Is there a thread about the US military refuelling plane that is above Cambridge?

[endofthelinefinally]

It is going round and round in circles and has been for ages. It has returned from refuelling a plane over the Adriatic. I guess it must be too full of fuel to land?

Oh interesting. Both Lakenheath and Mildenhall are nearby, is it just waiting to land there?

Well that is what I thought, but it has been circling for ages at 500 feet.

Arrrgghh! 5000 feet. 500 would be terrifying.

I'm in the North East and we've had an RAF cargo plane going round and round in circles tonight. On Flight radar it showed it as having come up from Brize Norton and after circling for ages, flew back to BN. What's that about?

Oh it goes round most days, they do a lot of training with it. But it is out quite late tonight though, it should land soon. It’s bloody loud when it goes over so I might have been shouting at them LOL!

Maybe it's practising refuelling and the planes being refuelled are not showing up?
@notimagain may know.

If it has flown from Cambridge to the Adriatic Sea, carried out refueling exercises/operations and then returned I doubt that it is burning off fuel to land. It could be that they are short of night flying hours for the month and they are just making them up.

You rang..😐

Just gone and looked at one of the trackers...

Bit of a mystery TBH...too low to be practising refuelling, looks like it's just been holding out to the west and is now on approach...

? No firm idea really...

The pilot is just waiting for the airport to be swept for assassins.

Or maybe they put too much fuel in so they can't land for a while.

Those who know will think those are brilliant points.

I suppose there is just an off chance the tanker had taken on fuel itself during the sortie (AFAIK the KC-135 can still "buddy buddy") and then had to RTB, for some reason ended back at base overweight but that whole scenario is a stretch and unlikely.

As for chasing hours - I'd forgotten about that game although you don't win many friends amongst your neighbours doing so flogging around at a couple of thousand feet over the countryside...

Still no idea...