Massive surge of American F-15 jets heads to UK

A significant movement of United States Air Force F-15E Strike Eagles is underway towards the United Kingdom, according to open-source flight tracking analysis.

Ten F-15E aircraft from Seymour Johnson Air Force Base are believed to be crossing the Atlantic supported by a substantial aerial refuelling package. Two aircraft from the same unit arrived at RAF Lakenheath earlier in the week, with the remaining jets now inbound.

The movements were first identified by DefenceGeek, the open-source analyst known as Jon, who is also part of the UK Defence Journal editorial team. Using publicly available flight tracking data and tanker callsigns, he assessed that the aircraft are transiting in two coordinated cells.

The first group includes six F-15Es operating under the callsigns TABOR61 through TABOR66, supported by KC-135 and KC-46A tankers using the CLEAN callsign series. Notably, two of the tankers were operating from Lajes in the Azores, a common staging point for transatlantic fighter deployments. A second cell includes four additional F-15Es, TABOR71 through TABOR74, again supported by KC-135 aircraft. Subsequent tracking updates indicated that all ten aircraft were confirmed inbound to the UK.

UPDATE: Confirmed we have 10x F-15E from SJ inbound to the UK #FreeIran
— “Operation LION & SUN” —

Cell 1:
F-15E “TABOR61”
F-15E “TABOR62”
F-15E “TABOR63”
F-15E “TABOR64”
F-15E “TABOR65”
F-15E “TABOR66”

Cell 2:
KC-135R “CLEAN13” 60-0364 #AE0663
F-15E “TABOR71”
F-15E… https://t.co/tFEz50Pxbp

— DefenceGeek 🇬🇧 (@DefenceGeek) February 27, 2026