I live in NYC and they've got one of these things on the deck of the USS Intrepid (a carrier docked along the West Side Highway), and every time I pass it, I get a little angry at myself for not becoming a Navy pilot.

/\ I went to see that when I was in New York but the guide book had the wrong opening hours for the intrepid.. d'oh! I settled for gazing from a nearby walkway. These have to be the coolest looking planes ever. Never too late to retrain maybe?

IT'S WHISPER QUIET.

>> ^Maze:
IT'S WHISPER QUIET.


WHAT?!

I believe it is engineered with gaps between the plates of it's body, etc. Everything is a perfect fit at high speed (and heat)..

Not that that stops engine noise.

To solve that problem they were fitted with special "slippa'" mods.

My kids went to space camp last summer in, of all places, Hutchinson, KS. They have a great space museum there with an SR 71 hanging in the lobby. An awesome machine. I think they still have one at the SAC museum outside Lincoln, NE as well.

Rhesus: Did Navy pilots ever fly the SR-71? It seems like it would be the USAF. I'm pretty darn sure the SR-71 has never taken off or landed on a carrier.

Wikipedia page for SR-71 has no mention of the Navy.

^ No, but I think there's an SR-71 there as part of the small aircraft museum on the deck.

I want to see it fly by at Mach 3.

what's the point of a low-altitude flyby if it's not even supersonic?

>> ^jwray:
what's the point of a low-altitude flyby if it's not even supersonic?


What's the point of your post if it does not bring anything to the conversation?

awesome. Like something from star wars.

>> ^vault_0:
>> ^jwray:
what's the point of a low-altitude flyby if it's not even supersonic?

What's the point of your post if it does not bring anything to the conversation?

What's the point of your FACE?!

nice post.

Flies fast, handles like a slug (by today's standards). Interesting design, but not very environmentally friendly The sucker leaks fuel out of its seams on the tarmac. Only once it takes off and starts to fly at speed for a while does the metal expand and start to seal the thing up. I saw one of these at the Air and Space museum. Beautiful plane for sure.

SR did its job.. reconnaissance. I wouldn't want to be in one in combat... its best defense is flying at very high altitude and high speed. Spy satellites and long range unmanned drones do the same job these days.

The Blackbird is a fascinating aircraft. It appears to be a complete failure when you look at its design goal vs the final product. It was designed to be highly stealth and have a minimal radar cross signature. In reality it has one of the largest signatures and can be detected at several hundred miles away. As honkeytonk says, the fuselage panels fit loosely until warmed up from friction by flying at high speed. The bird would take off and circle around at high speed, dumping fuel all the while, and then be refueled in the air once the panels had expanded.

Despite this, it was still an amazingly successful aircraft with an almost unheard of 33 years service (1966-1999). As their stealth design proved to be largely ineffective, they were fired upon frequently, but not one was ever shot down. Standard missile evasion was to crank the throttle up to top speed; the missile would either be unable to keep up or run out of fuel before it did.

They just blew my life's salary on that one flyby.

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