Some vehicles were designed specifically to break records: to shatter any existing mark, claim the top spot, and endure through history. However, when Lockheed created the SR-71 Blackbird, other priorities were on the agenda. The SR-71's high speed was a requirement to easily escape any threat, and since July 1976, no other design has been able to take away its title of the "fastest aircraft in the world".
"Child of the Cold War"
On May 1, 1960, an American reconnaissance aircraft, the Lockheed U-2, was shot down by an S-75 missile over Soviet territory. This happened two weeks before a high-profile meeting between the two superpowers in Paris, and quickly became one of the most humiliating intelligence incidents for the United States.
Two years later, on October 27, 1962, to be precise, the U-2 of Major Rudolf Anderson was shot down while conducting a reconnaissance mission over Cuban territory, during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Both the CIA (formally displaced from reconnaissance flights) and the Air Force had received the message: something better than the U-2 was needed.
In fact, the initial contact between the CIA and Lockheed to build an "undetectable spy plane" dates back to 1957. This led to the so-called "Project Archangel", and after twelve designs, Lockheed presented the A-12. Its first flight was in April 1962, and it entered service in 1967, but in the end it never flew over Cuba or the Soviet Union, but instead saw much more action during the Vietnam War. Even so, the A-12 had another job: to become the basis for the fastest aircraft in the world.
The Fastest Aircraft in the World
The first flight of the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird took place on December 22, 1964, but its entry into service was delayed until January 1966, with a total of 32 units built. The Air Force knew exactly what it had in its hands: with a top speed of Mach 3.3, the SR-71's standard evasive maneuver was simply to accelerate to escape any anti-aircraft missile. Its enemies could never touch it, and the twelve Blackbirds lost during its service were involved in accidents.
The appearance of the SR-71 is striking from wherever you look at it, and everything has a purpose. The intakes of its Pratt & Whitney J58 engines were specially designed to reduce the airspeed to subsonic parameters before entering. The famous "diamond pattern" of its engine exhaust is due to the additional thrust of the afterburner system. This creates successive shock waves that give the "jet" its characteristic pattern.
The end result is an aircraft that achieves its ideal efficiency at Mach 3.2, but in practice it was discovered that the SR-71 could be even more efficient flying at higher speeds, depending on the air temperature. Now, the Blackbird was not free of special requirements: one of the most interesting is that it took off with a partial fuel load to reduce stress on brakes and tires, so it had to be refueled immediately after starting its flight (that puts an end to the famous myth that its tanks leaked fuel) using modified Stratotanker KC-135Q aircraft.
Record and "Double Retirement"
The official speed record of the SR-71 Blackbird was registered on July 28, 1976, for airframe 61-7958, piloted by Captain Eldon W. Joersz (pilot) and Major George T. Morgan Jr. (navigator). Over time, additional measurements emerged that suggest an even higher speed, but they were never certified.
The first retirement of the SR-71 materialized in 1989, not because the aircraft was obsolete or deficient, but because it ended up being one of the victims of the so-called "Pentagon politics" with conflicts of interest and endless budget discussions. Even so, Congress was forced to reexamine the SR-71's retirement in 1994 due to political tensions in the Middle East, North Korea, and the war in Bosnia. Three aircraft returned to active service despite enormous resistance, and it wasn't until 1998 that funds were redistributed, and the Air Force permanently retired the Blackbird. Only NASA was able to fly the last two SR-71s until 1999.
Today, all Blackbirds are part of different museums (except the two retained by NASA), but the only thing that hasn't changed is the record. Despite everything, the SR-71 Blackbird remains the fastest aircraft in the world.
Sources: NASA, Google Arts and Culture, Wikipedia
