Posted on 01/12/2018 11:43:02 AM PST by Red Badger

I have been able to see a SR71 once. Not up close but at a military base in cali.
This spy plane started when we looked at the USSR circa 1950 and literally had no better information than the German charts created during the war. We literally didn’t know the locations of many cities. Complicating things back then were old soviet maps that were deliberately inaccurate in a paper version of what we can do with GPS today.
These days, it seems like we are “needing” this plane mostly out of habit.
Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to fly
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise
There’s one parked in front of Space Camp in Al. You can reach up and touch it. It’s beautiful.
I saw one up close at the Pima air museum. There’s a few out there to go see close now. I saw one at a distance at an air show at Carswell AFB around 1970.
They made a big show of keeping it in a hanger 100 yards or so away with the doors open. Air police all around it with AR-15’s.
But I’ve still never seen a U-2.
Very cool.
There is an A-12 (an SR-71 variant) outside of the NASA Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, where you can get quite close to it.
I see one all the time....................
You beat me to it. :-)
Fortunately, it has been repainted since your picture.
By the way, the rust is from the paint, not the skin. The skin is titanium, but the black paint contains iron.
Indeed it is.
http://www.afarmamentmuseum.com/sr71blackbird.html
Great place to go.
Saw many of the planes, of the models I had built as a kid.
Now I need to make it out to the Air Force museum and see the B-70
Paul.........................
I thought they mothballed the Blackbird years ago.
Guess not.
I know virtually nothing about planes——but the one in that pic is beautiful.
.
Been there, walked under it. There's also a Tacit Blue, parked underneath it, or there was when I was there. Great museum.
This looks very much like the plane in Google Earth picture published this week.
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