A KC-135 Stratotanker aircraft shown over Selfridge Air National Guard Base, Mich., during a local training mission on Jan. 23, 2023. (Munnaf Joarder/U.S. Air Force)
Detroit (Tribune News Service) — The Michigan Air National Guard conducted a flyover over nine Michigan communities across the state Tuesday to mark the U.S. Air Force’s 100th anniversary of aerial refueling, but low visibility prevented onlookers in Detroit from seeing the aircrafts overhead.
“I’m slightly disappointed,” said Nicolai Vincent, 23, of Brighton, who gathered with some friends on the Detroit Riverwalk at 12:30 p.m., expecting the KC-135 Stratotanker and A-10 thunderbolts to fly over. A handful of people gathered on the riverwalk during their lunchbreak to see the flyover and others visited Belle Isle for a different view.
The gray skies, an air quality alert and low hanging clouds made if difficult for anyone on the Riverwalk outside of Hart Plaza and on Belle Isle to see the aircraft.
“It was very stealthy,” said Marshall Lockyer, 22, of Beverly Hills, who cracked the joke just after 12:30 p.m., when the aircraft were supposed to be visible in Detroit.
This would have been Lockyer’s first time seeing a flyover in the city, if it weren’t for the low visibility.
“Once again Michigan weather gets in the way,” he said.
Some onlookers were more optimistic.
“At least it’s not pouring rain,” said Rachel Paulson, 49, of St. Clair Shores.
The low humming of an aircraft could be heard over the Detroit River around 12:50 p.m., but there were no visible signs of the tanker and A-10s.
Airmen from the 127th Wing based at Selfridge Air National Guard Base, with about 1,700 military and civilian personnel, were scheduled to fly in formation from 10 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. The route started in Port Huron and was supposed to end at the Selfridge base in Harrion Township. Other locations along the air route included Alpena, the Mackinac Bridge, the Sleeping Bear Dunes, downtown Grand Rapids.
Other flyovers happened around the nation to mark the centennial.
“Our citizen-airmen are proud to serve as Michigan’s Hometown Air Force,” said Brig. Gen. Rolf Mammen, 127th Wing commander, in a statement prior to the flyover. “The support we receive from our community is second to none, and this series of flyovers provides us an opportunity to say ‘Thank you’ to our neighbors while also demonstrating an important part of the Air Force mission.”
U.S. Army Air Service aviators accomplished the first aerial refueling on June 27, 1923, on a flight between Los Angeles and San Diego.
While the first military flight took place at Selfridge on July 8, 1917, the first aerial refueling aircraft, a KC-97 Stratofreighter, was not assigned to the base until January 1959. The KC-97 was flown by both the 4045th Air Refueling Wing and the 500th Air Refueling Wing at Selfridge into the mid-1960s.
The 127th Wing’s 171st Air Refueling Squadron, which was set to fly the KC-135s during Tuesday’s demonstration, conducted its first air refueling flight in September 2007, when it first became equipped with KC-135T Stratotanker aircraft.
About 300 airmen are directly affiliated with the air refueling mission at Selfridge. Over the last several years, KC-135 aircraft and personnel from Selfridge have supported missions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Europe and the Pacific region.
Despite being unable to see the aircraft from shore of the Detroit River, Lockyer said he is still looking forward to seeing other flyovers in the future.
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