When most of us aviation people think of Convair’s B-58 Hustler we think of a sexy silver lawn dart looking airplane traveling at about 1300 mph at 40,000 feet and delivering nuclear weapons in the famous drop-able pod carried under the fuselage on centerline between the engines.
The centerline pod, as carried, is shown here on the XB-58 prototype.
The idea was to fly fast and high over the air defenses of the Soviet Union and accurately deliver the weapons. In the 1960′s the Soviet Union started to deploy effective high altitude air defenses in the form of the SA-2 (NATO Code-name ‘Guideline’) surface to air missile (SAM) system. The missile had a range of about 45 miles at an altitude of about 60,000ft. Needless to say, right within the envelope of where the B-58 was expect to operate in wartime. On 1 May 1960, A USAF U-2 was shot down by as many as 3 SA-2s while on a photographic reconnaissance mission over the Soviet Union.
The USAF, in particular Strategic Air Command, was rightfully concerned about the vulnerability of their bombers to Soviet high altitude SAMs. Incoming bombers could fly under the SAM radar and reduce detection range to target. All the SAC bombers at the time sought to change tactics as a result. Low level penetration was now the name of the game.
Operation Bulls Eye was the B-58 community’s response to change to low level tactics. Another objective of Operation Bullseye was to turn the B-58 into a more flexible weapon system with the addition of externally carried conventional weapons. Possible use for the Hustler would have been in the war in Vietnam.
Wing root hardpoints fore and aft for the external accommodation of weapons.
The program itself was conducted in April 1967 and had the B-58 configured as a pathfinder aircraft and conventional iron bomber. The program originated out of Eglin AFB, FL and utilized Hustlers from the 305th Bomb Wing. Various weapons ranges at Eglin, Nellis, AFB, NV, and Matagorda Island. Other tests within the program replaced the Hustler’s navigator/bombardiers with F-4 Phantom Weapon Systems Officers (WSOs). The Hustlers were configured with up to 3,000 lbs of bombs and flew as many as 3,000 sorties over a 27 day period. Almost all the bomb drops were done visually without assistance from the B-58s bombing/navigation system. During testing a Hustler was damaged by it’s own bomb fragment with minor damage.
It was during these test the Hustler was painted in the South East Asia Camouflage (the war in Vietnam was going on at the time). I make a note of it here because, for Hustler enthusiasts, the infamous SEA-camo Hustler is a bit like Bigfoot. Everyone has heard of it but no one as a picture 
I’ve never seen pictures only renditions of the paint scheme:
Computer rendition of the B-58 Hustler in the SEA scheme.
I have heard of first hand sightings of the Hustler painted as such but sadly never any pictures.
Operation Bulls Eye proved the feasibility but in the end but concerns over the high operating cost and the perceived vulnerability of the Hustler’s subsystems, in particular the integral wing tanks, to ground fire. Other problems included the difficulty maintain visual contact within a formation and vulnerability of that formation to ground fire and SAMs. The results of the tests themselves showed little if any gain in the Hustler’s bombing accuracy.
What’s it’s like to low level in a B-58? See the video below. The in cockpit footage is amazing:
Although not a video from Operation Bullseye, does show low level testing that was done in another program, so at least in theory the Hustler would have a good low level bomber. Pure speed and a large delta wing for relatively docile gust response made it a natural for the low level penetration role. Ironically, the Hustler was replaced by a bomber that did fulfill a low bomber role, the FB-111.
You can find more on the B-58 here.
Nice write-up. That was a sweet jet. Great video too. Thanks!
Interesting write up!
Learned something new about the Hustler. If any of you are in/the Central Valley, the old Castle AFB in Merced has a fantastic static display of aircraft – even a B36.
It is a lot bigger in person – and the B58 seems a lot smaller.
Question: since jets seem to be most efficient at altitude how much did low altitude flying cut into their range?
Its not just jets, flying at altitude is generally more efficient as the thinner atmosphere puts up less drag. Flying on the deck, the air is A LOT thicker, plus the speed of sound is slower so that you need more energy to reach a given speed. You also have problems with aerodynamic heating as well.
The reduction in range from high to low altitude is very significant
…Manymanymanymanymany years ago I had the chance to chat for a bit with Dave Menard, a genuine national treasure who used to run the USAF Museum (pardon me….National Museum Of The United States Air Force) archives, and we got onto the subject of the camo B-58. What he told me then was this: Without question, at least ONE camo B-58 existed and flew some missions out of Eglin AFB FL. The pattern was actually listed in the tech order 1-B-58A-1, and that was even reproduced in a very well researched 1/72nd scale model from Italieri/Testors.
Now, why did the whole thing seemingly disappear down the memory hole? A couple reasons. First, it was an extremely close-held project. The camo B-58s were intended for use in Vietnam as pathfinders, recon birds, and strike ships, and the USAF didn’t want the North Vietnamese to have enough warning to go to the Soviets and get countermeasures. The second reason was that the project was killed on the orders of one Robert S. MacNamara…who hated the B-58 with the white-hot intensity of ten thousand suns. Officially he zeroed out the program because the -58 was, after all, pretty maintenance intensive and an overseas deployment might have been a reliability nightmare…along with the fact that nobody wanted to see NVA troops dancing on the carcass of a downed B-58. But unofficially he wanted it dead because he wanted the whole B-58 program shut down, plowed under, and sown with salt. Anything resembling a success in a combat environment would have prevented that.
Thus endeth today’s lesson.
Mike
Thanks for the feedback. The entire staff at the NMUSAF are indeed national treasures they have all the great “behind the scenes info” about the history at the museum. I’ve got a Neil Armstrong anecdote I’m trying to find a place for in these parts…
In another interesting anecdote, in International Airpower Review Volume 2 Bill Yenne writing about the B-58 recalls a rumor Cap Weinberger considered bringing back the B-58 and fitting it with turbofan engines to augment the planned B-1B. By that time however the Carter administration had had the aircraft destroyed at the Boneyard.
Great post, super video, achingly beautiful aircraft.
I got a chuckle outta the “lush vegetation in south-central New Mexico,” though. THAT term is pretty much an oxymoron.
MacNamara was the worst Sec. Od Defence we have ever had.
B-58, Boeing’s TFX, the destruction of the SR-71 tooling. Ranking with
the destruction of the Saturn tooling and plans by the Peanut Farmer…
tgmccoy – I remember when McNamara was tauted as one of the “best and brightest” – a “whiz kid”. And I agree – he was terrible – a lot of his problem was trying to micromanaged everything – from Vietnam – what bridges pilots could bomb – to what kind of plane the Navy will have (FB-111).
Jason; I loved seeing the B-58. You done a great job on this,looking forward to more.–dad.