mission. Six Air Force Reserve pilots will be on the five-hour training flight this morning, air-refueling with a KC-135 Stratotanker and then practicing “assault” landings and takeoffs on a short airstrip at Moses Lake in Eastern Washington, on the other side of the Cascade mountain range. Making a steep approach and landing a half-million pounds (226,800 kilograms) of airplane on a runway only 3,500 feet (1,100 meters) long and 90 feet (30 meters) wide is the kind of challenge that C-17 pilots sometimes face, whether supporting U.S. and allied warfighters in places such as Afghanistan or airlifting medical help, supplies and equipment to areas devastated by natural disasters. 24 Boeing Frontiers The aircraft commander is Maj. Peter Grossenbach, with the 728th Airlift Squadron at McChord, who has spent more than half of his 16 years in the Air Force Reserve flying C-17s and teaching others how to fly them. He’s an instructor pilot. In 2004, only a few hours after a powerful earthquake in the Indian Ocean triggered a tsunami that belted Indonesia, Thailand and other parts of South Asia on Dec. 26, killing more than 200,000 people and leaving several hundred thousand injured, Grossenbach, then a lieutenant, was on the first C-17 to deliver badly needed supplies to the devastated area. For its size, with a maximum takeoff weight, fully loaded, of nearly 600,000 pounds (272,200 kilograms), the C-17 actually handles more like a sports car, Grossenbach says while describing the short-runway landings and takeoffs the flight crew will practice at the Moses Lake airstrip. One of the other pilots on the training flight, Capt. Teycee Merritt, also with the 728th Airlift Squadron, describes the C-17 in much the same way. “It’s a big heavy airplane that really responds,” she says. “Just a great airplane, unique in its capabilities.” A propulsive lift system allows the C-17 to make safe landings on very short
Frontiers February 2015 Issue
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