Super Bowl Trifecta Bomber Flyover Was Unlike Any Other

Three generations of Air Force bombers flew over Super Bowl LV.

Instead of a fighter jet flyover typically seen at the Super Bowl and other sporting events, a trifecta of Air Force bombers took to the skies Sunday above the stadium in Tampa before the NFL championship game.

The three bombers, a B-1, B-2 and B-52, part of the Global Strike Command, took off from their home bases for the flyover above Raymond James Stadium at the conclusion of the National Anthem.

 “To be able to demonstrate what we’ve been doing around the clock overhead (for) Super Bowl LV, we hope it brings great strength to the American people,” MacDill Air Force Base Col. Ben Jonsson said.

The B-1B Lancer takes off from Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota. The B-2 Spirit is from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri. The B-52 Stratofortress is based out of Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota. All aircraft were refueled mid-air by the KC-135 Stratotanker, which is based out of MacDill in Tampa.

 “They don’t go long-range, they don’t go global without the KC-135 standing here behind me,” Jonsson said. “We are the ones that actually refuel them over the oceans around the world to make sure that we can touch an adversary any place in the world and they do that because of air refueling capability.”

Not without coincidence, numerically, the bombers 1, 2 and 52 add up to 55, for Super Bowl 55. The Air Force called it a “first-of-its-kind-trifecta,” WTVT reported.

The Air Force conducts nearly 1,000 flyovers a year. The exercises serve as “time-over-target training” for the flight crew and do not come at a cost to tax payers, WTVT reported.

B-1 + B-2 + B-52 = Super Bowl 55 Flyover!