No, not the Honda Blackbird, the SR71 Blackbird spy plane. This account, written by a retired pilot who flew over 500 hours in the legendary reconnaisance plane, is fascinating. I’ve always had a fascination with this plane and have, on my bookshelf, the book, “Skunk Works” by Ben R Rich, the man who was Kelly Johnson’s 2-i-c at the Lockheed works. A book well worth reading.
On the motorcycle front, MotoGp kicks off this weekend at Qatar in the Middle East. Australia’s Casey Stoner was faster by half a second in the practice yesterday. And, at Valencia, Rd3 of the WSBK takes place; local boy Carlos “Charlie Chucker” Ceca has set the pace for both practice and qualifying (Superpole tonight).
Australia’s Chris Vermeulen is a non-starter again after having to have arthroscopic surgery on his injured knee during the week.
sanoptic says
On the morning of April 15, I rocketed past the line at 2,125 mph.
Thats incredible speed ,it must have been fun piloting that sort of performance.
Great link…thanks
Phil Hall says
Yeah, makes the sort of speeds that we can do seem totally inadequate, doesn’t it?