page_title: Boeing EC-135
section_title: Advanced Range Instrumentation Aircraft
hierarchical_section_title: Boeing EC-135 / Missions / Advanced Range Instrumentation Aircraft
caption_attribution_description: Boeing EC-135E ARIA 60-0374 at the National Museum of the United States Air Force, Ohio.
context_page_description: The Boeing EC-135 was a command and control variant of the Boeing C-135 Stratolifter. During the Cold War, the EC-135 was best known for being modified to perform the Looking Glass mission where one EC-135 was always airborne 24 hours a day to serve as flying command post for the Strategic Air Command in the event of nuclear war. Various other EC-135 aircraft sat on airborne and ground alert throughout the Cold War, with the last EC-135C being retired in 1998. The EC-135N variant served as a tracking aircraft for the Apollo program.
context_section_description: The Advanced Range Instrumentation Aircraft are EC-135Bs, modified C-135B cargo aircraft and EC-18B (former American Airlines 707-320) passenger aircraft that provided tracking and telemetry information to support the US space program in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
  During the early 1960s, NASA and the Department of Defense (DoD) needed a very mobile tracking and telemetry platform to support the Apollo space program and other unmanned space flight operations. In a joint project, NASA and the DoD contracted with the McDonnell Douglas and the Bendix Corporations to modify eight Boeing C-135 Stratolifter cargo aircraft into EC-135N Apollo / Range Instrumentation Aircraft (A/RIA). Equipped with a steerable seven-foot antenna dish in its distinctive "Droop Snoot" or "Snoopy Nose", the EC-135N A/RIA became operational in January 1968, and was often known as the "Jimmy Durante" of the Air Force. The Air Force Eastern Test Range (AFETR) at Patrick AFB, Florida, maintained and operated the A/RIA until the end of the Apollo program in 1972, when the USAF renamed it the Advanced Range Instrumentation Aircraft (ARIA).
  Since Patrick AFB was located on the Atlantic Ocean, salt water and salt air-induced corrosion issues and associated aircraft maintenance challenges were problematic for the ARIA while based there.  Transferred to the 4950th Test Wing at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio, in December 1975 as part of an overall consolidation of large test and evaluation aircraft, the ARIA fleet underwent numerous conversions, including a re-engining that changed the EC-135N to the EC-135E. In 1994, the ARIA fleet relocated again to Edwards AFB, California, as part of the 412th Test Wing. However, taskings for the ARIA dwindled because of high costs and improved satellite technology, and the USAF transferred the aircraft to other programs such as E-8 J-STARS.
  Over its thirty-two year career, the ARIA supported the United States space program, gathered telemetry, verified international treaties, and supported cruise missile, ballistic missile defense tests, and the Space Shuttle.
caption: EC-135E "Droop Snoot" on display at USAF Museum
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