real emergency, theSeptember 11, 2001when he helped ensure the continuity of the American government during terrorist attacks. Furthermore, for decades it has been helping civil protection (FEMA) as a communication center after huge natural disasters such as hurricanes or earthquakes.
