KC-97L's Burmah 11/12 Late '70s

[LecLightning56]

A longshot of mine, perhaps, but I recall seeing two KC-97L's (resurrect these aircraft, please!) callsigns Burmah 11/12 enroute to Frankfurt sometime in the mid-to-late seventies during my spotting days at school. If anyone has any leads on these, then please let me know. Aircraft were routing Woodley-Dover at about lunch time.

[LecLightning56]

A quote from another source in response to the same request:


'They were part of 'Operation Creek Party' that lasted from 1967 until around 1975/76.

They used to rotate fortnightly to Frankfurt usually on a saturday evening using a variety of call-signs.

I think the 'Burma' call-sign was used when flying missions out of Frankfurt.

They were based at Mildenhall for a while sometime in the 1970's, so perhaps your sightings were operating from there.

They were asked for their tail numbers occasionally by spotter friendly controllers, but usually got a negative.

A superb sound on take off with piston & jet engines at full blast!'


I think that it is likely that the routing over Surrey would have precluded considerations that they were operating out of the 'hall, but more likely they were transatlantic flights to Frankfurt and I am sure that a KC-97 would have had sufficient fuel for such a crossing. It is true that air traffic controllers (spotter friendly) occasionally badgered aircrew for serial numbers (I knew one such gentlemen in my spotting days at school), but on this occasion I presume he was off-duty.

[LecLightning56]

I managed to track down a friend of mine from my schooldays, now stateside, and apparently the aircraft were probably 52-0844 and 52-2680 on Oct 7, 1975 routing to Frankfurt. If anyone has any independent verification of these aircraft then please let me know.

[LecLightning56]

Apparently the two KC-97Ls identified above (52-0844, 52-2680) were logged at Mildenhall on 4th October 1975 which does raise doubts about the validity of the sightings having been these aircraft, since they were observed at about FL230 routing Woodley-Dover well South and West of Mildenhall on 7th October 1975. The only other explanation is that the aircraft had routed into Fairford or Greenham before actually leaving for Frankfurt on the 7th (and hence the sightings OTT), but I think further research is necessary.