{"id":186,"date":"2025-12-05T13:33:25","date_gmt":"2025-12-05T13:33:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress.sciencepicker.com\/?p=186"},"modified":"2025-12-05T13:33:25","modified_gmt":"2025-12-05T13:33:25","slug":"the-doomsday-plane-was-designed-to-survive-nuclear-attack-a-bird-just-took-it-down","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/the-doomsday-plane-was-designed-to-survive-nuclear-attack-a-bird-just-took-it-down\/","title":{"rendered":"The doomsday plane was designed to survive a nuclear attack \u2013 A bird took it down"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The United States Navy “doomsday” aircraft which was designed to survive a nuclear attack, was recently taken down by a bird. The bird strike damaged one of the plane’s four engines, and the U.S. Navy declared it an “A- Class mishap.\u201d This meant that the bird strike event caused more than $2 million in damages, death or permanent disability. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 2nd<\/sup> October, when an aircraft lands and then takes off again without coming to a full stop \u2014 the E-6B Mercury aircraft<\/strong> struck an as-yet-unidentified bird, Tim Boulay, a spokesman for the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division, told Military.com. The bird strike event took place at the Maryland Naval Air Station Patuxent River.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

No injuries were reported, and the plane\nlanded safely on the runway at the air station at 3:12 p.m. ET, Military.com\nreported. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And now, the plane is back in action. “The engine has been replaced, and the aircraft has been returned to service,” Boulay said, according to Military.com.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The bird strike event marked the second A-Class mishap<\/strong> of this type of doomsday\naircraft. In February, an E-6B Mercury snagged a hangar while being moved one\nplace to another at the Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Boeing 707, E-6B Mercury, that’s a souped-up military-style to serve as an airborne command and communications platform for the U.S. Navy in the event of a nuclear war<\/strong>. Its systems are designed to survive the nuclear bombs detonating below it, according to a report by The Center for the National Interest, a public policy think tank based in Washington, D.C. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The aircraft uses a low-frequency system\nfor communication that would allow those in charge to communicate with the United States Navy<\/strong>‘s nuclear missile\nforce on ballistic missile submarines at sea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This doomsday airplane was also equipped\nwith the airborne launch control system<\/strong>,\nmeaning it can launch land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bird strikes<\/strong> are not\nuncommon. According to the government program Department of Defense\nPartners in Flight (DoD PIF), every year, about 3,000 wildlife-strike\nincidents are reported for military aircraft and another 2,300-plus for the civil\ncrafts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multiple prevention programs, including\nthe Bird or Wildlife Aircraft Strike Hazard program, have been put into place\nin an effort to reduce these incidents of bird-strike<\/strong>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The United States Navy “doomsday” aircraft which was designed to survive a nuclear attack, was recently taken down by a bird. The bird strike damaged one of the plane’s four engines, and the U.S. Navy declared it an “A- Class mishap.\u201d This meant that the bird strike event caused more than $2 million in damages, death […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":62,"featured_media":729,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chemistry-and-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/62"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=186"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2496,"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186\/revisions\/2496"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.science-pickers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}