After military tension escalated again and talk about the collapse of the understanding between Washington and Tehran, the Al Jazeera Network’s open source unit monitored new activity of US Air Force refueling planes over the eastern Mediterranean, in a pattern that brings to the fore previous air support movements when fighters and military shipments were transported to Israel and the region.
New American air movements in the eastern Mediterranean
Navigational data from the “Flight Radar” platform, analyzed by the Open Source Unit, showed the movement of 7 Boeing KC-135R Stratotanker aircraft yesterday, Wednesday, July 8, between bases and airports in Europe and the Mediterranean, with some of them following circular paths over the eastern Mediterranean, especially in the maritime area located between the islands of Crete and Cyprus.
The observed planes carried out several flights, back and forth, between Mildenhall in Britain and Chania in Greece, while other planes carried out circular sorties to and from Chania over the eastern Mediterranean, while another plane appeared on a long route that started from Sigonella in Italy and extended as far as Britain before returning to the starting point.
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The duration of the observed flights ranged from about 3 hours to more than 4 and a half hours, according to operating data on the Flight Radar platform. The tracks also showed that a number of planes flew in repeated waiting circles, patterns that typically appear in air support, training, or positioning sorties, but tracking data alone does not reveal the nature of the operational mission or determine whether there were other planes that received fuel during these flights.
A vital support layer for combat activity
These aircraft gain special importance in the context of the current escalation, although they do not represent a direct attack force as much as they provide a vital support layer for combat, reconnaissance, and early warning aircraft, as they allow them to remain in the air for longer periods and carry out missions far from their bases.
According to the US Air Force, the KC-135 has provided the primary air refueling capability for the US Air Force for more than 60 years, and also supports Navy, Marine Corps and allied aircraft, and can transport up to about 90.7 tons of fuel.
Based on the declared maximum capacity, the total theoretical capacity of transportable fuel in the seven observed aircraft amounts to about 635 tons. This does not mean that this quantity was actually transported or emptied during the sorties, but it shows the amount of air support capacity that these aircraft can provide when operating within a wide operational network.
A pattern that repeats as tension mounts
This monitoring does not come in isolation from a previous pattern documented by the Al Jazeera Network’s open source unit over Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean. On February 24, navigational data monitored by the unit revealed American military air activity that included 14 flights, distributed between fueling, reconnaissance, and heavy military cargo sorties, most of which took off from Mildenhall Air Base in the United Kingdom, coinciding with the arrival of fighters in Israel.
In the same monitoring, two refueling planes appeared that took off from the Chania base on the island of Crete and headed off the Israeli coast, where they flew in a circular path before returning after a mission that lasted about 5 hours, a pattern that the analysis considered an indication of the possibility of supporting air operations for fighters in the region.
The pattern was partially repeated on April 8, when the unit monitored new activity of refueling aircraft over Europe and the Mediterranean, in the context of American military movements related to the region.
The current monitoring adds additional significance; The appearance of 7 KC-135R aircraft over the route extending between Mildenhall, Chania, Sigonella and the eastern Mediterranean does not alone prove the existence of a fighter transfer operation, but it repeats the same pattern of air support: long-range fuel aircraft, circular routes over the Mediterranean, and focal points close to Israel, Cyprus and Crete, which are elements that had previously appeared in previous monitoring in conjunction with American military movements towards Israel and the region.
Flight Radar data alone does not reveal a direct relationship between the seven monitored aircraft and any specific military operation, but it places the monitoring within a broader pattern of the operation of American fuel aircraft over Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean when military tension in the region rises. The importance of this pattern increases because it previously appeared in conjunction with fighter movements and military shipments to Israel, which makes the current sorties an indication of the readiness of the air support layer, not direct evidence of a specific combat mission.
