An Air Force C-17 broke an airdrop record on Sunday, when the airlifter delivered 32,400 pounds of humanitarian aid within 40 minutes to four locations in Afghanistan. The mission, conducted by a crew deployed from McChord AFB, Wash., marks the most cargo air dropped to four zones in the shortest amount of time from a single aircraft in the history of US airdrops, said Lt. Col. Charles Ciuzio, chief of the Air Mobility Division at the Combined Air Operations Center in Southwest Asia. The supplies included winter survival gear, tools, school supplies, food, and blankets.
The Air Force is launching an effort to develop a new stand-off missile with a range of 1,000 nautical miles, or 1,150 miles, that would eventually be used for both air-to-air and air-to-surface missions.