#sr 71

[usafphantom2]

This project was more secret than the Manhattan Project.

Dave Bloomberg photo he worked at Area 51 with the A-12s.

Most pictures of Area 51, the landscape is erased so you can’t tell where it is. This photo was not touched up.

You can see the mountain range around the Area.

This is a picture of an MD 21 out of the secret base in Nevada.

Linda Sheffield

@Habubrats71 via X

[frozen-banana-guacamole]

[redacted-metallum]

I was going through my phone (as you do) and I found these pictures from when I went to an air and space museum fucking forever (over two years) ago and I. Ough.

[itsonlycomic]

darkstar (commission on twitter)

[dronescapesvideos]

SR-71 in the paint shop, January 1965

➤➤ VIDEO: https://youtu.be/AulhUIUhtnU

[responsivethoughts]

The SR-71 Blackbird.

A spy plane that flew at approximately 70 to 85 thousand (21,000 to 25,000 meters) above Earth's sea level and cruised at speeds of 2,500 miles per hour ( 4,000 km per hour) is one man's most most amazing creation in its class for the purposes of intelligence gathering.

When the enemy fired missiles and other rockets at the Blackbird, the evasive maneuver was simply, acceleration and climbing.

Nothing could reach this machine that practically flew at the edge of Earth's atmosphere and beginning of solar system space.

Enemy aircraft would run out of fuel before they could even attempt to get close to the Blackbird.

Missiles would burn out of rocket fuel. On some instances, the SR-71 outsped missiles and bullets fired at it.

Architecture, engineering and operation of this machine is phenomenal. Even though we outlived its usefulness, it would be awesome to keep this aircraft functional for research and demonstration purposes.

[a-4skyhawk]

SR-71 Blackbird

[coolthingsguyslike]

[wheelsgoroundincircles]

Lockheed U-2 Reconnaissance aircraft

On September 13, 1985, Major Doug Pearson made history when he destroyed a satellite with a missile launched from his F-15.

Declassfied Footage From U2 Spy Plane

North American X-15 Rocket-powered aircraft

Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird Strategic reconnaissance aircraft

Lockheed NF-104A Aerospace Trainer

[gorrus]

[usafphantom2]

This is not a picture of a manufacturing assembly line

This is a picture of the SR 71 Program Depot Maintenance (PDM) input back shop at site 2 Palmdale, California. Directly under the titanium panels are the fuel tanks.

The triangle-shaped panels were for reducing the radar cross-section. Everything about this beautiful SR 71 had to be invented because of the high heat; traditional sealants to seal the panels would break due to the extreme temperature range from very, very cold outside to very, very hot inside the plane.

The SR-71 was trucked from Burbank, assembled at Palmdale, and Flight Tested, then delivered to Beale.

SR-71s would disappear while being rotated in and out of maintenance, so there is no certain tail number that only stayed at, for instance, Beale, Okinawa, or Mildenhall. I once asked my father Butch Sheffield, which SR-71 did you fly in? and he said ALL of them.

This picture shows a full-blown phased inspection where the entire aircraft and systems were thoroughly inspected. Every 800 hours, the plane would be sent south to Palmdale, California, for the Periodic Depot-level Maintenance (PDM) inspection performed by the Lockheed Skunk Works. This six-month-long inspection is where the aircraft is basically taken apart, inspected, modified, upgraded, put back together, and flight tested.

When making the A-12/SR -71 at Palmdale, they had trouble dealing with the titanium. Lockheed engineers used a titanium alloy to construct over 90 percent of the SR-71. Titanium was challenging to work with and unavailable in the United States in large amounts. It was available in Russia!

Lockheed did have a big problem early on;it discovered that spot-welded parts made in the summer were failing very early in their life, but those welded in winter were fine.

They eventually tracked the problem to the fact that the Burbank water treatment facility added chlorine to the water they used to clean the parts to prevent algae blooms in summer but took it out in winter. Chlorine reacts with titanium, so they began using distilled water from this point on.

Linda Sheffield

@Habubrats71 via X

[safety-pin-punk]

[tarasthesauceboss]

Lockheed NASA SR-71A Oct 1997 (landis)

[neutron669]

SR-71 in Wind Tunnel

[dronescapesvideos]

A brief story of a secret funding project for three Lockheed YF-12 aircraft. YF-12 Secret Funding 🎥 https://youtu.be/waIKmfA-lP8