Posted on 12/28/2016 8:20:44 PM PST by BulletBobCo
This may be the single greatest aviation story ever told, it’s about the iconic SR-71 Blackbird whose full operating specs are still classified to this day. The story, from the now out-of-print book Sled Driver by former SR-71 jockey Brian Shul (available used on Amazon for just $700). Here’s the ultimate aviation troll:
There were a lot of things we couldn’t do in an SR-71, but we were the fastest guys on the block and loved reminding our fellow aviators of this fact. People often asked us if, because of this fact, it was fun to fly the jet. Fun would not be the first word I would use to describe flying this plane. Intense, maybe. Even cerebral. But there was one day in our Sled experience when we would have to say that it was pure fun to be the fastest guys out there, at least for a moment.
It occurred when Walt and I were flying our final training sortie. We needed 100 hours in the jet to complete our training and attain Mission Ready status. Somewhere over Colorado we had passed the century mark. We had made the turn in Arizona and the jet was performing flawlessly. My gauges were wired in the front seat and we were starting to feel pretty good about ourselves, not only because we would soon be flying real missions but because we had gained a great deal of confidence in the plane in the past ten months. Ripping across the barren deserts 80,000 feet below us, I could already see the coast of California from the Arizona border. I was, finally, after many humbling months of simulators and study, ahead of the jet.
I was beginning to feel a bit sorry for Walter in the back seat. There he was, with no really good view of the incredible sights before us, tasked with monitoring four different radios. This was good practice for him for when we began flying real missions, when a priority transmission from headquarters could be vital. It had been difficult, too, for me to relinquish control of the radios, as during my entire flying career I had controlled my own transmissions. But it was part of the division of duties in this plane and I had adjusted to it. I still insisted on talking on the radio while we were on the ground, however. Walt was so good at many things, but he couldn’t match my expertise at sounding smooth on the radios, a skill that had been honed sharply with years in fighter squadrons where the slightest radio miscue was grounds for beheading. He understood that and allowed me that luxury.
Just to get a sense of what Walt had to contend with, I pulled the radio toggle switches and monitored the frequencies along with him. The predominant radio chatter was from Los Angeles Center, far below us, controlling daily traffic in their sector. While they had us on their scope (albeit briefly), we were in uncontrolled airspace and normally would not talk to them unless we needed to descend into their airspace.
We listened as the shaky voice of a lone Cessna pilot asked Center for a readout of his ground speed. Center replied: “November Charlie 175, I’m showing you at ninety knots on the ground.”
Now the thing to understand about Center controllers, was that whether they were talking to a rookie pilot in a Cessna, or to Air Force One, they always spoke in the exact same, calm, deep, professional, tone that made one feel important. I referred to it as the ” Houston Center voice.” I have always felt that after years of seeing documentaries on this country’s space program and listening to the calm and distinct voice of the Houston controllers, that all other controllers since then wanted to sound like that, and that they basically did. And it didn’t matter what sector of the country we would be flying in, it always seemed like the same guy was talking. Over the years that tone of voice had become somewhat of a comforting sound to pilots everywhere. Conversely, over the years, pilots always wanted to ensure that, when transmitting, they sounded like Chuck Yeager, or at least like John Wayne. Better to die than sound bad on the radios.
Just moments after the Cessna’s inquiry, a Twin Beech piped up on frequency, in a rather superior tone, asking for his ground speed. “I have you at one hundred and twenty-five knots of ground speed.” Boy, I thought, the Beechcraft really must think he is dazzling his Cessna brethren. Then out of the blue, a navy F-18 pilot out of NAS Lemoore came up on frequency. You knew right away it was a Navy jock because he sounded very cool on the radios. “Center, Dusty 52 ground speed check”. Before Center could reply, I’m thinking to myself, hey, Dusty 52 has a ground speed indicator in that million-dollar cockpit, so why is he asking Center for a readout? Then I got it, ol’ Dusty here is making sure that every bug smasher from Mount Whitney to the Mojave knows what true speed is. He’s the fastest dude in the valley today, and he just wants everyone to know how much fun he is having in his new Hornet. And the reply, always with that same, calm, voice, with more distinct alliteration than emotion: “Dusty 52, Center, we have you at 620 on the ground.”
And I thought to myself, is this a ripe situation, or what? As my hand instinctively reached for the mic button, I had to remind myself that Walt was in control of the radios. Still, I thought, it must be done – in mere seconds we’ll be out of the sector and the opportunity will be lost. That Hornet must die, and die now. I thought about all of our Sim training and how important it was that we developed well as a crew and knew that to jump in on the radios now would destroy the integrity of all that we had worked toward becoming. I was torn.
Somewhere, 13 miles above Arizona, there was a pilot screaming inside his space helmet. Then, I heard it. The click of the mic button from the back seat. That was the very moment that I knew Walter and I had become a crew. Very professionally, and with no emotion, Walter spoke: “Los Angeles Center, Aspen 20, can you give us a ground speed check?” There was no hesitation, and the replay came as if was an everyday request. “Aspen 20, I show you at one thousand eight hundred and forty-two knots, across the ground.”
I think it was the forty-two knots that I liked the best, so accurate and proud was Center to deliver that information without hesitation, and you just knew he was smiling. But the precise point at which I knew that Walt and I were going to be really good friends for a long time was when he keyed the mic once again to say, in his most fighter-pilot-like voice: “Ah, Center, much thanks, we’re showing closer to nineteen hundred on the money.”
For a moment Walter was a god. And we finally heard a little crack in the armor of the Houston Center voice, when L.A.came back with, “Roger that Aspen, Your equipment is probably more accurate than ours. You boys have a good one.”
It all had lasted for just moments, but in that short, memorable sprint across the southwest, the Navy had been flamed, all mortal airplanes on freq were forced to bow before the King of Speed, and more importantly, Walter and I had crossed the threshold of being a crew. A fine day’s work. We never heard another transmission on that frequency all the way to the coast.
For just one day, it truly was fun being the fastest guys out there.
Who cares? It’s a story, a rather good one at that......’MERICA!!!!
You are correct. And the Space Shuttle was nothing without the strap-on rockets, unlike the Blackbird which I admire.
I saw the first Space Shuttle launch from US 1 in Titusville. I saw in person the Challenger explosion from Melbourne, FL. I saw two shuttle night launches from the VIP area at Kennedy Space Center.
I saw a Saturn 5 in the Vehicle Assembly Building for a moon flight.
I regret that I never saw a SR-71!
My favorite SR-71 story (which I read here on Free Republic) dealt with a craft that did an unauthorized low-level pass over a retired RAF field. some Some sort of scout troop was visiting the base and had been promised “a special visit” by some aircraft during the day. Apparently, the effort it took to bring the craft so low and slow (so that buildings weren’t subjected to a sonic boom) for an approach not intended for a landing brought it close to a stall.
True or not, it was a story I read here!
Two paintings on my office wall next to the 71 is “Lightship” - a night launch. Another is “Cape Winds” (shuttle creeping on a transporter towards the pad & tower).
Made many trips to T’ville back in the early 90’s (a GF was the sister-in-law of the Shuttle Simulator chief engineer). With all the trips there and special access I never saw a launch - all postponed and I had to get back to work in Alaska - bummer. But it sure was interesting and fun.
While I knew Bill I never saw a 71 in flight - only on the ground.
Thant is this one: http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/the-sr-71-blackbirds-most-spectacular-flyover-was-also-1719654907
Both do land on the earth, at least using landing gear, one way or the other.
I was lucky enough to have twice viewed SR-71s in flight... both at Edwards, both NASA operated. The first was while visiting (then) Dryden Flight Research Center... the main building had a map of the dry lake bed and runways painted on the roof to orient the visitors. While we were on the roof, an SR-71 departed... um... that was loud. The second wasn’t during the Edwards AFB air show a few years later... great air show that year: first public F-22 flight, B2 demonstration, x-15 pilots on hand answering questions, and a SR71 Mach 3 flyby... a speck darting across the sky that was long gone by the time the boom hit us. Have not been as lucky with launches... delayed the one time I was in the neighborhood with access.
That’s just Dennis Kucinich in his flying saucer.
There’s no telling what Trump will do.
I made the mistake, with a buddy, of taking a shortcut through their hanger once.
Thank you for that.
Well, the fuel leaking at the seams confirms what my friend’s dad told me about the blackbird, that it would leak jet fuel all over the runway when taking off.
Only one sighting of one in flight at a Pt Mugu airshow when one did a flyby. Not supersonic, dammit. Still unearthly with that dull black paint and shape. Looked more like a space plane than an aircraft. Seeing a static display at Miramar years later, was shocked at how huge the thing was.
The space shuttle actually did not have a main booster. The thing in the middle was just a big tank that fueled the 3 engines on the orbiter during take off. According to Wikipedia, each of the three orbiter engines had 393,800 pounds of thrust at lift off and each solid rocket booster had 2,800,000.
* * *
1900 knts is way faster than Mach 2. In fact 1900 knts at 80,000 feet is over mach 3.
There is a another story in Sled Driver that goes along the same lines. Pilots requesting to fly at higher altitutes to show off. Some fighter joke request 50 or 60 thousand feet. He gets cleared and then the SR71 requests 80,000 the controller says and just how do you think your going to climb to 80,000? And the sled driver says “we want to descent to 80,000”.
Re the “have you been to Frankfurt” joke.
Two other versions etc.
German citizen to a British visitor. “Have you ever been to Frankfurt before?”
Britisher: “Yeah, in 1944 to bomb it”.
TRUE STORY: A friend of mine, F-4 pilot off of two carriers during the VN war, call sign “ Sundowner 1”, and I were talking about Vietnam.
I asked him how did he like the country. He said, “I never landed there but I bombed it, both the North and the South.”
A couple weeks ago at his 71st birthday, we were talking about this very saying, and he said that when he would go into a Vietnamese restaurant in No. Virginia and saw a map of the country, he would go up to it and unconsciously say out loud, as he recognized places, “I bombed this, and that, and that...” and then stopped for fear of upsetting the owners and patrons.
I once asked a helicopter pilot if he ever went to Vung Tau (which had a beautiful beach, if you didn’t mind the signs that said “Landmines”). He said, “Yes, I crashed into the bay there”.
Curly, a DC policeman classmate in one of our police science classes, told me that he was a helicopter pilot on Search and Rescue (SAR) missions. I asked him if he was ever shot down and he said, yes, about 15 times - in No. Vietnam, Laos, and So. Vietnam.
He had to be one of the toughest cops ever - short, wiry, and Vice Squad. I’d trust him with my life.
These are the guys who made America great.
PS: A B-52 flew near my house about two weeks ago. Had to be coming out of Andrews AF Base (now Join Base Andrews). Needed an oil job because the black smoke trail it left.
Once saw a B-1 take off from Andrews. Never saw a plane go down a runway and lift off at a 45* angle. What at sight?
#26: Superman going out for a pizza.
great shot ! Dad’s down there somewhere
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