[petek]

"A few months later they had a decomissioning ceremony for the plane and I was again lucky enough to be able to attend - this time the plane was allowed to taxi up to the waiting crowd - who all applauded it."

Me too!

A friend's cousin worked on the U2's and got us permission to go into a hanger housing one of the SR-71s. We got to walk all around and under the plane but couldn't get anywhere near the cockpit.

I remember they had one SR-71 do a high altitude, high speed pass over the airbase during the decomissioning. So that folks could see the flight path of the aircraft, the pilot had to change alitude time and again. The change in altitude over presurized the fuel bladders which then caused fuel to come out the back of the aircraft. The result was a dotted line in the air, something like a contrail but made with unburnt fuel.

Truly an amazing aircraft!