Listen To Former SR-71 Blackbird Pilot Colonel Buzz Carpenter Talk About Flying The Baddest Airborne Hot Rod There Ever Was


Listen To Former SR-71 Blackbird Pilot Colonel Buzz Carpenter Talk About Flying The Baddest Airborne Hot Rod There Ever Was

When it comes to airborne hot rods, there are varying levels, just like their four wheeled cousins on the ground. There’s stuff that isn’t all that fast but rules like WWII bombers. These’s stuff that was pretty fast for its day and did cool stuff like the late piston fighters and machines like the F-85 Sabre, and then there are the legendary pieces of human engineering achievement that stand completely alone. That room at the museum is dedicated to the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird, an airplane we consider one of the best and baddest ever built. It flew at speed and heights that nothing else did. As you will hear Col. Buzz Carpenter talk about, it was so bad ass fast that they flew it in places that they knew it would get shot at to see how the missile systems worked. How’s that for confidence?!

Carpenter talks a lot about the plane and some of the stuff he did while flying it, like sonic boom heads of state that were doing stuff that the US government wasn’t too happy about and wanted to let them know it. One amazing story goes back to the Vietnam war where three SR-71s took off at the same time and sonic boomed over Hanoi at the same time in an effort to apparently let POWs know that they were not forgotten. According to Carpenter, people who were imprisoned at Hanoi later told him that the guards took off running because they had no idea what the incredible noise from the sky was. That’s real power.

In 1990 a Blackbird flew across the USA in one hour, eight minutes, and 17 seconds making an average speed of 2,112 mph. Is there a damned thing more that we have to say? One thing some people forget is that the SR-71 carries no weapons and at full tilt, it flew faster than a rifle bullet so given that fact, if there was a gun on the plane, it would have essentially flown into its own bullets. It doesn’t even sound real, but this plane certainly was and it was a marvel of engineering when it rolled out in 1964. It was one of the most powerful vehicles on Earth for the life of its service as each of the engines made 32,500 pounds of thrust which equates to about 160,000hp….per engine.

With the Marines landing craft and this video, apparently today is military vehicles day. Hmmm….wonder what else we can dig up.

PRESS PLAY BELOW FOR AN AMAZING VIDEO WITH SR-71 PILOT COLONEL BUZZ CARPENTER –


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7 thoughts on “Listen To Former SR-71 Blackbird Pilot Colonel Buzz Carpenter Talk About Flying The Baddest Airborne Hot Rod There Ever Was

  1. Gary

    Keep in mind, this airplane was built by Americans, using slide rules and pencils. Engineers who sat right on the productino floor, wearing ties.
    America used to build great things. Not any more.

    1. loren

      Engineers who probably drove to work in ’55 Chevys with carburetors and Powerglides.

      When the day comes we go to war with China, we are going to have trouble finding factories in China to make our war machines for us.

  2. 38P

    The great one.

    When did my weekly programming shift at a college television station years ago, I always ran an U.S. Air Force public service announcement featuring an SR-71 just so I could watch its awesomeness.

  3. Lee

    The top speed of the SR 71 was 2,200 mph BTW: Mach 3.3. It also holds the record for sustained highest flight at 85,069 feet.

    Kelly Johnson used an IBM 7000 mainframe to do calculations for the design of the SR-71 . . . not just slide rules as Gary said.

  4. Roger Dodger

    Um, we engineer and manufacture the best weapons systems in the world. And in case you didn’t notice, Murica’ engineers some pretty bad ass cars and equipment for the world as well. Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Caterpillar, John Deere, GM and Ford all sleep in the USA.

    America still builds the world standard stuff. I’ve worked in Europe and Asia. They LOVE american crap. This country is the SHIT.

    Signed – American Engineer

  5. Cyclone03

    The story of Jack Northrope and the Flying Wing , now B2 , then YB 49 , is also proof of how great we can be. Its also proof of how cruel or own government can be when they dont get there way.

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