Planelopnik: Did you know?

Kinja'd!!! by "ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
Published 11/02/2017 at 12:35

Tags: wingspan
STARS: 15

Today, we are used to seeing military aircraft painted in low-observable grays or camouflage. But that wasn’t the case 50 years ago. Why were so many Cold War era bombers painted white?

In the days before the intercontinental ballistic missile, long-range bombers provided the only means to deliver nuclear weapons against Cold War adversaries. But dropping nukes, even from high altitude, was a perilous affair. Not only did it put the crew in danger from the shock and radiation of the blast itself, the blindingly bright flash of light from the detonation posed dangers of its own. The flash produces an extraordinary amount of thermal radiation (heat) in the form of visible, infrared and ultraviolet light, enough to blind pilots, damage aircraft and fry delicate electronics. This led aircraft designers to adopt what was known as anti-flash white paint. They hoped that enough of the thermal radiation would be reflected by the brilliant white paint to protect both the crews and the vital electronics of the aircraft.

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At first, bombers were painted entirely white. While a white plane is difficult to spot from the ground, it stands out plainly against the ground when viewed from above. Subsequent paint schemes limited the white paint to the underside of the aircraft, with camouflage or neutral colors above. Today, advances in low-visibility paint and radar-absorbing materials have left the anti-flash white as a relic of the Cold War, though it still appears on some Cold War-era bombers that remain in service.

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If you enjoyed this post, please join in the conversation and let me know. For more posts about aviation history and aircraft oddities, head over to Wingspan .

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Replies (21)

Kinja'd!!! "Takuro Spirit" (takurospirit)
11/02/2017 at 12:43, STARS: 2

Interesting. Not sure if I’ve seen an all-white bomber before, but I have seen many camo/grey top, white underneath planes. I just figured white for blending in with the clouds, camo/grey for the ground/sea.

Kinja'd!!! "ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
11/02/2017 at 12:47, STARS: 1

Some are still white, like this E-4 Sentry I photographed at Dyess AFB a few years ago.

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Kinja'd!!! "You can tell a Finn but you can't tell him much" (youcantellafinn)
11/02/2017 at 13:13, STARS: 0

It may be apocryphal, but I’ve seen somewhere that the crews were trained to close or cover one eye after dropping a nuke so that if the flash blinded one eye they would still retain vision in the closed eye.

Kinja'd!!! "Chariotoflove" (chariotoflove)
11/02/2017 at 13:17, STARS: 1

Cool. I like the tag “Connecting Flights”

Also, that XB-70 still gives me wood.

Kinja'd!!! "ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
11/02/2017 at 13:22, STARS: 3

Thanks. That was a recent inspiration, when I started linking to articles other than just THIAH.

I got to see the XB-70 in the flesh this past summer. It’s amazing. The whole fourth hangar at the USAF Museum will take your breath away.

Kinja'd!!! "ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
11/02/2017 at 13:23, STARS: 0

I have read that elsewhere. Just seems prudent when you’re wiping out large portions of humanity.

Kinja'd!!! "Chariotoflove" (chariotoflove)
11/02/2017 at 13:24, STARS: 0

I must find a reason to go there.

Kinja'd!!! "user314" (user314)
11/02/2017 at 13:24, STARS: 0

B-52s and FB-111s in early SIOP camo:

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Kinja'd!!! "Jayhawk Jake" (jayhawkjake)
11/02/2017 at 13:31, STARS: 2

In my first senior design class my professor showed us some interestingly simple stealth tech. The demo piece was this thin flat electro-luminescent (EL) panel stuck to about a tissue paper sized aluminum block. The LED panel lit up blue with a dial, and there was a switch on the side of the box. He would tell you to put your hand on the top of the box and then flip the switch, and instantly you could feel all the heat of your hand and the box get sucked away. Some sort of crazy heat pump/heat sink to make the surface cold to hide from heat tracking tech.

The panel though, that was fascinating. The idea was you could cover the bottom of a plane in it and dial in the luminescence to match the sky. He showed us a video of a test with an RC plane - the plane was high overhead, clearly visible, and then someone dialed in the EL panels. It disappeared . You could not see the plane at all . It was amazing.

Kinja'd!!! "ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
11/02/2017 at 13:33, STARS: 0

That’s something I’d like to see in action. There has been discussion for a couple of years now of experiments in “cloaking” devices. They wouldn’t spoof a radar set, but imagine a fleet of invisible helicopters attacking troops on the ground.

Kinja'd!!! "ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
11/02/2017 at 13:34, STARS: 0

Nice! Thanks for adding those.

Kinja'd!!! "ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
11/02/2017 at 13:35, STARS: 2

I would use the museum itself as a reason. Otherwise, why would anybody want to go to Dayton?

Kinja'd!!! "Chariotoflove" (chariotoflove)
11/02/2017 at 13:38, STARS: 1

Fair point.

Kinja'd!!! "Cé hé sin" (michael-m-mouse)
11/02/2017 at 13:49, STARS: 0

I seem to recall that pilots of the UK’s V bombers were supposed to wear one eyepatch when heading to the target. Having been blinded in the unprotected eye the plan was then to transfer the patch to the now-bad eye for the return trip.

Kinja'd!!! "user314" (user314)
11/02/2017 at 14:05, STARS: 1

Probably morso in the early days. The B-52 and FB-111 had curtains that could be rigged or unfolded to block the flash.

B-52:

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