SR-71 **OT*** but good story

Nice story. One of the SR-71's is in the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, next to Dulles Airport. It arrived there from LA in one hour, 4 mins. It's there along with the Wright Brother's plane, the Enola Gay and a space shuttle. Nice progress in just 80 years. SR71 was flying about 60 years after the Wright Brothers. Shows what we can do when we really try.

Nice.

Wish I could have seen one in action... Just saw one after it was retired.

yep!

We have one here out by The Boneyard. While it's "cool" looking, I personally am more impressed with the B52/X15 pair; the idea of something that *big* launching something that *fast* that long *ago*...

Somewhere on YouTube there is a ride along. They leak and burn a lot of fuel to get up to refuel level.

When I was a kid, I think most of my friends wanted to be a X-15 pilots.

When we took a trip for school and flew for the first time, my friend puked and that put his X-15 career to a halt.

One of my customers who had been an air-force crewmen told me he only once was on a mission where he did not puke.

He told me that military pilots aren't made out of the same stuff the rest of us are made of.

A similar SR-70 story goes something like:

Pilot: Center, Austin 40 requesting flight level 600 Center: Austin 40, you can have it if you can reach it. Pilot: Roger center - descending to flight level 600.

Saw a SR-71 flyover at edwards, once up on a time. Also saw a shuttle landing there circa 1987.

There's an SR-71 at the Castle AFB museum in Merced. As for something *big*, they also have a B-36 (6x turboprop pushers, 4x turbojet) which is the largest bomber ever built.

Give the credit to the guy who actually wrote it: it's from Brian Shul's book, "Sled Driver: Flying the World's Fastest Jet".

Talk about big...I saw the Spruce Goose when it was on display in LA a long time ago.

The way it was displayed, you could not see it until you went around a bend, then saw it all at once.

It seemed impossible that it could have flown...but it did once briefly.

It was designed with the engines inside the wing, so in theory one could work on an engine while the plane was in flight.

Was there an SR-70? For a while the AF was obsessed with linear naming for fighters, at least so I wouldn't doubt it. Had uncles at Republic, Grumman and Lockheed (aero engineering family) and some other places I can't remember. But I do remember we would always go to the company's first public airshow of any jet my relatives worked on and have a picnic afterward.

I remember the 102, the 104 and the 105. I remember the 104 the most because it was nicknamed the "star fighter" and being a kid, conjured images of these jets flying around the stars with Rocky Jones or Flash Gordon. It was the delta-wing F-106 that really looked like a spaceship.

What always amazed me was no matter whomever was really filing the flight plans was why no one thought the Sovs wouldn't bend heaven and earth to shoot one of the Blackbirds down. Or, more likely, they knew they would get great pictures until then and the pilots like Gary Francis Powers were expendable. It was a really BIG news item when I was a kid.

Not that I ever heard of, I think he just made a typo

Just thought I'd ask - might have been prototype. IIRC, he's former USAF and might have had some inside info.

Our Nations Leaders appear to be really trying, but not in a direction that I approve.

- . Christopher A. Young learn more about Jesus .

First time in ages I laughed out loud at a usenet post. Very well done, good fellow.

- . Christopher A. Young learn more about Jesus .

Likely not MPG, but GPM. Galons per mile.

Big can be advantage, but it takes lot of fuel.

- . Christopher A. Young learn more about Jesus .

"Robert Green" wrote in news:mvp4c3$agp$1 @speranza.aioe.org:

They tried. That's what they built the MiG-25 for: to get as high as possible, as quickly as possible, to try to intercept the Blackbird.

One of the Blackbird pilots told of a recon flight over Soviet territory when the Soviet AF tried to intercept them -- a MiG managed to get close enough to launch rockets.

The Blackbird went to afterburners.

And outran the rockets.

possible, as quickly as

when the Soviet AF tried to

I hear they wrote a song about that: "Bye, Bye, Blackbird."