I love getting opportunities to photograph the B-2A Spirit. It’s hard to believe that this is airframe whose first example rolled out into the Palmdale sunshine twenty-nine years ago, because even today it looks like an aircraft ripped straight from a science fiction movie.

Now you see me…

As other (far better) photographers have noted, one of the neat things about the B-2 is how its character changes depending on the angle of the shot. At the Offutt Air & Space show we were graced with a couple of really nice low passes. I tried to capture some different angles as best I could.

Now you don’t. Well, almost, anyway.

The 2016 Offutt show had a B-2 on static display. Even twenty-seven years after rollout, it still has a cordon and armed security around it when it’s on the ground. It’s tough to get a sense of how big the bomber is when you see it in flight. It’s only on the ground that you realize this is a four-engine aircraft heavy bomber capable of slipping through enemy defenses with a 40,000lb bombload. For comparison’s sake, a B-52H can carry a 70,000 lb payload on a mixture of internal and external positions; a B-1B is capable of hauling 75,000 lbs internally with another 50,000 lbs on external hardpoints; WWII mainstay the B-17G could only carry 8,000 lbs internally for short range missions.

Not my photo. Public domain via official Air Force.