Ultimate piece of gear - possible Lockheed Blackbird sighting or help me ID it!!

[Paul_B]

Help please! I was driving back from Kendal via back roads and spotted something in the sky. I couldn't make it out at first as it looked like a black object with things dangling below it. Anyway I focussed on it (and not my driving, sorry to that car) and realised it was a plane like none I'd seen before. I have no idea what it is but I've been frantically googling military planes as it was so unusual that it had to be military. Anyway if anyone can help with its identification I'd be grateful.

It was black, long fuselage with relatively small delta wings right at the back. I didn't spot the engines but reckon it had two as there were two black vapour trails. Yes thin black trails coming from the wings. It was hard to work out the size but I think it is larger than fighter jets by some way. I have seen prototype Typhoons flying pretty close as I used to live on the hill above a BAe site and they used to fly in the valley underneath the ridge line. I say that because I know what a typhoon looks like and its size as seen from a moving vehicle.This plane I saw today had slightly flattened almost fins near the slightly wider front of the plan fuselage. My best guess that was underneath the cockpit but not 100% on that.

Anyway my research online makes me wonder if it is a blackbird which is totally daft as I didn't think anything like that was over here. In the images of this blackbird I think the one I saw is not as wide at the flattened side bits near the cockpit but it was hard to be sure. I also thought it was smaller than what I always thought the Blackbird was. I thought the Blackbird was a really long plane this was bigger then jet fighters but smaller than a Boeing 747 in length.

I am totally shocked. I saw something unusual but it can't be a Blackbird can it?? PS I've never seen a UFO and don't believe in them so I'm not a crank honest!!!

 

[R.Lewis]

Wouldn't be too surprised if it was a blackbird. Used to see them alot round here. One was so low it shook the house one day! You are correct about them being somewhat bigger then the fighters, they were originally designed as a bomber!

 

[bushwacker bob]

blackbird.

 

[Paul_B]

How big are they anyway? I'd always thought they were quite big like that spy plane U2??

So they are in the UK? This was low down (actually not far off level with me on the road I was on) and moving very slowly. Its engines were working a bit I think as the black trails came an went as it manoeuvred. Why on earth would it bother coming north to Kendal?? Did the pilot want a weekend in the Lakes or something? Why come up here to this aviation backwater? Although you do see hawks and tornados doing the shadow tracking thing up here and over the pennines too. It was going quite slow though. My thoughts at one stage was it was in some difficulty the speed it was going. Anyway I think I'll treat it as a new plane tick, not that I tick them. It was a nice plane but I still prefer my favourite ever plane the Harrier followed by the vulcan. Really want to see one of those flying. Will have to be quick as I think there is only one in flying condition. IIRC they were on Anglesey way I think and I used to go there a lot when the were still operational.

 

[Mesquite]

Won't have been an SR-71... they've all been grounded and a lot of them are now in museums

 

[Bigfoot]

^
Agreed, unlikely to be a Blackbird, although Paul B's description sounds like one. What else do we have flying around the UK? There is a restored Vulcan which has a huge delta wing but it's not black and the fuselage is not as long and slender as the Blackbird. The B2 bomber isn't long and slender either. Maybe the Russians are doing their incursions again?

 

[FGYT]

yep Blackbird was retired some years ago not one to sell on to private pilots

 

[sapper1]

Aurora??????

 

[Kepis]

There are a couple of two seat SR71's flying with NASA for research purposes, but very doubtful in fact nigh on impossible they would be seen over here, smoke from the wingtips is probably nothing more than a pressure vortex created in damp air, these can appear to be very dark depending on the lighting levels and the direction of the light, ie in shadow, the speed is a relative thing.

Just my 2p

 

[FGYT]

I had the Red arrows fly over earlier today ust be jumping between shows

 

[Kepis]

Might have been refueling at Bournemouth Duncan, it's a fairly regular fuel stop for them

 

[FGYT]

Might have been refueling at Bournemouth Duncan, it's a fairly regular fuel stop for them

yep we see em quite often...

we are also a fly over for Chinooks and Apache at low level which brings back my youth the used to hop the power lines at my parents at all hrs


ATB

Duncan

 

[wingstoo]

F16XL perhaps

http://www.af.mil/shared/media/photodb/photos/110513-F-9999T-921.jpg

 

[santaman2000]

I think even the NASA Blackbirds have been retired. Last I heard there are no longer any pilots qualified to fly them. Not certain about that though.

It's a shame too. I've just been crunching numbers and here are the results:

SR-71 top speed = classified but at least Mach 3+ (Mach 1 is about 620)
Mach 3 = 620mph x 3 = 1860mph = 31 miles/minute = .517 miles per second = 2729.76 feet per second.

Speed of a lead cast 30-06 bullet; around 2500-1700 feet per second. Gives a certain reality to the term, "faster than a speeding bullet."

 

[Kepis]

F16XL perhaps

http://www.af.mil/shared/media/photodb/photos/110513-F-9999T-921.jpg

Looks like an F-35 in the pic ?

 

[Kepis]

yep we see em quite often...

we are also a fly over for Chinooks and Apache at low level which brings back my youth the used to hop the power lines at my parents at all hrs


ATB

Duncan

aye, we get the Chinooks & Apaches here along the coast from you too, along with the odd Lynx, Gazelle & just recently flights of RAF Puma's

 

[ged]

...Gives a certain reality to the term, "faster than a speeding bullet."

STS135 was doing about five miles per second all last week. ISS still is.

 

[Retired Member southey]

Just to say if you think it was a sr71 you would have been easily able to see the engines, they are MASSIVE,

But as the others have said, they are grounded, sure it wasn't swamp gas?

 

[wingstoo]

Looks like an F-35 in the pic ?

I'm having probs with the photos at the moment, can't seem to upload the right stuff...with the correct text that goes with it...

How about this pic of the SR71 with the F16XL

http://www.allbestwallpapers.com/aircraft-sr-71_blackbird_and_f-16xl_wallpapers.html

 

[Andy BB]

Just a thought, but are there still some Canberras still flying?