SR-71 Speed Check Story – IOTW Report

SR-71 Speed Check Story

Thursday, 8 February 2024, 15:00 Claudia Uncategorized 33

I love this story! And it happens to be my favorite aircraft of the US military. Yeah, it’s a thing. Wanted to be a pilot since I was a kid.

33 Comments on SR-71 Speed Check Story

  2. A favorite of mine, too. He authored a book, SLED DRIVER, and only died within the past year. I wanted to buy the book for my son, was north of $600 a few years back. Amazing documentary on YT with his story. He did motivational speeches after his AF career ended.

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  3. I crack up every time I hear or read this. The SR 71’s and the U2’s use to fly out of Beale, slightly north of us. Occasionally you would see a U2. Never an SR71. Now they pilot most of the bigger drone missions out of there. The drones are half the world away. Cool stuff.

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  4. SR 71 is COOL AF–but you like it better than a North American P-51 Mustang, Vought F4U Corsair, Grumman P-38 Lightening, Douglas SBD Dauntless Dive Bomber, Grumman F6F Hellcat, Grumman TBM/F Avenger, Boeing B17, (Consolidated B24 is ugly–you get a pass on that one), Mitchell B25, Martin B26 Marauder, Douglas A26 Invader, Bell P39 Air Cobra–or P63 Kingcobra??? Just to name a few.. I like all of those planes (even the B24) more than the SR71–which didn’t have any weapons.

    Check yourself son..

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  5. Worked on the B52 “Stratofortress” wing center section replacement program at McConnell AFB in the mid 70’s and the “Blackbird” paid us a visit. OH! wait a minute, no it did not. That was a secret. I watched an airplane takeoff from McConnell, rotate immediately to vertical and fly straight up until it was out of sight. Damn, that was impressive.

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  7. It’ those damn Ramjet engines man. So cool.

    This never happened either, but back in the late 80’s early 90’s we built the housings for the replacement cameras for all of them. The shoe box sized housing we built, from aluminum, replaced this huge contraption with a rotating arm on top of it. I think it must have been the worlds very first ink jet printer. The damn thing probably weighed 1500 lbs. We saw some pretty cool pics of the interior, but that’s as close as we got.

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  10. The good old days of Oshkosh when great planes like the SR-71 flew in for the show. Such a spectacular time in aviation, I was a young’n and wanted desperately to be a pilot. Turns out when it came to applying myself to required credits like physics in college it just wasn’t my cup of tea. My favorites were and still are the warbirds and Oshkosh puts on a fantastic show every year. Can recommend 10/10, you should go.

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  11. @ecp — I only went to Oshkosh once, over 30 years ago, but still have wonderful vivid memories of that trip. I heartily second your recommendation. Anyone who has an interest in aviation needs to go at least once. But plan your trip well in advance! It does get crowded!

    The SR-71 speed check story is a long-time favorite of mine. I can just about hear the voices in my head. They almost drown out the other voices telling me about all the conspiracies! (-: šŸ¤

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  12. There’s two or three different versions similarā€¦

    Top This One for A Speeding Ticket!!

    Two California Highway Patrol Officers were conducting speeding enforcement on I-15, just north of the Marine Corps Air Station at Miramar . One of the officers was using a hand held radar device to check speeding vehicles approaching the crest of a hill. The officers were suddenly surprised when the radar gun began reading 300 miles per hour. The officer attempted to reset the radar gun, but it would not reset and then turned off.
    Just then a deafening roar over the treetops revealed that the radar had in fact locked on to a USMC F/A-18 Hornet which was engaged in a low flying exercise near the location.

    Back at the California Highway Patrol Headquarters the Patrol Captain fired off a complaint to the USMC Base Commander. The reply came back in true USMC style:

    Thank you for your letter. We can now complete the file on this incident.

    You may be interested to know that the tactical computer in the Hornet had detected the presence of, and subsequently locked on to your hostile radar equipment and automatically sent a jamming signal back to it, which is why it shut down.

    Furthermore, an Air-to-Ground missile aboard the fully armed aircraft had also automatically locked on to your equipment location.

    Fortunately, the Marine Pilot flying the Hornet recognized the situation for what it was, quickly responded to the missile system alert status and was able to override the automated defense system before the missile was launched to destroy the hostile radar position.

    The pilot also suggests you cover your mouths when cussing at them, since the video systems on these jets are very high tech.

    Thank you for your concern.

    Commander MCAS Miramar

    Semper Fi

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  16. The Blackbird used to fly out of Kadena AFB on Okinawa, back in the day, with the 6988 Electronic Security Squadron (or was it the 6990?). Anyway, I was coming around the back of the airstrip one afternoon. Blackbird was firing up in the hangar. From the time it left the hangar until it disappeared into the sky was 22 seconds. Probably the most fantastic thing I have ever seen in my life.

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  17. For some reason or another we had an unexpected visit by an SR 71 at NAS Miramar once back in 1973. I was working on the flightline and saw it coming in and was not expecting ever to see anything like that. The SR 71 landed and was immediately covered by a large tarp and taken by a tow tractor into a hangar and out of sight. I still don’t know why it landed at Miramar or why it was there. None of us at Miramar ever saw it leave either.

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  18. One of the Kelly Johnson stories (there are LOTS) that has enough corroboration that it’s likely true is that during the design and development of the SR-71 Johnson put a half dollar coin on his desk (some say it was a silver dollar), and bet the whole crew that every single piece of the SR-71 would have to be custom designed and machined. Even the screws and other fasteners were going to be unique, nothing off-the-shelf, even the aviation hardware shelf.

    No one ever collected.

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  19. Some time in the early 90s, I went to the SAC museum in Nebraska when visiting my sister. It was fascinating, but I nearly lost my mind when I walked outside and, there on the tarmac, sat a beautiful SR-71. I nearly knocked over an elderly lady (ok, she wasnā€™t really elderly ā€¦ and she was my mom) dashing to put my hands on the beautiful Blackbird!

    They had recently ā€œretiredā€ the SR-71 (to un-retire it in 1995 ā€¦ for a while), so they let us get right up to it and touch it. I reached up (on my tippy-toes because Iā€™m short, but the wings were fairly low when itā€™s not flying) and ran my fingers along the seam. I felt something fall into my hand, and thinking it was a bug, I looked at it (Iā€™m not scared of bugs). Not recognizing it for anything, I picked it up in my fingers (it was about the size of a big black ant) and feeling it give slightly, realized it was the sealant from the seam. Oh-oh!

    I looked around and hoped no one saw me rip off a piece of that valuable jet. Another Oh-no! Will it now crash when they fly it? Will I read how it plowed into a school bus full of children driven by a nun and killed them all? I put it in my pocket and continued to admire the beauty, knowing that my imagination was silly because I had read once that during flight, the sealant stretched and filled in to do itā€™s job properly as the wings were somewhat flexible. I might have misremembered it, but itā€™s something like that.

    I still have that piece of the SR-71 in my lock box. Shhhhhh, donā€™t tell anyone!

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  21. Claudia

    They build gaps in the entire plane. In fact it leaks fuel when they fill it. The reason being is it gets pretty hot when it flies and all the metal expands. I’m not sure how the keep the thing from blowing up when the first light the engines. I believe in it’s last couple years they put some sort of bladder inside the fuel tanks.
    That’s awesome you got that close to one. Very few people have.

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  22. Yes, Brad. Thanks for the explanation. I knew it was something like, but you said it better! hehe

    I wish I had a camera then, but that was before cellphones and cameras for selfies! But, as long as I have my memory, IT LIVES! šŸ˜‰

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  23. I understand that the plane was about 85% titanium and required a manufacturing process completely unlike aluminum plane manufacture. At speed and altitude, the metals expand and all but correct the leakage.

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  24. I was an Imagery Interpreter at Strategic Air Command Headquarters in Omaha. I viewed imagery from the SR-71 on occasion. It was pretty good, but nothing compared to the mind-blowing imagery from the KH-8 satellites.

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  26. I was out Buffing a ride one day near Mildenhall
    Have pics of an SR launch
    Happened to be at a lucky spot down the lane from the fish and chips shop. Many decades back so guess it’s ok to talk about it now. It was Fate ’91 or maybe ’92.

    I think they hosted some drag racing events on the runways those years too. Between there and Lakes an heath roads.

    Good Times

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  27. My fellow photo interpreters and I were at RAF Farnborough on September 1, 1974 when an SR-71 landed after breaking the speed record between New York and London. It was the first time the Europeans had ever seen one up close. The press was stunned at the sight of the Blackbird. The crowd of people just kept staring at it in silence. It’s as if they couldn’t believe what they were looking at. As USAF personnel, we were allowed to get closer than most. I still have several 35mm color slides of the aircraft.

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  29. Angus

    That’s true. It was the skins. Exactly what it sound like. They were anywhere from .125 to .093 in thickness, but 6A 4LV, the Ti of choice has an excellent memory and continues to try and assume it’s original shape. Not an issue today.

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  30. @Brad — The leaky plane didn’t blow up at start mostly because JP-7 is very hard to ignite. Starting the engines involved a start cart with tandem Buick V8 engines running at red line to turn them up to speed, then a shot of tetraethyl borane to get them lit. The TEB was also used to ignite the afterburners in flight.

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  31. Uncle Al

    you have no idea how much I appreciate you. I’m a simple man. Give me a picture and I’ll make a part that is exactly that. LOL. Ultimately, that’s my deal. And I enjoy the hell out of it. I will die on a machine shop floor.

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