There’s a new player on the air show circuit: the world’s first KC-46 Pegasus demo team debuted at a Texas airshow last week, marking the latest first for the Air Force’s new aerial refueling tanker.
The demo team performed at the Wings and Warriors Fly-In at San Marcos, Texas on Nov. 9, according to a Nov. 14 press release by the 97th Air Mobility Wing at Altus Air Force Base, Okla., home of the 56th Air Refueling Squadron, which hosts the demo team.
During the show, the team performed a high-speed pass at just 500 feet with the refueling boom extended, followed by a pass with the gear and flaps down.
“The team showcased the KC-46’s air refueling and slow-speed maneuvering capabilities,” Maj. Gary Sowa, 97th Operations Group KC-46 demo team lead, said in the release. “This gave spectators a glimpse into the aircraft’s versatility.”
Air Force fast-jet demo teams such as the Thunderbirds and the F-22 demo team make a splash at airshows with their tight turns and sneak passes. But the “heavies,” the term for larger aircraft such as transports and tankers, are no less impressive for their size and grace.
The 140-ton C-17 transport, for example, shows off its ability to take off and land in just a few thousand feet of runway, while tankers mimic their refueling mission by putting their boom down as another aircraft trails behind it.
Air show fans may have to wait a while before they can see the KC-46 team’s next act. The 97th AMW Public Affairs office told Air & Space Forces Magazine that the team will not perform any more shows in 2024 and is yet to announce its full 2025 schedule, but it will perform at the Altus Airpower Stampede Open House & Air Show scheduled for April 12-13, 2025. Once the rest of the 2025 lineup is solidified, it will be published on the wing’s Facebook page.
Flying a tanker is a team effort, and there are 13 total KC-46 aircrew members—seven pilots and six boom operators—at the 97th AMW certified to fly the demo team profile, the public affairs office explained. The minimum and typical aircrew during a demo performance consists of two pilots, one boom operator, and one pilot serving as a safety observer for a total of four aircrew. One of those crew members is Tech Sgt. Lacy Pickett, a boom operator.
“Being part of this demo team is very meaningful, especially as a woman in this field,” she said in the release. “We’re showing the public how far we’ve come in the KC-46 community and proving just what we’re capable of.”
Any Air Force unit worth its salt has a distinct shoulder patch, and KC-46 demo team sports one with a unique take on the emblem of the 56th Aerial Refueling Squadron. The emblem features a bird wearing a graduation hat watching over a smaller bird without one, which symbolizes the squadron’s mission as an aircrew training squadron.
The demo team version features that same design but with the silhouette of a KC-46 with its boom extended splashed on the right-hand side, the words “KC-46A Pegasus” scrawled across the top, and “97 AMW Demo Team” along the bottom.
The crew took out a special tail for the debut last week. It sported a black-and-white triangle symbol known as the Triangle Y, the marking assigned to the 97th AMW’s predecessor, the 97th Bombardment Group, during World War II. Each of the three aircraft types at the 97 AMW (C-17s, KC-135s, and KC-46s) has a jet with the Triangle Y painted on the tail in tribute to the wing’s long history.
“There is not a jet permanently assigned to the demo team, but the team coordinates with the 97th Maintenance Group to fly the KC-46 with the Triangle Y tail flash when it is available,” the wing’s public affairs office explained.
Last week’s debut marked the latest first for the KC-46, which Airmen from the New Jersey-based 305th Air Mobility Wing flew to the Middle East late last month for the tanker’s first-ever operational deployment, though the tanker had flown one-off operational sorties before that. The first KC-46 was delivered to the Air Force in 2019, and Air Mobility Command cleared it for worldwide deployments and combatant commander taskings in September 2022.
The older KC-135 tanker has a demo team, and now the Pegasus will show off the future of Air Force aerial refueling.
“With each demo flight, we’re not just showing what the KC-46 can do,” Sowa said. “We’re reshaping its story, growing as a team, and inspiring future Airmen.”