Strategic Lift & Mobility

1923 · 103 years ago

US Army Air Service pilots completed the first sustained air-to-air refuelling, transferring fuel between two biplanes

A hose passed by hand between aircraft flying in close formation proved that one aircraft could extend another's endurance in flight, a demonstration that took decades to mature into routine tanker operations but established the basic principle still used today.

1942–1945 · 84 years ago

Allied transport crews flew supplies over the Himalayas to China after Japan cut the Burma Road

Flying unpressurised aircraft over some of the world's highest terrain in severe weather, the route became the highest-volume airlift attempted up to that time and kept Chinese forces supplied for the rest of the war at a heavy cost in aircraft and crews.

1948–1949 · 78 years ago

The Berlin Airlift sustained a blockaded city of some two million people entirely by air for almost a year

American and British aircraft landed at Berlin's airfields at a rate of roughly one every few minutes at the operation's peak, defeating a Soviet land blockade without a shot fired and establishing airlift as a tool of Cold War statecraft.

• The airlift's success hardened the division of Germany and Europe

1954 · 72 years ago

The C-130 Hercules made its first flight, beginning what became the most widely used tactical transport aircraft in history

Rugged, able to use short and unpaved runways, and continuously updated over seven decades, the design was still in production and in front-line service with dozens of air forces long after most contemporaries had been retired.

1957 · 69 years ago

The KC-135 Stratotanker entered service as the first purpose-built jet aerial refuelling aircraft

Matching tanker speed to the new generation of jet bombers and fighters ended a mismatch that had limited refuelling with older piston-engined tankers, and variants of the aircraft remained in frontline US service for the rest of the century and beyond.

1973 · 53 years ago

The United States ran Operation Nickel Grass, a strategic airlift resupplying Israel during the Yom Kippur War

US Air Force C-5s and C-141s delivered replacement aircraft, munitions and equipment directly into a live conflict, demonstrating that a strategic airlift decision made in Washington could shift the material balance of a war within days.

1976 · 50 years ago

Israeli C-130 transports flew nearly 4,000 kilometres to rescue hostages held at Entebbe airport in Uganda

The raid combined long-range tactical airlift, in-flight planning and a night landing on unlit runways to insert and extract a rescue force far beyond Israel's borders, becoming a reference case for the reach that airlift gives special operations.

1982 · 44 years ago

The Antonov An-124 Ruslan entered service as the world's largest series-produced transport aircraft

Its unmatched cargo volume made it the aircraft of choice for outsize industrial and military loads, and chartered An-124s became a standard part of global heavy-lift logistics for cargo too large for any Western freighter to carry.

1984 · 42 years ago

India began sustaining troops on the Siachen Glacier almost entirely by helicopter and fixed-wing airdrop

After occupying the glacier ahead of Pakistan, India faced the task of supplying posts above 6,000 metres where no roads could reach, making the sector the longest-running example of a garrison kept alive by air mobility alone.

1988 · 38 years ago

The Antonov An-225 Mriya first flew as the largest aircraft ever built, designed to carry the Soviet Buran space shuttle

Built to ferry the Soviet space shuttle programme's orbiter and boosters, the six-engine giant later found a commercial role hauling outsize cargo worldwide; the only completed airframe was destroyed on the ground near Kyiv in the early days of Russia's 2022 invasion.

March 2025 · last year

China, India and Russia airlifted rescue teams and relief supplies into Myanmar after a major earthquake

Military transport aircraft from several countries delivered search-and-rescue teams, field hospitals and aid within days of the quake that struck the Mandalay region, illustrating airlift as a fast-response tool independent of a country's own alliance network.

• Myanmar's military government allowed only limited foreign access for relief flights

2025 · last year

Embraer added European customers to the export list for its KC-390 Millennium transport

Austria and the Netherlands moved ahead with orders or transfers of the Brazilian-built tanker-transport, building on earlier sales to Portugal and Hungary and establishing Embraer as a credible alternative to established European and American airlifters.

2025 · last year

India advanced a long-pursued programme to acquire dedicated aerial refuelling tankers

A procurement process for a small fleet of Airbus multi-role tanker aircraft moved forward after years of delay, aimed at closing a persistent gap in the Indian Air Force's ability to extend fighter range and endurance.

2025 · last year

The World Food Programme and partner agencies ran airlifts and airdrops into Sudan and Chad amid access restrictions on land routes

Fighting and bureaucratic obstruction limited overland convoys into Sudan, pushing the United Nations and humanitarian partners toward costlier air deliveries to reach famine-affected areas, a stopgap that could carry only a fraction of what road transport would move.

2025 · last year

Boeing continued fielding fixes to the KC-46 Pegasus tanker's remote vision system

The improved camera and display system, meant to correct years of refuelling boom control problems, moved through testing toward wider fielding, a step the US Air Force had treated as a condition for full confidence in the aircraft.

2025 · last year

China expanded its Y-20 transport fleet and brought the Y-20U tanker variant into wider service

Growing numbers of domestically built airlifters and tankers reduced the People's Liberation Army's long-standing reliance on ageing Russian-made Il-76 aircraft, extending its capacity for long-range troop movement and mid-air refuelling of fighter and bomber fleets.

October 2024 · 2 years ago

India inaugurated a final assembly line for C-295 transport aircraft at Vadodara

The Tata Advanced Systems facility, built with Airbus, was set to produce most of a 56-aircraft order to replace the Indian Air Force's Avro fleet and to become India's first private-sector military aircraft assembly line.

• The line was intended to produce aircraft for export as well as India's own fleet

2024 · 2 years ago

The Philippine Air Force took delivery of new C-130J Super Hercules aircraft

The newer aircraft began replacing a fleet of ageing C-130Bs and Ts that had suffered repeated accidents and low availability, restoring a more reliable heavy airlift capability for an archipelagic country dependent on air transport for disaster response.

2024 · 2 years ago

NATO expanded its Multinational MRTT Fleet of shared aerial tankers

The Eindhoven-based multinational unit, which lets smaller air forces buy shared access to aerial refuelling and strategic airlift rather than each building a national fleet, added member nations and additional Airbus A330 aircraft to its pool.

• The Czech Republic joined the pooled fleet as a newer member nation

2024 · 2 years ago

Indonesia signed for the A400M, becoming the type's first Asian operator

The order for European-built airlifter-tankers gave Indonesia a heavy strategic lift and refuelling capability well beyond its existing Hercules fleet, part of a wider modernisation of its air force's transport and logistics arm.