In-Flight Refueling

“As an In-Flight Refueling specialist, you'll operate the boom on the world's most advanced aerial tanker fleet, directly enabling global power projection for every fighter, bomber, and surveillance platform in the inventory. You'll fly constantly, earn flight pay, and be the literal lifeline of American airpower — without you, nothing flies far.”

You connect two aircraft mid-air using a flying gas station, which is objectively insane and you are completely desensitized to it. You lie on your stomach in the back of a KC-135 — an aircraft older than your parents' marriage — and guide a fuel boom into the receptacle of a fighter jet doing 400 mph in turbulence, at night, with 50,000 pounds of jet fuel sloshing behind you. Your biggest complaint is the box lunch. The boom operator position is the most 'I can't believe this is a real job' job in the Air Force. Every fighter pilot, bomber crew, and surveillance platform depends on you to fly far enough to matter. Without tankers, American airpower has the range of a long drive on I-40. With you, it reaches anywhere on Earth. You will refuel aircraft in combat airspace, in storms, and in conditions that would make a civilian pilot declare an emergency and go home. You'll log thousands of flight hours lying face-down looking out a window at the back of an airplane while jets approach from below. Your back will file a VA claim before you do. Your chiropractor will buy a boat with your copays. But you fly more than most pilots, earn flight pay, and have the most uniquely absurd job description in military aviation.