00:00Like the one shown here refueling a fighter jet mid-air during the United States Operation
00:05Epic Fury against Iran, it's a KC-135 strato tanker that crashed in western Iraq on Thursday,
00:13killing U.S. crew members.
00:15According to Central Command, a second plane was involved in the incident but landed safely.
00:20The incident occurred over friendly territory in western Iraq while the crew was on a combat
00:25mission and again was not the result of hostile or friendly fire.
00:32It comes after the deaths of seven other U.S. service members earlier in the war.
00:38War is hell. War is chaos. And as we saw yesterday with the tragic crash of our KC-135 tanker,
00:48bad things can happen. American heroes. All of them.
00:52The Islamic resistance in Iraq, which is a loose alliance of Iran-backed Iraqi factions,
00:58claimed to have downed a KC-135, providing no evidence. They also said they had targeted
01:04another plane that escaped. The KC-135, built by Boeing in the 1950s and early 60s,
01:12has served as the backbone of the U.S. military's air refueling fleet. Often called gas stations in the
01:19sky, the plane allows other aircraft to continue missions without having to land and fly very long
01:24distances. Aerial refueling is very dangerous, requiring precision while attaching the boom or
01:31hose to the receiving plane, while the two aircraft must maintain steady flight during the process.
01:38KC-135s are also used to transport wounded personnel during medical evacuations or conduct surveillance
01:45missions. Despite upgrades over the years, the aircraft's age has fueled concern about their
01:51reliability and durability. It's set to be gradually phased out as more of the next generation KC-46A
01:58and the Pegasus tankers into service.
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