Topic: A taste of what it was like to fly the SR-71

[Inigo Montoya]

http://gizmodo.com/5511236/the-thrill-of-flying-the-sr+71-blackbird?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+gizmodo%2Ffull+%28Gizmodo%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

[Nikkisixx]

The SR-71 is such a cool plane!  My uncle (former USAF) tells a story of an SR-71 pilot contacting the tower at Andrews AFB outside of DC asking for a vector.  The air traffic controller (likely a newbie) checks the location of the plane (damn far out over the Atlantic) and tells the pilot that he is to far out to worry about it, that he'll be given a slot when he is 300 miles out, which typically would be about 30 minutes flight time at subsonic speed.  The pilot's reply:  "son, I'm mach 2+.  I'll be in your lap in about 5 minutes.  What say you make a hole for me?"

[bill440cars]

The SR-71 is such a cool plane!  My uncle (former USAF) tells a story of an SR-71 pilot contacting the tower at Andrews AFB outside of DC asking for a vector.  The air traffic controller (likely a newbie) checks the location of the plane (damn far out over the Atlantic) and tells the pilot that he is to far out to worry about it, that he'll be given a slot when he is 300 miles out, which typically would be about 30 minutes flight time at subsonic speed.  The pilot's reply:  "son, I'm mach 2+.  I'll be in your lap in about 5 minutes.  What say you make a hole for me?"

                    

[Gordon]

The pilot's reply:  "son, I'm mach 2+.  I'll be in your lap in about 5 minutes.  What say you make a hole for me?"

He was really lumbering along at that speed.

[Duke McDukiedook]

Got my heart racing a little reading that.

Makes me wish I got into the academy  .

[Nikkisixx]

Got my heart racing a little reading that.

Makes me wish I got into the academy  .

+1  stoopid colorblindness   

[MickeyX]

I've seen the one at the Smithsonian in WDC and one on the USS Enterprise carrier in NYC. Beautiful birds. Leak like a bugger when sitting still as I understand it but incredible to just stand next to. They have flexible joints because of the speed and temps they endure. I can't even imagine flying in one. 

[Duke McDukiedook]

Smithsonian and saw one at the Cosmosphere in Hutchinson, Kansas.

If you are a flight/space buff and are remotely close to it you have to visit- well worth the trip.

[78 k550]

SR-71 will go mach 4 i'm sure.

Paul

[hoodellyhoo]

I was at EAA airventure a quite a while ago and they had gotten special clearance to fly one by at over mach one so we could hear a sonic boom. Unfortunately the plane had some kind of trouble before it could make the pass and ended up landing in Iowa or something. I'm still kinda mad about it.

[BobbyR]

I saw one take off on a test flight in Nevada. They did not tell us, it looked like a missile test. The afterburners were what gave it away.

[Inigo Montoya]

I might almost give my left nut to go over mach3 in one of those!

[78 k550]

I saw one take off on a test flight in Nevada. They did not tell us, it looked like a missile test. The afterburners were what gave it away.

Something like 24 stages of afterburner.

Paul

[BobbyR]

I saw one take off on a test flight in Nevada. They did not tell us, it looked like a missile test. The afterburners were what gave it away.

Something like 24 stages of afterburner.

Paul

It was all hush hush. Our job was to enforce the no fly zone around the field which was not our normal job. We were at 2,000 feet and this thing just blasted out of nowhere. After a few nights of this we realized it was a an new kind of U2. All kinds of odd things were flying around that place.

I read an article by a journalist that was given a ride after the plane was declassified. He said you could smell the fuselage burning during flight. No one really knew the operational life of the craft due to that burning. The metal expanded so much everything had to be made with wide margins for expansion. I doubt I could have flown a thing like that at any point in my life. You had to be the best of the best, that fellow is being modest.

[toycollector10]

I read a book about the aircraft some years ago. I remember the pilot's quote...

"you have to know your position at all times. You haven't been lost until you've been lost at Mach Three"


 

[jaknight]

I Can't Believe I Found This Thread Here,

I was standing in the hangar at Beale AFB waiting as the first operational blackbird came in and rolled into the hangar.

Myself and the blackbird crossed paths many times; after leaving Beale AFB, I worked for Lockheed and also wound up as a civilian worker at Edwards AFB.

My son and the son of Colonel Vida, a man who was on board the blackbird taken to Andrews AFB to be turned over to the Smithsonian I believe, were cross country runners and track runners together and partied together also.  Colonel Vida set new records on that last run from California to the east coast.

Colonel Vida was a fine man and a very clean living man.  It freaked me out that he passed over from cancer.  His son is a very fine example of everything that a father and mother could be proud of.

My son was always an honor student and went on to accomplish incredible things and is doing very well now; I am very proud of him.

Kelly Johnson was an incredible man. All the aircraft he designed were mind blowers for their time of design and concept, and remain so even now.  His A12 was the forerunner of the SR-71 and the YF12.

But, he did design a fighter plane, towards the end of WWII, that was really the seed of the SR-71, it only had a single engine, yet the blackbird's design and near performance is clearly there.

At least one was built, but later destroyed on purpose.  The US government told Kelly that the war was almost over and that "we" didn't need a plane that would go so fast.
Yep........ go figure.

   ~ ~ ~ jaknight ~ ~ ~

[tramp]

got a museum in az that has one too
at high altitude you probably can't feel the speed
near the ground you'd be screaming

[Freaky1]

There is one at the SAC museum in Nebraska, hanging right inside the entrance, had a picture of my son and I in front of it but can't find it, suck.

Anyway, one of the things that always impressed me was the fact that that plane was built without the aid of any computer and it is still one of the greatest planes ever.

[BobbyR]

Imagine this, the Wright Brothers first flight was 1903. The SR-71 entered service in 1966. In 63 years, the average persons lifespan we went from we went from a few seconds aloft to 3X the speed of sound.

[bucky katt]

I might almost give my left nut to go over mach3 in one of those!

as long i could keep the right one i would! and to think of the strong aversion i have to not having at least one body part touching the ground at all times...............


this paragraph had me totally entranced. what it must have been like to be the man that wrote it...............

One moonless night, while flying a routine training mission over the Pacific, I wondered what the sky would look like from 84,000 feet if the cockpit lighting were dark. While heading home on a straight course, I slowly turned down all of the lighting, reducing the glare and revealing the night sky. Within seconds, I turned the lights back up, fearful that the jet would know and somehow punish me. But my desire to see the sky overruled my caution, I dimmed the lighting again. To my amazement, I saw a bright light outside my window. As my eyes adjusted to the view, I realized that the brilliance was the broad expanse of the Milky Way, now a gleaming stripe across the sky. Where dark spaces in the sky had usually existed, there were now dense clusters of sparkling stars Shooting stars flashed across the canvas every few seconds. It was like a fireworks display with no sound. I knew I had to get my eyes back on the instruments, and reluctantly I brought my attention back inside. To my surprise, with the cockpit lighting still off, I could see every gauge, lit by starlight. In the plane's mirrors, I could see the eerie shine of my gold spacesuit incandescently illuminated in a celestial glow. I stole one last glance out the window. Despite our speed, we seemed still before the heavens, humbled in the radiance of a much greater power. For those few moments, I felt a part of something far more significant than anything we were doing in the plane. The sharp sound of Walt's voice on the radio brought me back to the tasks at hand as I prepared for our descent.



wow................just.......................wow


almost like a good, really good horseman describing "the" horse.

[Kframe]

I used to think the SR-71 was fast.

Then, in the mid-eighties, my Dad took my little brother and I (ages 10 and 8 ) to a dinner at the Officer's Club of Fort Snelling in MN.
Scott Crossfield (USN, ret.) was the speaker.  
Like I said, I was 10, so my memories are kind of random and spotty.  
I remember we had breaded Chicken Kiev, I'd never heard of it before, WOW, chicken filled with butter!  Awesome!  And the waiter was wearing a suit and tie and called me, 10 years old, sir!  It was surreal.  
I remember the black and white films, actual film reels on a projector, of the X-15.  And the slideshows, including some amazing and terrifying crash photos.  
I also got Mr. Crossfield's autograph on his official business card, I don't know where it is right now but it's around here somewhere.
His hands were huge and I felt like my palm was being crushed by his handshake, and his voice sounded like bearings in a can.  
I also remember hearing that the X-15 achieved speeds around Mach 6, or roughly 4,500mph.  
Yes, the Blackbird is still incredibly fast, and in a different league - but meeting one of the original space cowboys was pretty impressive on this young speed freak!




 
-K

[BobbyR]

I might almost give my left nut to go over mach3 in one of those!

as long i could keep the right one i would! and to think of the strong aversion i have to not having at least one body part touching the ground at all times...............


this paragraph had me totally entranced. what it must have been like to be the man that wrote it...............

One moonless night, while flying a routine training mission over the Pacific, I wondered what the sky would look like from 84,000 feet if the cockpit lighting were dark. While heading home on a straight course, I slowly turned down all of the lighting, reducing the glare and revealing the night sky. Within seconds, I turned the lights back up, fearful that the jet would know and somehow punish me. But my desire to see the sky overruled my caution, I dimmed the lighting again. To my amazement, I saw a bright light outside my window. As my eyes adjusted to the view, I realized that the brilliance was the broad expanse of the Milky Way, now a gleaming stripe across the sky. Where dark spaces in the sky had usually existed, there were now dense clusters of sparkling stars Shooting stars flashed across the canvas every few seconds. It was like a fireworks display with no sound. I knew I had to get my eyes back on the instruments, and reluctantly I brought my attention back inside. To my surprise, with the cockpit lighting still off, I could see every gauge, lit by starlight. In the plane's mirrors, I could see the eerie shine of my gold spacesuit incandescently illuminated in a celestial glow. I stole one last glance out the window. Despite our speed, we seemed still before the heavens, humbled in the radiance of a much greater power. For those few moments, I felt a part of something far more significant than anything we were doing in the plane. The sharp sound of Walt's voice on the radio brought me back to the tasks at hand as I prepared for our descent.



wow................just.......................wow


almost like a good, really good horseman describing "the" horse.

The other thing to consider is that at that altitude there is no turbulence whatsoever, at that speed the sound is all way behind you. I would imagine it would be quite peaceful.