The USAF ordered 93 F-12B Blackbird Mach 3+ Interceptors, each of which was equipped with three Hughes AIM-47A Falcon air-to-air missiles in secure compartments at the fuselage’s bottom On February…
‘I am really tired of hearing the “LA speed story” so I thought I would relay a mission that gives real perspective to the speed of the Blackbird,’ David Peters,…
According to the story, President Johnson intended to call the Blackbird the “RS-71,” but he misread the letters, and said “SR-71.” The following story appears in Col. Richard H. Graham’s book…
“How about solid waste? We just had to control any urges. There was occasional incidents; no names mentioned here!” Richard H. Graham, SR-71 pilot In the following story, which appears in Col.…
“With no drag chute doors, the drag chute had departed the aircraft and was lost at sea. We were grateful to the Lockheed engineers for designing the drag chute to…
“Like every other crew, we wanted this mission. It was special, it was a first, it would cover territory that the jet had never been in, and it would provide…
The first of a series of Silverjavelin-coded long-distance, high-speed, high-altitude test flights took place on January 27, 1965. In about one hour and forty minutes, article Number 129 flew the…
The contract for the first six U-2s the CIA bought is the subject of an urban legend David Peters, an SR 71 pilot, was accepted into the program in 1976…
The most concerning MiG-25 reconnaissance trip had place on October 10, 1971, when two Foxbats flew at Mach 2.5 and extremely high altitudes parallel to the Israeli and Sinai Mediterranean…
“With no forward visibility from the back seat, my RSO was looking through his view sight and had picked up the sequence of flashing lights beneath the aircraft. It was…