Bangor air base expects plane swap in 2007

BANGOR – Eight refueling tankers are scheduled to begin arriving at the Maine Air National Guard base in March 2007 to replace the base’s 10 existing aircraft.

The final two KC135-R models will arrive in March 2009, Col. Don McCormack, chief of the joint staff for the Maine National Guard, said Thursday. A task force from the National Guard Bureau visited the Bangor base last week as part of preparations for the conversion.

The base originally was scheduled to receive 12 aircraft and an estimated 240 jobs as a result of the Air Force’s nationwide shuffling of Air National Guard units in 2005. That change never materialized, and the base now anticipates “an even swap” of aircraft, and additional jobs are unlikely, McCormack said.

The nationwide base closure proceedings did, however, hasten the delivery of the slightly newer replacement aircraft, he said.

“The base has been preparing for this, and they’re well on their way to accepting them,” he said.

The Department of Defense originally recommended that the newer planes come from Guard bases in Niagara Falls, N.Y., Alabama and Mississippi.

Now, the final two tankers will be sent from Grand Forks, N.D., though the origin of the first eight has yet to be determined, McCormack said.

The older E model planes, manufactured in the late 1950s and early 1960s, will be transitioned out of the base as the quieter R models, which are only a few years newer, arrive.

“We won’t have more than one or two extra on the ramp at any one time,” McCormack said.

Bangor Guard members will train on the new models in conjunction with Pease Air Force Base in New Hampshire, which already uses the R models, McCormack said.