“Center, Aspen 20, you got a ground speed readout for us?’ There was a longer than normal pause … “Aspen, I show 1,942 knots.” No further inquiries were heard on that frequency.
The Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird Mach 3 strategic reconnaissance aircraft maintained its position as the world’s fastest and highest-flying operational aircraft for approximately 24 years. It could survey 100,000 square miles of the Earth’s surface per hour from an altitude of 80,000 feet.
It is therefore not surprising that the aircraft has consistently broken records for both speed and altitude due to its astounding flight qualities.
Nevertheless, as SR-71 pilot Brian Shul describes in his book Sled Driver, the Blackbird wasn’t a simple aircraft to operate. “There were a lot of things we couldn’t do in an SR-71, but we were the fastest guys on the block and loved reminding our fellow aviators of this fact. People often asked us if, because of this fact, it was fun to fly the jet. Fun would not be the first word I would use to describe flying this plane—intense, maybe, even cerebral.”
However according to Shul “there was one day in our Sled experience when we would have to say that it was pure fun to be the fastest guys out there, at least for a moment. I’ll always remember a certain radio exchange that occurred one day as Walt (my back-seater) and I were screaming across Southern California 13 miles high. We were monitoring various radio transmissions from other aircraft as we entered Los Angeles airspace. Though they didn’t really control us, they did monitor our movement across their scope. I heard a Cessna ask for a readout of its ground speed. ’90 knots’ Center replied. Moments later, a Twin Beech required the same. ‘120 knots,’ Center answered. We weren’t the only ones proud of our ground speed that day…as almost instantly an F-18 smugly transmitted, ‘Ah, Center, Dusty 52 requests ground speed readout.’
There was a slight pause, then the response, ‘620 knots on the ground, Dusty.’ Another silent pause. As I was thinking to myself how ripe a situation this was, I heard a familiar click of a radio transmission coming from my back-seater. It was at that precise moment I realized Walt and I had become a real crew, for we were both thinking in unison.
‘Center, Aspen 20, you got a ground speed readout for us?’ There was a longer than normal pause … ‘Aspen, I show 1,942 knots.’ No further inquiries were heard on that frequency.”
Major Brian Shul narrates the story of this renowned ground speed check in the video that follows, which was shot at the Hiller Aviation Museum at San Carlos Airport in San Carlos, California.
Photo by Brian Shul / U.S. Air Force