The King of Speed

From The Inside ^ | Unknown

[jjr153]

Great story. In 1975, I was stationed at a base in Sacramento about 60 mi. south of the SR-71 home base. One morning I was down at the base motorpool which was near the end of the runway, with one of our ambulances for some routine maintenance. As I was standing outside waiting I hear a different sound over the runway, not the usual scream of an F-4 or F-111 so I’m watching the runway and all of a sudden there’s a SR-71 about 60 feet off the runway less than 1/4 mile away. It had done a touch and go, anyway, as soon as it cleared the end of the runway it hit the afterburners went basically vertical and was gone in a twinkling. I was thrilled, never saw or was as close to one again. What a sight, I’ll never forget it.

[ASOC]

lol

thanks for posting

[DuncanWaring]

Another longer story by Maj. Shul, containing the initially-referenced anecdote, here:

http://maggiesfarm.anotherdotcom.com/archives/7821-Major-Brian-Shul-I-loved-that-jet.html

[papasmurf]

Yes, it was mod’d with a rudder kit.

[jwparkerjr]

There were several of them at the little SW Alabama airport where I hung out as a kid who was in love with aviation. Don’t recall if any of them had the mods or not. That was long time ago! Just me and a tank nearly full of gas would probably exceed the maximum take off weight now days!