BLU-82 cuts its last daisies - Air Force News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Air Force Times

BLU-82 cuts its last daisies

The end of an era went out with a blast.

An Air Force special operations crew dropped the last “Daisy Cutter” bomb July 15 on the Utah Test and Training Range.

The Reserve’s 711th Special Operations Squadron, an MC-130E Combat Talon I unit based out of Duke Field, Fla., turned the 15,000-pound bomb into a fireball.

“The power of this weapon is overwhelming,” said Col. Jon Weeks, mission commander for the final drop. “Flying the chase plane at 6,000 feet and approximately three quarters of a mile away from the bomb’s detonation point, we felt a shock wave that shook the aircraft.”

The BLU-82 was created during the Vietnam War to instantly clear helicopter landing zones in dense forests. The bomb was essentially a 55-inch diameter steel tank filled with 12,600-pounds of explosive and a fuse, according to the Air Force. It was so large that the only aircraft able to carry it in Vietnam was the C-130. To release the BLU-82, the bomb was mounted atop a sled and dragged out the back, much like a cargo pallet is air-dropped today.

Two decades latter, BLU-82s had a new mission. Eleven bombs were dropped during Desert Storm to scare Iraqi troops and clear mine fields. In 2001, four Daisy Cutter bombs were released in Afghanistan over tunnels reportedly holding top al-Qaida leaders.

For the past seven years, the 506th Combat Sustainment Squadron at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, has watched over the remaining BLU-82s, performing extensive testing and modeling to extend the bomb’s shelf life.

The purpose of the final mission was to check if calculations about the bomb’s life span and effectiveness were correct. “Part of our validation testing effort includes live tests of the BLU-82s in stockpile,” said Gordon Guymon, a bomb engineer with the 506th.