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Joined 2 years ago
Cake day: August 21st, 2024
  • the sr-71 is definitely not a scramble-able plane:

    • it leaks fuel when on the ground (it shrinks when cold) so it’s stored empty,
    • it’s as aerodynamic as a brick when subsonic so it needs an insanely long runway, and
    • it has an always-on afterburner so it burns an alarming amount of fuel.

    when they were doing surveys of iraq during desert storm they had to field a fleet of eight tanker planes over the indian ocean just so the damn thing would make it from japan to the gulf.

    Edit: oh and those are specially designed tanker planes because of course it uses JP-7 so they needed separate tanks for that and their own fuel. they also needed to be able to refuel at like 850km/h or the blackbird would just drop out of the sky.

    love that plane.