A routine aerial refueling mission last year turned into a nearly $10 million mishap after a tanker lost its entire refueling boom while attempting to refuel an F-22 Raptor.
On July 8, 2025, a KC-46A Pegasus tanker and an F-22A Raptor were conducting refueling operations roughly 100 miles off the coast of Virginia when the tanker boom became stuck in the fighter’s refueling receptacle, according to a new Air Force accident investigation released last week.
A refueling boom is essentially a flying gas pump. It’s a rigid, maneuverable tube that extends from a tanker and plugs into a receptacle on another aircraft to transfer fuel in flight.
Unlike day-to-day fuel transfers on the ground from a gas station pump to a vehicle, these complex transfers take place in the air at hundreds of miles per hour and require the tanker pilots, boom operator, and the pilot of the receiving aircraft to keep both the boom and each aircraft in position and alignment.
That didn’t quite happen here. The boom nozzle got stuck and wouldn’t come loose, triggering an emergency breakaway.
About 5 seconds after the F-22 disconnected, the boom came free and whipped up into the tanker’s tail, damaging the aircraft’s tail cone and auxiliary power unit exhaust duct. The crew described the impact as a “loud noise, violent action” that made the KC-46 “bow wave several times” before the boom began swinging and ultimately broke away, plummeting into the sea below.
No one was hurt, but the mishap caused $9,978,567 in damage to the refueling tanker.
Investigators found that the boom operator’s control inputs caused the boom nozzle to bind inside the F-22’s refueling receptacle. They also found that the F-22 pilot failed to take into account the KC-46’s “stiff boom characteristics,” which caused an “excessive closure rate” as the fighter jet moved in too quickly.
The investigation said that the fighter jet struggled to maintain its position behind the tanker, forcing multiple corrections from the boom operator. After the aircraft finally established contact, the fighter inched too far forward as the operator continued adjusting the boom’s control system.
Those adjustments left the boom out of trim, meaning aerodynamic forces had built up in the boom, similar to tension in a bent spring. That force caused the nozzle to become stuck inside the F-22’s refueling receptacle, and the boom operator was unable to unhitch it from the jet, setting the mishap in motion.
The fighter jet pilot and tanker boom operator bore the brunt of the blame in the Air Force investigation, though the KC-46’s stiff boom has been tied to previous refueling problems. At least three mishaps between 2022 and 2024 were found to have been caused by stiff booms, according to reporting from Air & Space Forces Magazine.
In this incident, the F-22 got away safely. The KC-46 landed safely. The boom did not.
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