Aviation Week outs successor to SR 71 "BlackBird" . This one can do Mach 6 and is armed...!

Gizmondo ^

[njslim]

Aviation Week's Guy Norris has an exclusive article on the successor for the Lockheed Martin SR-71 Blackbird, the legendary spy plane that may be the favorite of every airplane nerd in the world. The hypersonic SR-72 is the first aircraft that can fit perfectly in Star Wars or Galactica, a true space age ship.

[skimbell]

"I think you can pretty well guarantee our enemies know about anything we have."

Well he11 yeah! He is the president you know!

[tanknetter]

Figured this was appropriate. Taken right before retirement the 9th SRW pulled out almost all of its SR-71s for a family picture.

The one in the second row, facing to our right, is the one on display in Dayton at the USAF Museum. The one all the way in the back is the sole SR-71C. This was a two-seat frankentrainer cobbled together from the aft fuselage of one of the crashed YF-12 interceptors and the forward fuselage of a static test article. It never flew quite right, don't think it made it past 600 flight hours before being retired to duty as a spares source. Being pulled out for this picture was apparently the first time it had seen the light of day in nearly 20 years. It's currently on display at Hill Aerospace Museum at Hill AFB, UT.

[SunkenCiv]

:’) Thanks for those links!

[BenLurkin]

Palmdale California Blackbird Air Park SR-71 U-2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGP70S3ZBpQ

[GreyFriar]

Blackbird & son of Blackbird ping

[yarddog]

Great stories and yes that is the one I was thinking of.

[ExSoldier]

Supposedly the following is a quote from a former SR71 pilot. I have no idea if it's true or not but it makes a great story!

I came to the program in 1983, with a sterling record and a recommendation from my commander, completing the weeklong interview, and meeting Walt, my partner for the next four years.

He would ride four feet behind me, working all the cameras, radios, and electronic jamming equipment. I joked, that if we were ever captured, he was the spy, and I was just the driver.

He told me to keep the pointy end forward.

We trained for a year, flying out of Beale AFB in California , Kadena Airbase in Okinawa , and RAF Mildenhall in England ..

On a typical training mission, we would take off near Sacramento , refuel over Nevada , accelerate into Montana , obtain a high Mach speed over Colorado , turn right over New Mexico, speed across the Los Angeles Basin, run up the West Coast, turn right at Seattle , then return to Beale.

Total flight time:- Two Hours and Forty Minutes.

One day, high above Arizona , we were monitoring the radio traffic, of all the mortal airplanes below us. First, a Cessna pilot asked the air traffic controllers to check his ground speed. 'Ninety knots,' ATC replied.

A Bonanza soon made the same request. 'One-twenty on the ground,' was the reply.

To our surprise, a navy FA-18 came over the radio, with a ground speed check.

I knew exactly what he was doing.

Of course, he had a ground speed indicator in his cockpit, but he wanted to let all the bug-smashers in the valley, know what real speed was, 'Dusty 52, we show you at 620 on the ground,' ATC responded.

The situation was too ripe.

I heard the click of Walt's mike button in the rear seat. In his most innocent voice, Walt startled the controller by asking for a ground speed check from 81,000 feet, clearly above controlled airspace. In a cool, professional voice, the controller replied, 'Aspen 20, I show you at 1,982 knots on the ground.'

We did not hear another transmission on that frequency, all the way to the coast.

Bogus? Maybe. But very cool!

[SunkenCiv]

Beads on a rope — cryo contrail.

[Loud Mime]

A ‘71 once flew over an Air Force Academy football game. The Cheers were only equal to the smiles.

I’ll never forget that moment, nor the first time they beat Notre Dame.

[headstamp 2]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn6CgKEuB-M

[SunkenCiv]

Probably a big /bingo to that, but we have to take into account that Zero works for our enemies, just as Carter did when he shot off his mouth about codename Aurora.

[CodeToad]

“I’m sure this new bird can go a minimum of Mach 6.”

Many aircraft can do M2+ without all the tech the SR-71 uses, so we know it can exceed M2+ without question.

[headstamp 2]

http://roadrunnersinternationale.com/transporting_the_a-12.html

[headstamp 2]

Sorry, the SR-71 still looks far more badass. (grin)

[SunkenCiv]

X - 15
Hypersonic Research at the Edge of Space
http://history.nasa.gov/x15/cover.html

This joint program by NASA, the Air Force, the Navy, and North American operated the most remarkable of all the rocket research aircraft. Composed of an internal structure of titanium and a skin surface of a chrome-nickel alloy known as Inconel X, the X-15 had its first, unpowered glide flight on June 8, 1959, while the first powered flight took place on September 17, 1959. Because of the large fuel consumption of its rocket engine, the X-15 was air launched from a B-52 aircraft at about 45,000 ft and speeds upward of 500 mph. The airplane first set speed records in the Mach 4-6 range with Mach 4.43 on March 7, 1961; Mach 5.27 on June 23, 1961; Mach 6.04 on November 9, 1961; and Mach 6.7 on October 3, 1967. It also set an altitude record of 354,200 feet (67 miles) on August 22, 1963, and provided an enormous wealth of data on hypersonic air flow, aerodynamic heating, control and stability at hypersonic speeds, reaction controls for flight above the atmosphere, piloting techniques for reentry, human factors, and flight instrumentation. The highly successful program contributed to the development of the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo piloted spaceflight programs as well as the Space Shuttle program. The program’s final flight was performed on October 24, 1968.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBnkbeGLGk4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=skG5ioabGVQ

[American Constitutionalist]

I am not so worried about what our enemies know of what we have, I am more worried of what our enemies know that you and I don't know we have.
They don't call them black projects for nothing.

[yarddog]

I knew a former U2 and SR-71 pilot pretty well until he died a few years back.

We were driving to a gun show and I got him to tell me a few of his war stories and he had a bunch having started as a B-26 pilot in WWII.

One I remember was he was flying a B-29 over the North Pole. This was during the time they were obtaining radio active samples after Russian nuclear tests. He said they were flying through some very hot radioactive clouds. (BTW that is probably what eventually killed him).

He said there was some kind of odd radio signals and he heard an air traffic controller clear as a bell. I forgot the city but it was in the mainland U.S.

He got on the radio and asked for something maybe a radio check but anyway he told the guy he was at zero degrees North. The guy came back and asked if he was really over the North Pole.

[American Constitutionalist]

Even the famed Lockheed P-38 Lightning was ahead of it's time.
The SR-71 black bird got it's genes from many other designs from Kelly Johnson.
My GOD we were so blessed with such talent at that time.

[SunkenCiv]

Nice!

[SunkenCiv]

Slide rules, blueprints, no CAD/CAM.