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March 08, 2008
Saturday
 
 
Tales of a Blackbird
Dale Amon (Belfast, Northern Ireland/Laramie, Wy)  Aerospace

Earlier today business partner Jim Bennett passed this SR-71 story along to me.

Mach 3.5 at 80,000 MSL... It just makes me go all quivery inside.

SR-71 on USS Intrepid museum flight deck in Manhattan.
Not a single SR-71 was scrapped: every last one has been given an honoured and well-cared for retirement.
Photo: copyright Dale Amon, All Rights Reserved
Comments

It is a crying shame that these beautiful creatures should be grounded (if indeed they all are, are there any still flying?). They belong in the air, on the ground they just look ungainly and out of place.


Posted by mandrill at March 10, 2008 01:06 PM

Of course those carrier landings at high Mach numbers were murder...


Posted by Zoe Brain at March 10, 2008 01:24 PM

Sorry to get all pedantic on you, but if that in the plane that's on the Intrepid in New York, then its an A-12 and not an SR-71.

BTW do you know if the story is true about LBJ getting the designation backwards. It was supposed to be the RS-71 but after the President refered to it as the SR-71 they were stuck with that?


Posted by Taylor at March 10, 2008 02:46 PM

If you read the linked story they scotch that myth!

Beautiful indeed. I especially liked the comment "I pulled the throttles to idle just south of Sicily, but we still overran the refueling tanker awaiting us over Gibraltar".

Didn't realise that the one on display in Duxford is the only one outside the US. Yeah! I went to the airsho there and spent most of my time inside gazing at this instead.


Posted by manuel II paleologos at March 10, 2008 03:02 PM
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