Enjoy a Guided Tour Inside the E-4B NAOC Doomsday Plane

The E-4B is one of the so-called Doomsday planes.

In the event of a nuclear war, a terrorist attack, an alien invasion or, generally speaking, Armageddon, the U.S. Air Force’s four E-4B planes based at Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska will be responsible to keep the U.S. Secretary of Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other top personalities alive whilst Obama would be on board the Air Force One.

The E-4B is a modified B747-200 that serves as National Airborne Operations Center providing a flying command, control and communications center to direct nuclear (and conventional) forces, by receiving, verifying and relaying EAM (Emergency Action Messages).

One aircraft is usually airborne every 12 hours, with another one ready for departure with a 5-minute notice.  An E-4B always supports Air Force One’s trips abroad. If national command centers on the ground are attacked or unavailable, an E-4B is immediately scrambled.

The following video gives you the opportunity to take a guided tour inside one of these interesting and important planes.

 

H/T to Jonathan Kohn for the heads-up

Image credit: U.S. Air Force

 

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About David Cenciotti
David Cenciotti is a journalist based in Rome, Italy. He is the Founder and Editor of “The Aviationist”, one of the world’s most famous and read military aviation blogs. Since 1996, he has written for major worldwide magazines, including Air Forces Monthly, Combat Aircraft, and many others, covering aviation, defense, war, industry, intelligence, crime and cyberwar. He has reported from the U.S., Europe, Australia and Syria, and flown several combat planes with different air forces. He is a former 2nd Lt. of the Italian Air Force, a private pilot and a graduate in Computer Engineering. He has written five books and contributed to many more ones.