Air Force One

[da prez]

  A new airplane was cancelled by Trump. He said it was to much money. Into the billions. Boeing is entitled to make money , but not like this "Trump said".  Good on you Donald!
  I guess if hitlary was in she would have matching planes for all of the family at our expense.

                                         da prez

[Serk]

While Trump has tweeted his dissatisfaction with the deal, a president-elect tweeting something doesn't cancel a standing government contract...

Although it DOES bring the deal into the spotlight, which is always good!

[The emperor has no clothes]

While Trump has tweeted his dissatisfaction with the deal, a president-elect tweeting something doesn't cancel a standing government contract...

Although it DOES bring the deal into the spotlight, which is always good!

There really isn't a deal though. They just have a contract to research some technology for the planes. I think for 170 million.

[Jess from VA]

If I was the president, I'd rather take a copilot seat in an SR-71.  You get there WAY faster.  Almost nothing can shoot you down.  And you don't have to spend all that time with annoying people and reporters.

Gotta wear a funny suit though.


Still the bitchenest plane ever built.

[DirtyDan]

Broomstick one cleared for takeoff

Dan

[The emperor has no clothes]

  I guess if hitlary was in she would have matching planes for all of the family at our expense.

                                         da prez

What?   Pretty sure Hillary already had her own broomstick.

Broomstick one cleared for takeoff

Dan

News Flash guys. She lost. 

[Jess from VA]

 I guess if hitlary was in she would have matching planes for all of the family at our expense.

                                         da prez

What?   Pretty sure Hillary already had her own broomstick.

Broomstick one cleared for takeoff

Dan

News Flash guys. She lost.  

Ah, this started with "if" Hillary was in..................    

Just because she lost doesn't mean she shouldn't be in jail...... 

Or still fly a broomstick. 

Just ask Bill, he'll tell you so.  He's probably pissed she lost because she'll be home all the time now.

[old2soon]

bill the beast obama the TRAITOR kerry all in the same cell.  2 maybe 3days only be one left.  RIDE SAFE.

[Serk]

If I was the president, I'd rather take a copilot seat in an SR-71.

Ah HELLS yes! I've had an obsession about the Black Mamba since my teenage years, used to be able to rattle off every tail number of every airframe there ever was (Officially), where it was, what happened to the lost ones, etc. Took a detour on a "Dad and son crazy cross country trip" to Beale Air Force Base just so I could get a pic of myself by the guard shack at the front gates, etc, when I was 15...

I mean, the STARTER engine for those birds used a PAIR of Buick or Chevy V8's... For each engine!

I'd give up the left part of my reproductive system to be able to take a ride in one of those birds!

...and to think, it was designed back when all they had was graph paper and slip sticks!

[Jess from VA]

If I was the president, I'd rather take a copilot seat in an SR-71.

Ah HELLS yes! I've had an obsession about the Black Mamba since my teenage years, used to be able to rattle off every tail number of every airframe there ever was (Officially), where it was, what happened to the lost ones, etc. Took a detour on a "Dad and son crazy cross country trip" to Beale Air Force Base just so I could get a pic of myself by the guard shack at the front gates, etc, when I was 15...

I mean, the STARTER engine for those birds used a PAIR of Buick or Chevy V8's... For each engine!

I'd give up the left part of my reproductive system to be able to take a ride in one of those birds!

...and to think, it was designed back when all they had was graph paper and slip sticks!

I don't know as much about them as you.  I've seen them on the ground up close, and a flyby.

But I did know and drink beer with a former Commander of the 14th Air Division, (all SR 71's but the CIA's), and hang upside down from a bar in the ceiling in our boots and drink shots of tequila (with spotters).  He was a one-star at Beale with the SR 71 squadron.  At March where I knew him, he was the two-star deputy 15 AF Commander.  As a captain, he flew Ravens out of Thailand in combat operations in RVN.

He came to me for advice on his choice of a general officer's personal (semi custom) sidearm, and we worked up a Colt all steel Commander, and they did a very nice job on it, even Sambar Stag grips.

Back in the day.  http://www.af.mil/AboutUs/Biographies/Display/tabid/225/Article/107103/major-general-john-r-farrington.aspx

[Serk]

I've seen them on the ground up close, and a flyby.

*Jealous*

Best I've gotten was I snuck a touch of the nose  (Being 6'7" has advantages) of the SR71 at Smithsonian's Steven F. Udvar-Házy center a few years ago...

[DirtyDan]

I snuck a touch on board the intrepid back in the day

Dan

[Jess from VA]

Best I've gotten was I snuck a touch of the nose

Good thing it was a museum and not a flight-line.  

I got jacked up (while in uniform) across the yellow line with no flight-line badge one time.  No one actually aimed their rifle at me, but they were in their hands (not slung).  I surrendered right away.    

B1-B squadron at McConnell AFB KS, part an accident investigation.  I wasn't molesting any planes, I just walked where I wasn't supposed to be.  The maintenance commander, who my boss had been meeting with, came out and gave his security team a big pat on the back; they had recently done poorly on an ORI inspection in security, so I got the full treatment.  He thanked me too for being a good dummy.

He who is arrested, also serves.

You know, that museum out at Dulles Int'l is 40 minutes from me and I've not been there.

[Serk]

You know, that museum out at Dulles Int'l is 40 minutes from me and I've not been there.

Go, it's well worth it, even if you have to descend into a defenseless victim zone to get there...

Time well spent just wandering around there...



Also while you're in that neck of the woods head over to the NRA National Firearm Muesum located inside the NRA headquarters at 11250 Maples Mill Road in Fairfax... Lots of fascinating history to get a look at there as well!


(Still can't over just hot fat I was just 5 years ago!)

[Jess from VA]

Now I've been there, several times; and shot at their range.

You can't touch anything there, either. 

[Willow]

In 1976 (before some of us were born) I lived on the Marine base next door to an Air Force base on Okinawa.  The Japanese called the SR-71 the Habu.  It flew in and out fairly regularly.  It made one approach to land, no circle of the field and did not stop taxiing until it was inside its own hangar.  On take off as soon as it was airborne it would turn its nose straight up and disappear in seconds.

1976.  I'm told they would laugh at the surface to air missiles coming up at them.  1976.  Has anything superior yet been produced?  Speed and altitude, not combat.

[Wizzard]

There is one on display at my favorite museum. Wright Patterson AFB

[mike72903]

Years (decades?) ago I had read the SR 71 was the brainchild of and designed by one person.  Don't know how true that was.  Wiki has a nice write up on the Blackbirds complete history. Found it interesting. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_SR-71_Blackbird

[3fan4life]

You know, that museum out at Dulles Int'l is 40 minutes from me and I've not been there.

Go sometime, It's well worth the trip.



Shoot, I'll even go with you if you want.

[old2soon]

Years (decades?) ago I had read the SR 71 was the brainchild of and designed by one person.  Don't know how true that was.  Wiki has a nice write up on the Blackbirds complete history. Found it interesting. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_SR-71_Blackbird

               With out Even looking at the link-Kelly Johnson. RIDE SAFE.

[Jess from VA]

Shoot, I'll even go with you if you want.

Hey Mark.  Well I can find it on my own, but you're welcome up at my place anytime (with a little notice).

There's a lot of places and things to see up here I've never seen.  Mostly, I don't go because I have to navigate through bad traffic, everywhere.  And when I get on my bike, running around town is never on the list.  

Years ago, the wife and I decided to go to the National Zoo in DC; it's free and supposed to be nice.  The day before our trip, they had a family day, and some teen gang bangers had a gunfight inside the zoo and shot each other up, and a couple bystanders.  So I've never been there either.   I'd go with my bullet proof and combat load vests and slung AR, but that probably wouldn't go well either.  NoVA is safe enough, just perpetual bad traffic.

[scooperhsd]

In 1976 (before some of us were born) I lived on the Marine base next door to an Air Force base on Okinawa.  The Japanese called the SR-71 the Habu.  It flew in and out fairly regularly.  It made one approach to land, no circle of the field and did not stop taxiing until it was inside its own hangar.  On take off as soon as it was airborne it would turn its nose straight up and disappear in seconds.

1976.  I'm told they would laugh at the surface to air missiles coming up at them.  1976.  Has anything superior yet been produced?  Speed and altitude, not combat.

I've heard rumors, but nothing substantial. Heck,an F15 held the record for take off to 100,000 feet (the streak eagle project), but that may be broke by now. Certainly, F22 Raptor is very impressive, as are some of the Russian 5th Gen fighters.

Jet noise - the sound of freedom !

[Alpha Dog]

In 1976 (before some of us were born) I lived on the Marine base next door to an Air Force base on Okinawa.  The Japanese called the SR-71 the Habu.  It flew in and out fairly regularly.  It made one approach to land, no circle of the field and did not stop taxiing until it was inside its own hangar.  On take off as soon as it was airborne it would turn its nose straight up and disappear in seconds.

1976.  I'm told they would laugh at the surface to air missiles coming up at them.  1976.  Has anything superior yet been produced?  Speed and altitude, not combat.

I've heard rumors, but nothing substantial. Heck,an F15 held the record for take off to 100,000 feet (the streak eagle project), but that may be broke by now. Certainly, F22 Raptor is very impressive, as are some of the Russian 5th Gen fighters.

Jet noise - the sound of freedom !

If it exists and there is good reason to think it does than the Aurora would be in a class of its own at speeds of Mach 10 or above, and it may well be an unmanned craft.  I know the history channel did a bit about it a long time ago in the 90s and they mentioned clocked at Mach 14.  It was talked about extensively on Chuck Harder's For the People and on Art Bells Coast to Coast AM.  In the first half of the 90s the San Diego papers and press were talking about the sonic booms in the skys above.  They were so great they called them Sky Quakes.  It was also said they were dropped from transport planes like in the X project.  Their base was Area 51/Groom Lake.

In, I believe the fall of 95 or 94, while standing in a parking lot in Ranch Mirage, CA ( Palm Springs )  a glint of flash caught my eye while scanning the horizon.  I use to watch the KC 135 tankers go across the sky out of March AFB routinely.  I was able to fix on it.  It was the highest object I had ever seen in the sky and it blasted across the sky in less than 30 seconds.  It was much faster and higher than any F15 to 18 I had witnessed.  I was taken back by the speed it achieved and its course was towards Groom Lake.  I thought to myself that must be the Aurora.  Later that year I was talking with a 3 or 4 star Air Force General.  I got to talk to them on a limited basis all the time, some were retired, some active.  I always asked them about UFOs and never got any answer.  Of course I knew that knowledge was kept from most of them and I expected as much.  This time I asked one 3 star about the Aurora.  He gave me know answer.  Then I said I hear it can go Mach 14.  Well this General got all wide eyed and sort of yelled at me " Where in the hell did you hear that? I could tell I hit a nerve.   I told him the History Channel "  He shook his head as if I had gotten into it, and huffed off.  If it exists, and I believe it did,  I am not sure it was simply experimental for future craft or If it took over spy efforts.  It just never made sense to put the Blackbird out of service unless you had something better.

[Jess from VA]

It just never made sense to put the Blackbird out of service unless you had something better.

Satellites were better, with unbelievable imaging (license plates and faces), lots of them.  The 71 was an incredibly complex plane and expensive to maintain, with an entire infrastructure of men, maintenance, air refueling requirements, and risk.  Satellites don't get shot down, and when they fly over other nations in space, it is not an act of war (as are reconnaissance aircraft).

We still have and use U2/TR1s when necessary.  And other recon aircraft also still exist.     

[Willow]

While there are a lot of records out there, I honestly question them on military items, events and records such as posted above.    I find it hard to believe some of that isn't in general terms.   I mean really, why would we tell the world what such a weapon system or spy plane is capable of?    But then, some administrations freely put out information.

I have wondered if they ever released real/true information on the Blackbird.  ...

When I was active duty the word was that the SR-71 held several distance speed records such as across the continental U.S.  Scuttlebutt was that it could have done more but they only did what was required to get and hold the record.

[Willow]

...
But that was long ago and most likely out of date by now.   They don't use horse drawn stuff still do they?

Yes.  Most of the world's advanced military powers have moved well away from the horse drawn satellites.

[Rams]

...
But that was long ago and most likely out of date by now.   They don't use horse drawn stuff still do they?

Yes.  Most of the world's advanced military powers have moved well away from the horse drawn satellites.

Pegasus will be missed.   

[Bighead]

Jet noise - the sound of freedom !

I live only about 4 miles from a military base and see fighters flying all the time and smile every time one passes over

[Oss]

A Horse has no complex electronics, of course

Soon tiny drones will do the job, heck they may already be doing some jobs

Got to see lots of fine jets on approach runs when I rode out to Psycho and F6gals place as there is a base off the main road near Surprise AZ

Seen the Blackbird on Intrepid, mighty awesome machine indeed

Once flew under a Concorde as it was flaring in for a landing at JFK

That sucker was  L O U D

[scooperhsd]

Once flew under a Concorde as it was flaring in for a landing at JFK

That sucker was  L O U D

The Concord or the SR71 ?

I stayed at the BOQ at NAS Pensacola.  Practically on the main departure route. The Training Command planes weren't too bad , but when something from the fleet was leaving - you had NO problem distingushing them....



That line was from one of Tom Clancy's books -

[MarkT]

Used to be SR71's based out of U-Tapao during the nam.  U2's also.  If on the flightline they would put a covering structure over the cockpits, the area roped off, armed guards and "deadly force authorized" signs.  I had no inclination to get closer.

Speaking of satellites, I had no idea there were so many until I got a hot tub out here on the ranch well away from the city so the sky is - was pretty dark.  For the first couple hours after dark you can see satellites pretty much constantly. Most of them on a polar orbit.  BTW you can also see the space station go over - the 3rd brightest object in the sky.  Go to nasa.gov and sign up with your zip code for emails indicating it's path over you.  You need to renew that signup periodically it times out.  Anyway I can't imagine nowadays ducking from being viewed by satellites.  Might as well be under cover all the time.

[RP#62]

Used to be SR71's based out of U-Tapao during the nam.  U2's also.  If on the flightline they would put a covering structure over the cockpits, the area roped off, armed guards and "deadly force authorized" signs.  I had no inclination to get closer.

Speaking of satellites, I had no idea there were so many until I got a hot tub out here on the ranch well away from the city so the sky is - was pretty dark.  For the first couple hours after dark you can see satellites pretty much constantly. Most of them on a polar orbit.  BTW you can also see the space station go over - the 3rd brightest object in the sky.  Go to nasa.gov and sign up with your zip code for emails indicating it's path over you.  You need to renew that signup periodically it times out.  Anyway I can't imagine nowadays ducking from being viewed by satellites.  Might as well be under cover all the time.

This is another good site:
https://www.n2yo.com/

-RP

[3fan4life]

In 1976 (before some of us were born) I lived on the Marine base next door to an Air Force base on Okinawa.  The Japanese called the SR-71 the Habu.  It flew in and out fairly regularly.  It made one approach to land, no circle of the field and did not stop taxiing until it was inside its own hangar.  On take off as soon as it was airborne it would turn its nose straight up and disappear in seconds.

1976.  I'm told they would laugh at the surface to air missiles coming up at them.  1976.  Has anything superior yet been produced?  Speed and altitude, not combat.

I've heard rumors, but nothing substantial. Heck,an F15 held the record for take off to 100,000 feet (the streak eagle project), but that may be broke by now. Certainly, F22 Raptor is very impressive, as are some of the Russian 5th Gen fighters.

Jet noise - the sound of freedom !

If it exists and there is good reason to think it does than the Aurora would be in a class of its own at speeds of Mach 10 or above, and it may well be an unmanned craft.  I know the history channel did a bit about it a long time ago in the 90s and they mentioned clocked at Mach 14.  It was talked about extensively on Chuck Harder's For the People and on Art Bells Coast to Coast AM.  In the first half of the 90s the San Diego papers and press were talking about the sonic booms in the skys above.  They were so great they called them Sky Quakes.  It was also said they were dropped from transport planes like in the X project.  Their base was Area 51/Groom Lake.

In, I believe the fall of 95 or 94, while standing in a parking lot in Ranch Mirage, CA ( Palm Springs )  a glint of flash caught my eye while scanning the horizon.  I use to watch the KC 135 tankers go across the sky out of March AFB routinely.  I was able to fix on it.  It was the highest object I had ever seen in the sky and it blasted across the sky in less than 30 seconds.  It was much faster and higher than any F15 to 18 I had witnessed.  I was taken back by the speed it achieved and its course was towards Groom Lake.  I thought to myself that must be the Aurora.  Later that year I was talking with a 3 or 4 star Air Force General.  I got to talk to them on a limited basis all the time, some were retired, some active.  I always asked them about UFOs and never got any answer.  Of course I knew that knowledge was kept from most of them and I expected as much.  This time I asked one 3 star about the Aurora.  He gave me know answer.  Then I said I hear it can go Mach 14.  Well this General got all wide eyed and sort of yelled at me " Where in the hell did you hear that? I could tell I hit a nerve.   I told him the History Channel "  He shook his head as if I had gotten into it, and huffed off.  If it exists, and I believe it did,  I am not sure it was simply experimental for future craft or If it took over spy efforts.  It just never made sense to put the Blackbird out of service unless you had something better.

Stumbled across this on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/Y9MaP-J5ps8
SR-91 Aurora