A little bit of Military

[SCOTYDEMCO]

I was outside putting up the Christmas lights today at around 4:30pm. I look up to see a plane with 4 engine contrails, rare sight in Great Neck with LGA patterns. I don't get to see the JFK heavies. So I run in and grab my camera, lucky I still had the 100-400L on from spotting. Turns out it was a C-17 Globemaster, most likely out of McGuire from the direction, heading Northeast at about 30,000 or so. Ten minutes later heading the same direction and same flight path, I see another 4 engine contrail. This one was a KC-135, very high, but easy to tell due to the color and the 707 body. Very exciting to see on one of the busiest days!

[Mateo]

A McG C-17 may not be high enough to trail by the time it gets to Great Neck - it could have been an Airevac flight heading back from Andrews to Germany, or even a usual Reach mission out of the Charleston base. The KC-135 may have been going back to Bangor or Pease after pulling duty in the CAP that was up over Camp David all weekend.

[SCOTYDEMCO]

Good point Mateo. I thought about that after I posted. They were headed more East than Northeast too.

[USAF Pilot 07]

The C-17 could have very well been one of the numerous scheduled C-17s out of Charleston over to Rammstein or someplace other overseas. Then again there's a ton of military stuff always going overseas, so it really could have been anything...

[Nick]

I often look at contrails too, now I need a camera so I can see wth I'm lookin at.