The major news agencies and aviation reporters all pointed out the Lockheed Martin Skunkworks press release this week that they are developing the successor to the SR-71 Blackbird spyplane. The new unmanned Mach 6+ vehicle, tentatively referred to as the SR-72, will be twice as fast as the original.
Bearing little to no resemblance to its earlier brother, the SR-72 features the latest 'waverider' aeroform, designed to operate at hypersonic speeds without tearing itself apart from vibrational stress and heat buildup. Various mysterious sonic booms and 'skyquakes' over the last few years, generally attributed to the mythical
Project Aurora craft, are now being explained as probable emissions from the test beds of the new Blackbird.
It may not look like the SR-71, but it does bear more than a fleeting resemblance to certain classic spaceships..
Funny how the more we progress the more things start to look like the classic 'pointy tube with wings' design. Maybe those old sci-fi artists had something there.
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