Military plane I.D. please

I guess he was just getting in some flight time (?). I was at the wildlife refuge adjacent to Canaveral Air station and he just flew large circles as slow as this big plane could go for about an hour.

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Lockheed C5 Galaxy

nice shot btw!

Dave_G wrote in post #2618625
Lockheed C5 Galaxy

nice shot btw!

Agreed. But I've never seen one with a stinger on the front such as this. Any idea?

Thanks for the I.D.

I thought it looked like a 747 but there wasn't that "bubble" on top of the fuselage.

Maybe the stinger has something to do with it being stationed where they launch the space shuttle ?

Interesting ! my friend mr Google says its a newly upgraded C5m "super Galaxy"

AJ711 wrote in post #2618696
Agreed. But I've never seen one with a stinger on the front such as this. Any idea?

refuelling nozzle?

Blue Deuce wrote in post #2618734
Thanks for the I.D.

I thought it looked like a 747 but there wasn't that "bubble" on top of the fuselage.

Maybe the stinger has something to do with it being stationed where they launch the space shuttle ?

Not stationed in FL. Its based at Dover, DE.

More than likely, that C-5 is being used as a test bed aircraft. The stinger on the front is doing something scientific. There is DC-9 That flies out of BWI from the northrop Grumman facility there. That has an F-16 nose on it.

The weirdest test bed aircraft I have seen is from Pratt and WHitney canada. Its a 707-720 that they hang diffrent engines off the nose....

Nice Galaxy Blue, thats one big bird for sure.

Dave_G wrote in post #2618892
refuelling nozzle?

Sounds viable, especialy if it testing something, will mean it can stay airbourne longer for the sake of test hours/flying time.

bit long for a pitot tube

The extended pitot tube is probably related to testing a modification. It is common to see test aircraft with such a fixture. It allows very accurate reading of the free stream Q, or dynamic airflow unaltered by it's flow around various aircraft surfaces. The aircrafts normal pitot system can then be calibrated correctly from these readings. Such a fixture may also hold very accurate angle of attack vanes and or other sensors.
It is not a refueling probe.

cool!

Dave_G wrote in post #2618892
refuelling nozzle?

Airforce uses "Flying Boom" for refueling, not "hose and drogue"

IE: you won't see a long refueling proboscis on an Air force plane.

Cool shot Blue, looks like you were in the air with him!

Correct, if you look closely you can see the white alignment bars painted on top of the cockpit to aid the boom operator.

A few US Airforce tankers can be equipped with a hose on the boom to allow fueling of Navy and Marine aircraft which use the hose and probe system, but this isn't changeable once airborne.

CyberDyneSystems wrote in post #2619858
Cool shot Blue, looks like you were in the air with him!

Yeah, it was pretty neat. I am accustomed to seeing planes around there but this guy was flying so low I would lose him behind the trees and out over the ocean he probably wasn't 200 feet above it.

Once when I was surfing there (long time ago) a SR-71 took off screaming over my head and then went straight up like a rocket with its after burners almost curling my hair.