Comparing fleet operations, Boeing's tanker measures up

Boeing's KC-767 Advanced Tanker (AT) is tailored to U.S. Air Force requirements for replacing the medium-sized KC-135. Its attributes give it a critical edge in a fleet-to-fleet comparison with its competitor, the Airbus/Northrop Grumman KC-30.

It is a basic tenet of air-refueling operations that tankers do not operate as single aircraft, but rather as task forces deployed to support joint-theater air-refueling requirements.

The KC-767AT's ability to operate with a full fuel load from shorter runways, at higher elevations, in hotter temperatures and from more-austere airfields gives it the advantage when comparing fleet operations, the real measuring stick.

Its smaller size also allows a higher maximum number of tankers at typically smaller airfields, thereby putting more booms in the sky. This capability is critical to how America will fight wars in the future.

Quite simply, flexibility is the key to airpower. But that flexibility is in danger of being confused with capacity.

No one will deny that EADS, Airbus' parent, and Northrop Grumman offer a bigger tanker than Boeing's.

If selected, the KC-30 would be the second-largest aircraft in the Air Force's inventory (53 percent larger than the KC-767AT). Its footprint on the tarmac, at 38,000 square feet, severely restricts the number that can be accommodated at many small airfields.

Additionally, the plane is 25 percent heavier and burns 24 percent more fuel than the KC-767AT.

Not only is fuel efficiency a key performance factor in the competition to produce the new tanker, dubbed the KC-X; it's a real-world budget consideration.

As the highest consumer of fuel in the Department of Defense, the Air Force would spend almost $600 million a year more with just a $10 increase in the cost of a barrel of oil. So, selecting the European KC-30 is like blowing your budget on a gas guzzler.

Each company has its own philosophical approach concerning the pilot's authority over flight controls and aircraft performance. All Airbus aircraft have limits placed upon maneuvers, which are strictly enforced by flight-control computers despite pilot input. Simply said, a military pilot may need to accomplish a dramatic maneuver to avoid anti-aircraft artillery or a missile shot — and, in an Airbus aircraft, the computer physically restricts a maneuver outside the parameters of its lines of code.

There will be no such limits on the KC-767AT. The pilot will have full authority over the aircraft.

My conclusion is that a fleet of tankers close to the KC-135 in footprint but equipped with modern engines and aerodynamic capabilities provides the definite edge over its significantly larger competitor.