How slow can an SR-71 BLACKBIRD fly?

Fueled by Caffeine wrote: Saw that dude speak at a work function. Awesome. Found his speech here. Just cool http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_Gyd6EYuXI

Thanks for posting that. Awesome.

So...this lead to a flight speed record search.

I particularly like the entry for Felix. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_airspeed_record

Felix was falling THAT fast? Goddamn!

I could read the SR-71 stories all day long - thanks for sharing!

I got to see one fly over Oshkosh in 97. I will tell you in 20 straight years of going there, I've never seen the grounds STOP. Everyone, and I mean everyone had their eyes cast skyward. It was otherworldly.

Are there any left that are airworthy? Or have they all officially been grounded?

I'll leave this here...

I wish I could have seen one fly.

Last I heard NASA still has at least one. Not sure they are still using it though.

NASA also uses one of the last U2s for high atmospheric research.

I like those planes even more than the SR71

I did have the opportunity to visit Beal AFB when they were still operating them. No flights (they did a U2 flight) but there was an SR71 on the tarmac (drip pans everywhere for the fuel leakage). They are a bit smaller then you would expect.

28 August 1995: Second reactivated SR-71A (#61-7967) makes first flight after restoration.

19 October 1997: The last flight of SR-71B #61-7956 at Edwards AFB Open House.

9 October 1999: The last flight of the SR-71 (#61-7980/NASA 844).

Looks like 1999 was it.

One of it's last uses was for testing the aerospike:

I have an autographed copy of Brian Schul's book. Something comes to mind about cold dead fingers...He's one of us, he got that airplane. He writes about when he heard one take off for the first time. How the Sled was talking to him, and he was listening. If you can find a copy, it's prolly worth it.

mad_machine wrote: I like those planes even more than the SR71

Apples and oranges.

The U2 is really cool, the SR-71 is just a big pile of titanium 'murica berkeley yeah badassery. I mean cmon, we're talking about a plane whose missile avoidance strategy was to fly faster than the missile. The starter is made from TWO open header Buick Nailhead V8s!

Kenny_McCormic wrote: we're talking about a plane whose missile avoidance strategy was to fly faster than the missile.

Sounds like a damn good strategy.

Awesome story, thanks for posting!

http://www.sleddriver.com/

mndsm wrote: Are there any left that are airworthy? Or have they all officially been grounded?

There is a FB group for the SR-71 (called "HABU! SR-71" IIRC) and a surprising number of members and posters are retired ground crew members who worked on them right up to the end (plus a few actual pilots and radio operators). There was a discussion about this subject a few weeks ago and the basic answer is no. While there may be one or two that could be made air-worthy again (many were irrepairably cut up for transport to museum locations), one of the real issues is the current lack of support infrastructure. It's not a plane that you can simply fill up with fuel and go. Plus, the plane has been decommissioned for so long now that most (if not all) of the qualified pilots are now retired.

The "go faster to avoid missles" worked great up until the Soviets developed faster missles (Mach 5-6). I read an article recently that the F-14 was the first plane that could technically take down a SR-71 if it wanted to. The plane was fast enough to approximately intercept and it's missles were more than fast enough to take it down. The Soviets matched that capability with the (IIRC) Mig-35. In the same article there was an interview with a retired Mig pilot. He said they figured out they had 18 minutes from the time they spotted an SR-71 to interecept. While no SR-71 was ever shot down, they apparently recorded a number of missle-locks.

For the most part, the SR-71 didn't fly over Soviet air space. It's trick was it could fly high enough that it could peer deep into a country without havign to fly over it.

the problem with an air intercept and missile launch has to do with reaction time …

the SR-71 was so fast that it was overhead "almost" before defense systems had a chance to react … sure a ground missile launch could be done in time … but from the moment of sounding the alert, to manning an aircraft, to run-up/take off, to climb to altitude, to actual launch …

if the flight path was such that the "offended" nation had time to plot the flight path and launch ahead of the SR-71, then, yeah, there was a shot at taking one down

but remember reading on of the stories, where the pilot said the plane was eventually traveling at 1.6mi per sec … that's nearly 5800 mph … hard for anything to catch up with that … the only way would be to be out ahead of it to start with

this is based on the speed of sound being ~ 1 mi. per 5sec.

and he got his plane to 1.6mi. per 1 sec

so a rear chase would have been problematic

This plane was designed with slide rules in a back office at the Skunkworks 50 years ago. That's pretty amazing if you ask me. I have seen three of them in museums so far, and they still have warnings about classified stuff being inside so don't try to go in there. AFAIK, they never recorded an absolute top speed on the SR-71. They broke the speed record and recorded a speed, but the pilot was quoted as saying if something ever topped it, they would simply go up and put the hammer down a little more. I love that.

Kenny_McCormic wrote: The starter is made from TWO open header Buick Nailhead V8s!

would like to hear more about that....

pinchvalve wrote: This plane was designed with slide rules in a back office at the Skunkworks 50 years ago. That's pretty amazing if you ask me. I have seen three of them in museums so far, and they still have warnings about classified stuff being inside so don't try to go in there. AFAIK, they never recorded an absolute top speed on the SR-71. They broke the speed record and recorded a speed, but the pilot was quoted as saying if something ever topped it, they would simply go up and put the hammer down a little more. I love that.

So basicly it will continue to accelerate until you run out of fuel or reach the limit of the airframe and parts start coming off?

In reply to Gearheadotaku:

http://www.wvi.com/~sr71webmaster/ag330_sr.htm

Gearheadotaku wrote:

Kenny_McCormic wrote: The starter is made from TWO open header Buick Nailhead V8s!

would like to hear more about that....

http://www.sr-71.org/blackbird/

In reply to Gearheadotaku:

Probably, or the engines won't be able to cope with the airspeed, backfire, cause a loss of control, you'll break up, and maybe survive like this guy! http://www.thedigitalaviator.com/blog/?p=504

Kenny_McCormic wrote: In reply to Gearheadotaku: Probably, or the engines won't be able to cope with the airspeed, backfire, cause a loss of control, you'll break up, and maybe survive like this guy! http://www.thedigitalaviator.com/blog/?p=504

Holy E36 M3, what a story!

Kenny_McCormic wrote: The starter is made from TWO open header Buick Nailhead V8s!

This to me speaks volumes about what an accomplishment this plane truly was. Consider the relative crudeness of a Buick Nailhead to any modern engine, and look at how advanced the SR-71 is still to this day.

Makes you wonder what we've been keeping secret since then, doesn't it?