Sorry about the video quality folks! 🙃We'll re-shoot it next time the SR-71 crew are in town, and do something even more in-depth. If you want a close look at anything specific, let us know by replying below before we close the cockpits next week!
Thank you so much for this, Air Zoo! The SR-71 has captured my imagination since I was a kid. This is the most comprehensive video of the aircraft itself I think I've ever seen. This is the best tour ever, short of getting a guided tour in person!
You built up hype by setting a premier for a video that looks like it was shot with a dirty potato? My thumbs down is for the awful video quality combined with the fact you made it a premier that sat in my recommended for the last day... only to turn out as an epic disappointment. It's disrespectful to this former instructor to waste his time with such terrible video quality. You know better, so do better. No excuses.
Funny how these things stick with you. It’s been years, but if you stuck me back in a Tomcat, I am 100% certain I could still remember everything in the front seat, and Gonzo could still remember what all the switches in the back did, cause I sure can’t 😀. That was the most realistic part of the new Top Gun movie. Maverick remembered about the pilots seat, but like he told Rooster, “I don’t know. That was your dad’s job.”
Amazing that this instructor probably hasn’t done this in 40 years but remembers it like it were yesterday. Great job. He tied in everything Graham and Thomas discussed while flying the SR.
Before sitting there as a candidate he was already a trained pilot, he's likely in the top 5 of a class with 50, after being a trained pilot in the front seat, they had to get 300 hours in a back seat sim and pass without a single mistake, sure he flew thousands of hours, that stuff is written inside his brain forever..
Early cold war technology is still amazing. Especially when the host was talking about loading star charts! I just wish the protective film was removed from the camera...it looks blurry. Otherwise, thank you, really cool!
2000mph and 600*F+.....they used to hold their ration tubes---like a toothpaste tube...against the canopy to heat them up a bit before they ate them.....if you set your home oven at 450*F and let it get hot and touch it....it WILL brand you
And if you have an engine unstart at cruise speed the turbulence and upset will cause the whole plane to break apart, and you’ll get a forceful ejection at supersonic speeds
@@loganbaileysfunwithtrains606 ...NEGATIVE there ghostrider....when the stability control systems were being refined, it was quite common to get an unstart and not destroy the aircraft......one pilot described it as like being 'in a train wreck', but it was not destructive of the aircraft.....and there were several pilots who reported that they had multiple unstarts on the same mission.
@@ssnerd583 there was an accident involving the loss of an SR-71 due to the engine unstart, the pilot landed in a field where a farmer picked him up in his crop sprayer helicopter and flew him to the hospital
@@loganbaileysfunwithtrains606 ....unstarts didnt always lead to destruction of the aircraft......and the incident you note, I believe, was a double unstart
My great grandpa worked on that. He was a contractor from Minneapolis-Honeywell, and I have some never before seen photos. I wish I knew more of his involvement but from the pictures I have I believe he was a head or director of the Honeywell involvement in the black project. What's insane is that's a role where he knew more and kept secrets from the CEO of Honeywell. He would ride a black bus with blacked out windows, he'd leave his house with a briefcase handcuffed to his arm. He'd fly janet flights and wouldn't tell the family a peep. I thought he worked for Lockheed most of my life until I looked into it more and more info came out which revealed he was at Honeywell.
I'm old enough to remember when this view was 100% off limits to anyone without a security clearance. First time I got any kind of look at an SR-71 was about 1993 at the air museum at Warner-Robbins and the interior was not visible, and most of the important instruments were removed. Then in 2015 I saw one at the Evergreen museum and they had some of the gadgets on display. But the kid in me is very excited to finally see the cockpit of one! Now if only Evergreen would let me sit in it I'd be 5 years old again!
SR71 Instructor..! When this guy is talking you know he is one of the best. Retired, getting on, but perfect memory and confidence in what he is telling us..! Awesome..! Thankyou.
Ive learned to run some big yellow construction machines in the past .. this is the COOLEST and most informative instructor tour Ive ever seen. Thanks for posting!
i loved sitting at a museum with a some family friends, a married couple, looking at one of these aircraft when one of them said "i remember working with this when it was classified", their spouse (the other in the group) looked over and said "you were on that project also!?", they were both CIA back in the day, married, and didnt know they were both dealing with intel that came from these birds, my dad was also there and had some loose connections from his job so it spawned some interesting conversations that i wish i had paid more attention to
This was a great video. I really enjoyed listening to him describe everything. Sr-71 crews were the best of the best. I'd bet with the money spent on keeping them in the air each jet was a hundred million dollar investment. Just really fascinating.
👏Unbelievably remarkable engineering, especially those J 58 engines. Just incredible accomplishments, the temperatures overcoming, the structure of this Beautiful Bird. Hard to believe this plane 🦨 has been around the sun as many times as I have. No wonder it was/is my favorite aircraft since I was born and will always be.
Simply, wow. Hard to believe the technology and pace at which that was developed that long ago. Guessing there was a lot less red tape in the way then...
There was always a tone of red tape. But not inside the Skunkworks. Lockheed and Kelly Johnson kept the staff small and the bypassed all of normal layers of management and reported in to the very top of the organization.
I remember a time where even a glimpse of the inside of this aircraft's cockpit was severely off limits for most anyone that didn't have a mission critical reason to see it. Now we can see what was at one time so secret. Just awesome.
@@jaman878 the B model was never mission capable. It was designed as a trainer and a trainer only. We never even thought about gutting it to make it an A model which could not be done.
It was amazing how they must have to commit all of these gauges and switches to memory because half of them he probably couldn’t even really see with a space suit on.. especially the ones on the lower sides
“Two fire lights, that we’d rather not see…” 😄 Great video and even though it’s weaponless - there’s clearly a lot to think about. Interesting point about the lack of comms with the tanker too. That astro-tracker is amazingly accurate for its vintage, as well.
I did not expect it to burn as much fuel as it does. The burn rate in those first thirty minutes is insane. I'm also surprised they move the CG back when going supersonic. I would expect the craft to be more stable with the CG more in the front. Really interesting video.
It is more stable with a forward CG but more efficient with an aft CG. When going supersonic they were probably worried more about efficiency than stability being the control movements were minimal.
@@michaelarlen7805 That is anotger thing I don't understand. How does moving the CG back make it more efficient at supersonic speeds? I assumed the craft is stable enough to not really do any corrections. Even then, I thought moving the CG only made it more sensitive. I also thought it didn't have any noteworthy angle of attack either. Amateur questions, I know. I don't know more than the bare minimum basics of aerodynamics, and practically nothing about trans/supersonic flight.
@@olekaarvaag9405 I know little about the aerodynamical differences between subsonic and supersonic flight on the airframe. I do know the basics that under subsonic flight an aircraft can achieve higher speeds with a more aft CG but at the cost of stability. The airplane is more stable at a more forward CG but can’t achieve higher speeds. It comes down to how much downward force the tail has to produce to counter the forward CG. More force on the tail means more drag, but more stability. I assume even at supersonic speeds it still applies.
@@olekaarvaag9405 It's a good question. What Michael A. above said, is true, and it's true for both sub- and supersonic, Cessna 172 to SR-71. An aft CG is less stable, but more efficient. So it's a trade-off, and there's a maximum aft limit the CG can be at; if it's aft of that limit then the stability is dangerously low. But one thing that happens when accelerating into the supersonic regime, is that the airflow around the wing changes such that the center of pressure moves aft, which increases the stability. This means that the aft CG can go further aft while still saying safe, while taking advantage of the extra efficiency.
There are a lot of smart people today but we don’t have a growing number of SR 71 instructor smart people like this man. It’s a shame we can’t bottle his abilities.
It is amazing to hear an expert's perspective on the most exceptional aircraft ever built... And it makes me think about the designers who told him everything he knows. What else is hidden behind words like "that's how this switch works"
This is after 9 months of simulator where they can wash you out anytime then as well. That’s why only 86 front and 86 backseaters ever flew operational in 22 years.
That astrotracker sounds amazing. I know that in the early days, they did sextant based celestial navigation with the propeller planes, but I had no idea there was an automated system with that level of detail.
Amazing that you can go somewhere and see these exhibits. The leap in technology in the 60's was phenomenal with the Apollo program, the A12 and Blackbird being the pinnacle. You could by the end of that decade buy a ticket and travel at supersonic speed with Concorde. All the things that are being said now about building bases on the moon and manned landings on Mars were being said as realistic goals back then. But upon the cancellation of the Apollo program the big dreams felt like they were reigned in, that exotic engineering and the skills of those who could do such and that even now most would struggle to replicate if at all was exchanged for sending manufacturing contracts overseas where cheaper labour and the quality it buys are found. To the point now you have some who are adamant that it never even happened, we have windmills to generate electricity and people have gone back to burning wood to heat their room.
I am one of the adamant. This demonstration video highlights many reasons why. Chiefly, the high altitude and high velocity temperature challenges that are met with complex engineering of the SR-71 which are not even remotely addressed by so called “space craft “ that are said to fly at Mach 20 and over four times the operational altitude. Before one achieves orbit, one must be an aircraft first, flying to and exceeding 385, 000 feet of altitude, all the while, dealing with the friction of speeds that are well in excess of Mach 3.
@@michaeltaylors2456 A rocket isn't travelling as fast during the launch phase in relation to when the capsule is trying to decelerate from orbit and the incredible speeds reached there, by using the atmosphere to slow down upon reentry. Only once a Spacecraft/Rocket left the Earths atmosphere on it's desired trajectory does it accelerate further to maintain it's desired Earth orbit.
My father was born in 1920, was a decorated WW2 combat veteran, and worked a career as an aerospace electrical engineer on numerous programs… the S2 stage of the Saturn rocket (Apollo), and the B2 bomber, among others. He & his colleagues used slide rules.
@@ryansta Very well, then which of Newtons laws applies here, the second or the third ? The fastest rocket engines produce about 10,000 mph thrust or about half of orbital velocity required ? They tell us that the 3rd law explains how a rocket produces thrust in a vacuum, ignoring proven Jules Thompson law, while also ignoring the 2nd law, equal and opposite. Can’t have both.
@@michaeltaylors2456 Thrust isn't measured in MPH for starters, so you need to go away and research that one. Next have a long hard think about why a jet fighter can travel much faster at higher altitude than it can close to the ground. When you discover the answers to those have a think about how spacecraft such as Voyager and June can travel at tens of thousands kilometers per hour without having massively powerful rocket engines. Lastly stop watching and listening to Flat Earther nonsense.
The SR-71B flew for the last time in the Edwards Air Force Base airshow in October of 1997 and I got to see it take off, fly around and land both Saturday and Sunday, and then taxi by not far away! I didn't know then that it was going to be that particular SR's final flight, but when I found out later, that added more meaning for me to my memories.
My favorite bird in the US arsenal. Would really love a tour of the airframe and hear more about the materials, maintenance any methods used to keep this beauty in flight. First seen a blackbird at a air base at a distance when I was 10 years old and I was awe stricken, that was almost 40 years ago. Of course any type of close look or inspection of a Blackbird was totally off limits. To finally get a look inside the cockpit and at the flight instruments is quiet interesting. Still have an infinity for planes till this day.
It's crazy that some brilliant minds engineered this masterpiece and all of its thousands of features from scratch. I wonder if the engineers could explain everything as competently as this instructor, or would they only be well versed in specific aspect of the plane that they were tasked with designing.
Great tour by Jerry. With zero forward vis could a back seat IP accurately land the a/c? The cockpit doesn't look much different than an F-4 cockpit ie same engine gauges, ASI, etc.
@@jcheck6 Landing from the back seat of the SR-71B was a skill that could be learned quickly, especially since only experienced SR-71 instructor pilots flew in the back as pilot-in-command. From the back seat of the trainer aircraft, forward visibility was not zero, but the runway was obscured when established on final approach, glide path and on-speed. We could determine proper alignment by quickly tapping the rudder, or the aileron function of the elevon if necessary. Aircraft “flare” altitude could be perceived by quick glances left and/or right to watch the ground “rise” to the proper elevation, then “hold it off” until touchdown. It simultaneously was interesting and fun!
@@bcthomas2h90 Thanks BC, forgot the rear cockpit was elevated with a windscreen that did not show in the vid. Actually the vis is better than the WSO seat of the recce F-4 I flew.
At 7:00 minutes he points to the map projector. Part of my job was to load the map strips before the missions. They were 35mm film strips of their route on WAC charts. There was another, larger one in the back seat of a normal SR.
Anything making that much power and designed for that much speed is going to burn a lot of fuel. Besides, the fuel it runs on is basically highly refined diesel fuel anyway.
The B-2 and B-21 bombers both have Astro-Trackers also. GPS can be jammed, and INS drifts. Although INS gyros are much better than in the 60's, plus you have all sorts of accelerometers in the XYZ.
Good Lord!! Unstarts...fuel-cooled airframe...daytime Astronav...can't see shit!!! Who in the Hell taught the instructors?!? Sadly, a time and mindset we'll likely never see again. A damn shame.
Over the US we used to track the SR-71 transponder in AWACS because they always squawked 44XX on their Mode-3. We'd also see the U-2's squawking the same codes.
Wow. How can some one who is so knowledged on the aircraft be so bad at explaining everything. Spike indicators ? Rolling map? Star charts? Nozzle for the engines??!! Wtf. well done naming things is different to explaining things .
Good one. I remember it like yesterday. I'm still creating rings from mission flown titanium parts. Working upside down in the cockpits and on hot summer days, with all the blood rushing to my head. Doing whatever it takes to make the birds faster, safer, better.
Can burn 74k lbs of fuel per hour per engine. Holds 81k lbs. How does this thing stay in the air? How many times would they have to re fuel while crossing an ocean? Crazy.
the map display he discussed, i had a hand in producing during my time at Beale AFB. i held the highest security clearance in the Audio-Visual Services (graphic arts and still photography) shop, higher even than the shop chief...
I've recently read that an sr71 was spotted flying again.............. I was aware they keep a few in near flight capability, but are there any that are flight worthy?
Thanks. Amazing tour. That Astro tracker blew my mind. I always heard that the SR71 was shut down due to cost and the use of Spy Satellites in low earth orbit. What is your opinion ?
@@preachers4135 ....weeeellll.....its just a BIT more complicated than THAT....and the advent of VERY advanced technology that originates....well...from the stars....that negates the necessity for anything like the SR71.....the SR71 isnt even a Wright Flyer in comparison.....more like a piece of paper carefully folded by a 9yo on a saturday afternoon and thrown across the den to simulate 'flight' for a few seconds
It still has advantages in 2022, but manpower and costs killed the program. They should’ve kept just one flying to show the world what we could do 60 years ago.
When it seems to be impossible moving legs for a better view, why dont hold the camera in your hand instead? Please adjust the white balance next time.
Is it true that the instructor panel has a switch to override the front cabin and also lock the pilot on it and also a switch to administer cyanide on the air supply also.
I like how he calls the astronav unit behind, the R2D2 :) Also it's feels strange when he says "when we fly supersonic". The Concorde was supersonic, the fast fighters are supersonic(for a while). The SR71 is super-duper-sonic at least :DDDD
Like many this is my most favorite vehicle of all time of all types. If anybody here has not seen the movie Top Gun Maverick you really need to see it on the big screen and it's back in the imax screens again here in early September. The vehicle at the beginning code name dark star was built by skunk works for the movie but but with the CGI and all what it does it's amazing to be a typical SR72. In Marietta Georgia at Dobbins Air Force base around 3 PM don't remember the day of the week but got to see one of these planes make 4 circles and land and make call Parkway turn into a parking lot. But flew up again that night around 3 AM and I had to be on site to witness it just the noise was shocking. Thank you so much for the detailed explanation about this craft.
Can we all just appreciate individuals like this? Mid century American exceptionalism, the CIA, the Cold War, the Space Race, created this incredible machine... and countless devoted talented individuals like this gentleman.
Very interesting. Regarding the instructor's comment on the astro-tracker, and knowing that the SR71 was primarily missioned the fly over USSR- has there been any known SR71 flights in Southern Hemisphere?
This plane was just a masterpiece, like a bunch of Kelly's work actually...The Starlight nav locked on freakin stars and IC's had just literally been invented when they flew and hadn't existed at the time of design.
Thanks a lot verry interesting. Impressive how the designers managed to put all that stuff in this crampy cockpit. Most fighters are cramped but they do not fly that fast and do not need astronav. Still i'd expect a lot more equipment in this aircraft, however this instructor explaines pretty well what everything is needed for and i wouldn't know what else you need (appart from bigger gauges)
This video would have been a childhood dream come true, grew up in the 80s playing those card games with the stats of different aeroplanes....forgot the card name. Great video, this guy is a legend!
