SR-71--Now my Cobra feels Flaccid!

[David Kirkham]

Fellow Car Nuts:

I remember laughing when I posted

http://clubcobra.com/forums/showthre...hlight=flaccid

"Yea, we make the coolest cars on earth!" I said--not too humbly.

Then I read this and decided I am NOT worthy. The SR-71 is an AWESOME piece of machinery. Possibly the greatest piece ever made!

My father was a fuels officer in the Air Force and worked on the fuel delivery trucks to refuel those babies. He told me the first time they filled up a tanker the fuel ate through the tank and they ended up with a jellied puddle on the runway with everyone looking at each other. The General was pissed, of course, and said "FIX IT!" So, they ended up getting stainless steel tanker trucks to haul the fuel.

Enjoy!

David


http://maggiesfarm.anotherdotcom.com...-that-jet.html

[Brent Mills]

Fixed up the thread title.

[David Kirkham]

Thanks!

David

[dbn04]

great story!!!

[Venamm]

They should have called it a Cobra.....lol (do snakes fly?)

[lovehamr]

Originally Posted by Venamm

They should have called it a Cobra.....lol (do snakes fly?)

One of the places that the SR71 flew out of was Kadena AB, Okinawa. The locals and a good bit of the military called it "Habu." The real Habu is a variety of poisonous snakes indigenous to SE Asia including Okinawa. If you liked David’s story you'll probably like this site.

http://www.habu.org

Steve

[vettestr]

THANK YOU for the link

[David Kirkham]

Thudmaster,

We have been very fortunate to have all sorts of cool customers. If you have a chance, could you give me a call today at my office? Thanks!

Vettestr,

You are most welcome. It is a really, really cool story.

David

[J. T. Toad]

FYI the Smithsonian isn't the only place to get close to one...

http://www.elite.net/castle-air/index.html

[hey,littlecobra]

wow!!!!

an experience of a lifetime!!

I think I'm going to do this:
http://www.flightmuseum.com/docs/fof...swebposter.pdf

think it might be a similar experience???

k

[saltytri]

David K.:

Thanks for posting that. As skillful as those pilots are, few can convey the experience so well to those of us who are less fortunate.

David I.

[David Kirkham]

No problem for the link. Like my father in law says, "I know good art when I see it."

EDIT: See below...my BS meter is ticking...

David

[olddog]

Great reading and a sexy story, but I have to tell you, I think it was internet BS. Sorry to be the party pooper.

Quote (copy paste) from the link:
As inconceivable as it may sound, I once discarded the plane. Literally. My first encounter with the SR-71 came when I was 10 years old in the form of molded black plastic in a Revell kit. Cementing together the long fuselage parts proved tricky, and my finished product looked less than menacing. Glue,oozing from the seams, discolored the black plastic. It seemed ungainly alongside the fighter planes in my collection, and I threw it away.

Twenty-nine years later, I stood awe-struck in a Beale Air Force Base hangar, staring at the very real SR-71 before me.

end quote.

Ronald Regan declassified the SR71 in the 1980's, when this guy claimed to be flying the SR71 (the bombing of Libia was in the 1980's). 29 years before this, there were no plastic models to build as it was a clasified air craft at that time. Many other statement sounded quite fishy to me as well.

But if a SR71 doesn't give you a mental woody, you are not a man.

PS doing the math 29 years before the mid 1980's puts you in the mid 1950's. I do not think the SR71 was even a wild thought in the designers mind.

[thudmaster]

I live just outside Beale AFB in Yuba City. I have been on and off with the SR since 1969. No I did not fly this aircraft. We never thought it was really that classified. Flew in and out of the base day in and day out. During the base air shows people were allowed to get up close and personal looks into the cockpit. It is probally one of the finest aircraft ever to grace our skys.

Sorry to hear about your model............

[olddog]

Originally Posted by thudmaster

I live just outside Beale AFB in Yuba City. I have been on and off with the SR since 1969. No I did not fly this aircraft. We never thought it was really that classified. Flew in and out of the base day in and day out. During the base air shows people were allowed to get up close and personal looks into the cockpit. It is probally one of the finest aircraft ever to grace our skys.

Sorry to hear about your model............

In 1969 the SR71 was such a closely guarded secret that it only flew at night. It came out of the hanger with the power on and rolling. When landing it rolled into the hanger without stopping. These plane were never outside a hanger in daylight hours.

I worked with a guy who fueled the SR71 (ground crew) when it was flying over Vietnam. He never uttered a word about this plane until after it was declasified.

[thudmaster]

I watched it fly out in the day time also.........I know I was on the flightline with it.........your friend was fueling it with jp-7.......I watched that also. I am not here to argue about the plane. I am also a member of the Blackbird Association. People who disigned, built, maintained, and flew it.

[David Kirkham]

So Thudmaster...

What is your take???

BS?
True Story?
Not yet sure?

The part about the model does seem quite fishy.

David

[turnpike boy]

According to a Squadron/Signals Publications book I have (printed 1982), Lockheed was given the contract to develop the plane in 1959 and the first flight was April 26, 1962. Would have been tough to build a plastic model in the mid-50's of a plane that hadn't been designed yet.

Still, there's a lot in the story that parallels both the aforementioned book and the book that Ben Rich, Johnson's protoge', wrote a few years ago. So, maybe the author of the story does have some seat time in the projectile.

Although....neither his name, as a pilot, nor that of his RIO show up on the list contained in lovehamr's link.

[thudmaster]

Habu snakes usually only come out at night.....hence the referance.

[Historybuff]

I went to one at Riverside's March AFB just this year. Anybody can go, I had to pay a $10 entrance fee, but check for a website on SR71s and it will tell you when the next one is happening. At the one I went to, there were at least 4 to 5 former pilots, one of whom flew them so early he flew the two seater versions when they were still CIA planes. They also had an engine on display but not knowing engines, I couldn't tell how special it was from its first incarnation (for another plane) . One pilot told of aborting a take off, and plowing through a cornfield only to find his back seat man had ejected in panic. Another said he bailed out at 1600 mph but didn't get hurt, something about the rotation of the earth not making it as fast as it sounds.


The funniest comment was from one little old man (60's anyway) who said when he would go to parties after the plane was no longer secret and people would ask him "What'd you fly in the Air Force?" he would say "Blackbird" and they would say "Com'on, you're not tall enough and handsome enough to have flown that." Now he is a teacher at a Colorado branch of that famous Aeronautical school based in Florida.

There's a lot of parallels between Shelby American and the SR-71 program--a mere handful of men determined to succeed, against all odds, etc. etc. I like ithe SR a lot better than the Stealth fighter which to me relies way too much on computers to fly. The cockpit of the SR71 looks downright primitive! I always thought they missed their chance to rattle the Russkies--and would have liked to see one of those Blue Angelstyle flybys over Hanoi with six or so Blackbirds, each at a different altitutude and coming from a different direction, converging at Mach 2 over a set point over red square. It would have got their attention!