Originally Posted by
Zoot Suit
There was NO reason to do this. Computer Graphics could have save A LOT of gas. I think the "carbon footprint" for this flight kicked us all in the @ss.
Sure there was, it was to get nice video and images of two very powerful and symbolic national assets.
The flight was a training mission and a portion of the flight was the fly-by. Although I agree that we shouldn't waste fuel, trust me when I say this, the fuel spent on this flight is a drop in the bucket compared to the overall defense consumption of jet fuel.