Narrative:

We were cleared on the ILS 23R at tys and contacted the tower. We checked in and were cleared to land at about a 7 mile final. The tower then cleared a military tanker to take off on 23R and advised that there was a crj on 4 mile final. We could not see them due some cloud cover that extended just over the end of runway 23R. As we were stabilized and descending on the G/south we heard the tower say 'no delay; traffic on 2 mile final.' we saw them at that point and realized that they were not even pointed down the runway. We slowed the best we could and briefed the go-around. The tanker accelerated down the runway as we approached and as we entered the airport fence line they became airborne. We were still cleared to land but at approx 150 ft our a/C pitched up; to the left 15 degrees; and then to the right 30 degrees. I called 'go-around; set thrust; flaps up' then 'positive rate; gear up; speed mode' and we recovered from a nasty turbulence induced a/C upset. We were VFR at this point and had runway 23L in sight and were asked if we could maintain visual contact with runway 23L. We could and accepted a landing clearance to runway 23L and landed with no further incident.

Related reports:

Google
 

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A CRJ-200 Captain reported encountering wake from a departing military tanker at TYS that resulted in aircraft upset and a go-around.

Narrative: We were cleared on the ILS 23R at TYS and contacted the Tower. We checked in and were cleared to land at about a 7 mile final. The Tower then cleared a military tanker to take off on 23R and advised that there was a CRJ on 4 mile final. We could not see them due some cloud cover that extended just over the end of Runway 23R. As we were stabilized and descending on the G/S we heard the tower say 'no delay; traffic on 2 mile final.' We saw them at that point and realized that they were not even pointed down the runway. We slowed the best we could and briefed the go-around. The tanker accelerated down the runway as we approached and as we entered the airport fence line they became airborne. We were still cleared to land but at approx 150 FT our A/C pitched up; to the left 15 degrees; and then to the right 30 degrees. I called 'GO-AROUND; set thrust; flaps up' then 'Positive rate; gear up; speed mode' and we recovered from a nasty turbulence induced A/C upset. We were VFR at this point and had Runway 23L in sight and were asked if we could maintain visual contact with Runway 23L. We could and accepted a landing clearance to Runway 23L and landed with no further incident.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.