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THE 456th FIGHTER INTERCEPTOR SQUADRON |
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THE PROTECTORS OF S. A. C. |
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"Aurora" / "Senior Citizen" |
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Reports of plans for a high-performance piloted replacement for the SR-71 date back more than a decade. In 1979 it was reported that a:<41>
"... Mach 4, 200,000-ft.-altitude aircraft that could be a follow-on to the Lockheed SR-71 strategic reconnaissance vehicle in the 1990s has been defined by the Air Force Aeronautical Systems Division and Lockheed."
As previously noted, reports of the existence of a successor to the SR-71 surfaced repeatedly during the debate over termination of the SR-71. Subsequent observations of mysterious aerial phenomena have been connected with the 1988 reports that Aurora was a Mach 6 stealthy reconnaissance aircraft that was being developed to replace the SR-71.<42>
Noted aerospace analyst Wolfgang Demisch, of First Boston Company, suggested that the $10 billion program would result in the production of about 30 aircraft.<43> More recently, Kemper Security analyst Lawrence Harris concluded that Lockheed was involved in a:<44>
"... hypersonic replacement for the Mach 3 plus SR-71 reconnaissance aircraft. Circumstantial evidence suggests that this project has been underway since 1987 and that a first flight occurred in 1989... Aurora could be operational in 1995, six years after the probable first flight."
This analysis suggested that the total development costs for Aurora might range from $4.4 billion to $8 billion, with the procurement of 24 aircraft costing an additional $10 billion to $24 billion.
According to another report, by mid-1992:<45>
"... Aurora was being flown from a base in the Nevada desert to an atoll in the Pacific, then on to Scotland to refuel before returning to the US at night. Specially modified tanker aircraft are being used to top up Aurora's tanks with liquid methane fuel in mid-air... The US Air Force is using the remote RAF airbase at Machrihanish, Strathclyde, as a staging point... The mystery aircraft has been dropping in at night before streaking back to America across the North Pole at more than six times the speed of sound... An F-111 fighter bomber is scrambling as the black-painted aircraft lands, flying in close formation to confuse prying civilian radars."
The rationale used most frequently by the Department of Defense for the SR-71's termination was financial. The Blackbird's operation and maintenance costs were very high. According to some reports, the SR-71's O&M costs were nearly $710- million in FY-90 and FY-91.<46> Furthermore, they argued, imaging satellites could now conduct worldwide surveillance more efficiently and less expensively than manned reconnaissance aircraft.
Independent aerospace analysts, however, deflated this argument somewhat by pointing to the unique advantages aircraft bring to the reconnaissance arena. Aircraft, for example, are inherently flexible and unpredictable. Though not as fast as satellites, they can fly lower and the interval between over the horizon arrival and time-over-target is just as short. Aircraft have a wide choice of routes, so tracking ships are unlikely to see it on the way in. Application of low observable technology could further reduce warning time.<47> Thus, it appears plausible that aircraft may still have a role in global reconnaissance.
Another analyst has considered the possibilities of "Aurora's" characteristics and capabilities. A long-range reconnaissance follow-on to the SR-71 would be a blended delta with 75 degree leading-edge sweep and retractable low-speed fore-planes. It would be powered by two regenerative air-turbo-ramjet (RATR) engines of 180 kN sea-level static thrust. It would carry a crew of two and use a synthetic aperture radar with real-time data-link for reconnaissance (Figure 4). It is suggested that this type of platform could be very responsive, much more easily maintainable than the SR-71 and could deliver imagery of most points of interest within six hours of the decision to go. A speed between Mach 5 and Mach 6 and a cruising altitude of 40 kilometers would make the aircraft invulnerable to any current missile system.<48>
The Public Record
Beginning in the mid-1980s, the Air Force and NASA have supported a number of studies of aircraft that are consistent with accounts of the Aurora project. Although these studies have not been linked to actual development efforts, they provide some insight into the potential configuration and capabilities of Aurora.
In 1985 McDonnell Douglas conducted studies of a Mach 5, 12,000 km range 305 passenger HSCT (hypersonic commercial transport) powered by regenerative ATR (air turboramjet) engines. Initial research led to claims that this type of aircraft was not only feasible, but remarkably efficient. According to these studies, a ramjet was the best option at Mach 5, and that methane was the preferred fuel. Hydrogen was also considered, but it takes up to five times as much space. If the large HSCT was scaled down to the dimensions of an SR-71, the aircraft could have a range of approximately 10,000 miles with a crew of two and a 1 ton sensor suite.<49>
Lockheed's renowned Skunk Works has been the incubator of several programs that could evolve, or could already have evolved, into an SR-71 replacement. Presently, Lockheed engineers are reportedly studying the development of a liquid methane- fueled aircraft that could penetrate enemy airspace in order to perform reconnaissance missions.<50>
"The sleek aircraft would cruise at Mach 5 (3,350 mph) speed at a maximum altitude of about 100,000 feet. The aircraft would be made primarily of titanium with its outer edges constructed of Inconel, a heat-resistant stainless steel. At Mach 5 speed the leading edges of the air-frame would glow red above 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Power for this futuristic airplane would come from four turbo-ramjets. The engines would operate as turbojets at low speeds, but at higher speeds the compressor and turbine would be overridden so the engines would operate as ramjets."
Other aircraft designs that would fly between Mach 4 and Mach 8, fueled by hydrocarbon or liquid hydrogen are also being considered.<51> And in the mid-1980s, Lockheed proposed a Mach 7-8 "trans-atmospheric vehicle" or TAV as an SR-71 replacement. Intriguingly enough, the name "Aurora" was also used in conjunction with this proposal.<52>
TABLE 1
Aurora Advanced Aircraft CharacteristicsSource Lockheed Sweetman Lockheed Boeing Boeing Date 1985 1990 1990 1990 1990 Figure 1 2 3 4 5 Dimensions: Length - meters ? 35 30.6 26.0 42.7 Span - meters ? 20 13.6 / 25 14.7 13.5 wing area - m2 - 300 - - 95 Weights: tons Empty ? 32.5 - 19.3 - Fuel ? 44.0 - 19.5 12.6 Payload ? 2.0 - 1.5 - Max T/O ? 78.5 - 40.3 34.5 Propulsion: Thrust - kN ? ? ? 267 ? Fuel Methane MCH MCH LH2 Performance: Cruise - Mach 5 5-6 5 5.5 6 Ceiling - km 30 40 27 32 33 Range - km ? 17,000 1,900 5,000 27,750 ------------------------------ MCH = methylcyclohexane LH2 = liquid hydrogen
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FIGURE 1
FIGURE 2
<57>
FIGURE 3
<58>
FIGURE 4
<59>
FIGURE 5
<60>
In 1986, the Directorate for R&D Contracting, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, issued an RFP for aircraft propulsion integration technology. The<61>
"... purpose of the proposed investigation is to develop an improved foundation for manned aircraft air-breathing propulsion integration technology in the Mach 4 to 6 regime."
Under an Air Force contract, Boeing Military Airplane Co. designed an interceptor capable of sustaining supersonic speeds. It was reported that wind tunnel tests would be conducted under a 26 month $572,000 follow-on contract.<62> This effort also included detailed studies of aircraft subsystems.<63> Similar studies were conducted by Lockheed<64> and General Dynamics.<65>
Keeping an aircraft sufficiently cool during extreme speeds is a primary challenge of hypersonic flight. According to studies done by General Dynamics and Boeing, an aircraft travelling at between Mach 5.5 and Mach 6 would have an average skin temperature of approximately 1100-1300 degrees Fahrenheit.<66> One potential solution incorporated in the Air Force studies, also being explored by researchers at NASA's Langley Research Center and Wright-Patterson Air Force base,<67> is the use of Methylcyclohexane (MCH) as both the fuel and the thermal management medium of the vehicle.
MCH has several advantages over other possible hydrocarbon or cryogenic fuels. Unlike standard hydrocarbon fuels, MCH has a very high capacity to absorb heat prior to combustion, up to 1800 Btu per pound of fuel, which is ten times the capacity of most hydrocarbon fuels.<68> Cryogenic Methane and Hydrogen have high heat absorbtion capacities as well, but their use as an aviation fuel is limited by the logistical difficulties of handling, storage and fuel boil off.<69>
The principle behind MCH thermal management is based on a catalytic reaction transforming MCH into Toluene and Hydrogen, which are then used to fuel the aircraft:<70>
A fuel pump pressurizes the fuel to... avoid boiling. The preheater heats the fuel to the proper reaction temperature while removing heat from a secondary coolant...After preheating, the fuel passes through the catalytic heat exchanger/ reactor...
The secondary coolant, Syltherm, circulates to the hot spots to maintain skin temperatures to within specified tolerances.<71>
One aerospace journal says that an aircraft travelling at Mach 6 would be inside the combustion envelope of a subsonic-combustion ramjet. It suggests that the aircraft would thus need an accelerator to get it moving. One type of accelerator would be a ducted-rocket cycle into the engine. A fuel-rich, liquid rocket exhaust would be injected into a ramjet duct, pumping air through it even at rest. A second combustion then takes place, using atmospheric oxygen.<72> (This second combustion could produce the loud rumbling noises heard recently in California, discussed below).
Budget And Financial Data
The first suggestion that these studies might be translated into operational hardware appeared in the Fiscal Year 1986 procurement program document, colloquially known as the P-1, dated 4 February 1985. A line item in this document, labeled "Aurora," was slated to receive $80 million in 1986, and over $2.2 billion in 1987.<73> Since this line item appeared next to the line funding the TR-1 reconnaissance aircraft, it stirred up a hornet's nest of conjecture that a secret aircraft was being developed to replace the aging SR-71.
The Air Force quickly denied the existence of a secret program, and said the "Aurora" budget line was simply one site for B-2 bomber funds when that program was highly classified.<74> One Air Force official commented, "I wish I could say it is (an SR-71 follow-on), because we'd love to have it. But it's just accounting, I'm afraid."<75>
Others disagreed. One journal reported that "the general consensus now is that the item did not refer to the B-2 bomber but to another effort."<76> Other analysts placed the SR-71 follow-on at both Edwards Air Force Base and Nellis Air Range.<77>
Other publications saw a more complicated, more expansive black world. These periodicals posited that Aurora was one of several code names "nested within other code names, all referring to a class of aircraft designed for multiple missions."<78>
However, the discussions of the Aurora budget line item overlook one very crucial fact:
Money was Never Appropriated For Aurora
In the February 1985 submission of the FY 1986 budget, the Aurora line item projected a request of over $2 billion in the FY 1987 budget. But one year later, when the FY 1987 budget was submitted, the Aurora line item had vanished as mysteriously as it had first appeared. Indeed, FY 1987 request for the overall Air Force aircraft procurement account was several billion dollars less than had be projected in 1985, and there were no line items in the FY 1987 request that could have been used to conceal a request for funding for Aurora.
Much of the subsequent speculation on Aurora has implicitly assumed that there was an identifiable source of funding for the program. Although this is not obviously the case, there nonetheless remains one tantalizing, and previously unremarked, hint that the Aurora program was in fact funded, though at a significantly reduced scale.
As previously noted, the case for the existence of all mystery aircraft, including Aurora, must be predicated on identifiable sources of funding. Thus the proper identification of the programmatic content of the major elements of the black budget is essential to assessing the status of mystery aircraft, such as Aurora. A not-implausible accounting has already been given that suggests an identifiable source of funding that may be attributed to the TR-3A stealth aircraft program. But where in the budget might other aircraft programs be funded?
Some have assumed that the funding for the CIA and NRO is entirely hidden from view -- completely off-budget, or widely dispersed among a large number of accounts in many government agencies, or disguised in some obscure accounting transaction of the Federal Financing Bank, or perhaps secreted somewhere among the subsidy programs of the Agriculture Department. Under such assumptions, the billions of dollars appropriated each year for such programs as "Selected Activities" or "Special Programs" would provide more than enough money to finance a vast fleet of exotic aircraft.
But a more detailed consideration of the classified budget provides little basis for believing that these line items might provide funding for such purposes.
While the structure of the classified budget is obscure, it is not perverse. Line items in the budget may be given opaque names, like Selected Activities, which obscure their programmatic content, but there are no activities that are not included in some budget item, however obscurely. There are no off-budget programs. Other line items, such as "Special Programs" (the nomenclature used for the National Reconnaissance Office) may omit the value of the budget. But in such cases, a fair approximation of the omitted value may be obtained by subtracting the sum of those lines for which values are given from the total provided for the budget category which includes the omitted values. It may also be fairly assumed that the multitudinous Navy classified budget items, such as Chalk Coral and Retract Amber, are funding only Navy projects, rather than Air Force programs. And it may also be assumed that Aircraft Procurement accounts fund only aircraft, and that Missile Procurement accounts fund only missiles or space vehicles, though the more generic Other Procurement accounts clearly fund a wide range of programs.
The Other Procurement Air Force account includes a line item opaquely labeled "Selected Activities," which typically accounts for about half of the total budget of this account. Analysis of the outlay rates for this and other budget accounts reveals an interesting anomaly. Procurement accounts, which fund the purchase of hardware, typically spend about 5% to 15% of their appropriation in the first year, with outlays rising to 20% to 40% in the second and third years, and declining thereafter. This reflects the contracting process, in which several years are required to complete manufacture of hardware. In contrast, personnel and operations and maintenance accounts, which are largely for payroll and supplies, typically have first year outlay rates of 50% to 80%.
Uniquely, the Other Procurement Air Force account has a first year outlay rate that has ranged from over 40% to nearly 60%. The only possible explanation for this anomaly is that the "Selected Activities" half of the Other Procurement Air Force account is in fact not a procurement activity, with a low first-year outlay rate, but rather funds personnel and operating expenses, with their characteristic high first-year outlay rate.
Table 2
Classified Aircraft BudgetAIRCRAFT OTHER PROCUREMENT PROCUREMENT Aurora Special Update Program FY86 FY86 1980 50 1981 123 1982 554 1983 217 1984 656 1985 -- 928 1986 80 84 1987 (2,272) 851 ( 139 ) 1988 -- 121 1989 126 1990 122 1991 105 1992 162 1993 176 Millions of Dollars Numbers in parentheses are FY86 projections All others are actual appropriationsIn recent years, the budget for the "Selected Activities" line item has been somewhat in excess of $5 billion annually. This value is consistent with the roughly $3 billion that is the reported budget of the Central Intelligence Agency, as well as the personnel and operations and maintenance budget of the National Reconnaissance Office. There is no reason to doubt this conclusion.
However, the next line down from "Selected Activities" in the Other Procurement Air Force account is an item dubbed, "Special Update Program." This proximity in the budget is suggestive of some relationship in mission as well. It is plausible that this line item includes procurement of intelligence collection systems of interest to the CIA or Air Force, other than satellites, which are funded elsewhere in the budget. Funding for this line item peaked at over $900 million in 1985, then dropped to $84 million in 1986. This suggests that whatever activity was funded under this account in the early 1980s had been concluded. The same FY 1986 procurement program document, that included the $2.2 billion funding projection for Aurora in FY 1987 also projected that the FY 1987 funding for Special Update Program would be $139 million.<79>
But when the actual FY 1987 budget was submitted a year later, not only had Aurora disappeared, but the Special Update Program budget request was $851 million, over $700 million more than had been projected a year earlier.
It is not implausible that this reflected a decision not to proceed with production of an operational system which would have been funded under the Aurora line item, but instead to conduct some sort of prototype propulsion test program, funded under the Special Update Program line. The $1.5 billion appropriated for this account since 1987 would be consistent with such a prototype effort.
Although this analysis is necessarily speculative, the coincidental behavior of these two budget line items is certainly highly suggestive. This also identifies a not- implausible source of funding for an experimental high-speed, high-altitude aircraft with primarily intelligence applications.
Observer Reports
A wide range of reports of observations of mysterious aerial phenomena have been associated with the Aurora aircraft. These observations are also in many regards consistent with the suggested Exotic Propulsion Aircraft. Those reports relating to both possibilities are discussed here, while those reports unique to the Exotic Propulsion Aircraft are discussed subsequently. These unexplained phenomena have led some to conclude that:<80>
"...the US Government has secretly developed and deployed a hypersonic reconnaissance aircraft, probably as a replacement for the SR-71."
There are two classes of reports relating to Aurora: those that are consistent with a limited experimental test program; and those that are suggestive of the existence of an operational capability.
Edwards Air Force Base in southern California is the primary facility used by the American military for the flight testing of experimental aircraft. In addition, the Groom Lake facility at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada was used for developmental testing of the F-117A, and has been associated with reports of other advanced aircraft. Given this geographical concentration, it would not be surprising if secret aircraft undergoing flight tests were to be observed in the Southwestern United States.
In October 1990 Aviation Week & Space Technology published reports of:<81>
"A high altitude aircraft that crosses the night sky at extremely high speed.... The vehicle typically is observed as a single, bright light -- sometimes pulsating -- flying at speeds far exceeding other aircraft in the area, and at altitudes estimated to be above 50,000 ft.... Normally, no engine noise or sonic boom is heard."
More recently, a sighting by two British Airways pilots and other witnesses at Manchester Airport on January 6 1995 has been attributed to the Aurora aircraft.
Probably the most compelling evidence for such flight tests are the series of unusual sonic booms chronicled above Southern California, beginning in mid to late 1991. On at least five occasions, these sonic booms were recorded by at least 25 of the 220 US Geological Survey sensors across Southern California used to pinpoint earthquake epicenters. The incidents were recorded in June, October, November, and late January 1991.<82> Seismologists estimate that the aircraft were flying at speeds between Mach 3 and 4 and at altitudes of 8 to 10 kilometers. The aircraft's flight path was in a North North-East direction, consistent with flight paths to secret test ranges in Nevada. Seismologists say that the sonic booms were characteristic of a smaller vehicle than the 37 meter long shuttle orbiter. Furthermore, neither the shuttle nor NASA's single SR-71B were operating on the days the booms were registered.<83>
One of the seismologists, Jim Mori, noted:<84>
"We can't tell anything about the vehicle. They seem stronger than other sonic booms that we record once in a while. They've all come on Thursday mornings about the same time, between 6 and 7 in the morning."
These "sky quakes" are a continuing phenomenon, with the most recent report over Orange County, CA coming on 20 July 1996. It is reported that the "quake" occurred around 3pm PST, fitting the "skyquake" pattern in the following respects:
- It occurred in a coastal area.
- Described as similar to an earthquake in some respects (rattling of loose objects, etc) but also like a boom (but no distinct double bang as far as is known).
- Severe enough to light up government and media switchboards, but no known damage.
- Not an earthquake (CalTech sensors saw nothing)
- Local military bases deny any knowledge.
- No known other source (eg explosion)
Intercepted radio transmissions are equally intriguing:<85>
"On Apr. 5 (a Sunday) and Apr. 22, radio hobbyists in Southern California monitored transmissions between Edwards AFB's radar control facility (Joshua Control) and a high-altitude aircraft using the call sign "Gaspipe."
The series of radio calls occurred at approximately 6 a.m. local time on both dates.
"Controllers were directing the unknown Gaspipe aircraft to a runway at Edwards, using advisories similar to those given space shuttle crews during a landing approach. The monitors recorded two advisories, both transmitted by Joshua Control to Gaspipe: "You're at 67,000, 81 mi. out," and "Seventy mi. out, 36,000. Above glide slope."
Reported sightings of unusual high performance aircraft are not confined to the Southwestern United States. More recently, such observations have also been reported in other parts of the United States, as well as in Europe. These reports are particularly intriguing because they are difficult to reconcile with an experimental test program, since there would be no reason for test flights to be conducted in Europe. Rather, these reports would have to be understood in the context of the deployment of an operational aircraft.
One unexplained set of observations was reported at Beale Air Force Base, the California facility that was long home to the SR-71. On two consecutive nights in late February 1992, observers reported sighting a triangular aircraft displaying a distinctive diamond-shaped lighting pattern, comprised of a red light near the nose -- similar to the F-117 configuration -- two 'whitish' lights near what would be conventional wingtips and an amber light near the tail.<86> While the wing lights are reportedly much brighter than normal navigation lamps, they do not illuminate the aircraft's platform. Observers claim the vehicle's wing lights are approximately twice as far apart as those on the F-117, and nose-to-tail light spacing is about 50 percent longer than that on the stealth fighter.<87>
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This "refueling" picture is a hoax
Reports of "unusually loud, rumbling sonic booms" near Pensacola, Florida in November 1991 have also been associated with the Aurora program.<88> At least 30 unexplained sonic booms have been reported in Southern California in late 1991 and early 1992.<89> By mid-1992 noted aviation observer Bill Sweetman concluded that, "The frequency of the sonic booms indicates that whatever is making them is now an operational aircraft."<90>
In early 1992 it was reported that:<91>
"... RAF radars have acquired the hypersonic target traveling at speeds ranging from about Mach 6 to Mach 3 over a NATO-RAF base at Machrihanish, Scotland, near the tip of the Kintyre peninsula, last November and again this past January."
It was recently reported than on 27 September 1995 David Morris of Walsall, Cornwall UK took a picture of a triangular shaped plane being refueled by a KC-135, and flanked by a pair of F-111s. The unknown aircraft appeared to be about three-quarters the size of the KC-135. This picture has been widely distributed. However, the "refueling" picture is a hoax -- it was a montage by Bill Rose for the October 1995 issue of Astronomy Now (UK) magazine. There, it is captioned "A simulation of the refueling of the top secret 'Aurora'. Photo composition by Bill Rose."<92a>
Interpretation
In 1990, it was suggested that the Aurora (also reportedly designated "Senior Citizen") had been intended to be the SR-71's successor, but it had been canceled along with the "Blackbird" in 1989.<92> One report suggested that:<93>
"Congress, in addition to killing the SR-71 late last year [1989], voted to terminate a $100 million "related classified activity" that may have been the follow-on effort."
According to the Senate Armed Services Committee, in 1989:<94>
"... the Congress directed the Department [of Defense] to develop a viable long-term roadmap for airborne reconnaissance. The Department has not done that and will not have that roadmap available until next year. Even then, the Department has proposed to initiate an extraordinarily expensive effort to reproduce the capabilities inherent in the SR-71. The committee cannot endorse that request..."
Representative Robert Livingston (R-LA) noted during a January 1990 House Appropriations Committee hearing that:<95>
"The possible follow-ons (to the SR-71), which again we can't even talk about, even if we were going ahead with them, wouldn't be available for many years, six or seven years, and we are not going ahead with them."
Addressing the prospects for an SR-71 follow-on, Air Force Chief of Staff Lawrence Welch noted that:<96>
"There are a couple of programs... Frankly, we have not found them too promising."
These official pronouncements are difficult to reconcile with other forms of evidence suggesting the existence of an SR-71 follow-on.
Click on Picture to enlarge
Byron Salisbury has built an aircraft model of a conceptual design based on eye witness sightings and information from highly reputable sources. He believes the model to be 95%+ accurate of the "aurora" plane sighted in the North Sea and South Eastern and South Western United States. REFERENCES
<41> "Mach 4, 200,000-Ft.-altitude Aircraft Defined," Aviation Week & Space Technology, 29 January 1979, page 141.
<42> Sweetman, Bill, "Mystery contact may be Aurora," Jane's Defense Weekly, 29 February 1992, page 333.
<43> "Evidence Points to Stealth Spy Plane," High Technology Business, April 1988, pages 8-9.
<44> "Skunk Works Revenues Point to Active Aurora Program, Kemper Says," Aerospace Daily, 17 July 1992, page 102.
<45> Campbell, Christy, "Secret US Spy Plane is Kintyre's Dark Visitor," Sunday Telegraph, 26 July 1992, page 1.
<46> "Air Force Battle Brews over using unmanned vehicles for coveted spy mission," Inside The Pentagon, 9 June 1989, page 8.
<47> Sweetman, Bill, "Aurora - is Mach 5 a reality?" Interavia Aerospace Review, 11 1990, page 1009.
<48> ibid.
<49> Sweetman, Bill, "Aurora - is Mach 5 a reality?" Interavia Aerospace Review, 11 1990, p.1010.
<50> Artists Rendering, US Air Force, Washington, DC, 12 November 1985.
<51> ibid.
<52> "Secret Advanced Vehicles Demonstrate Technologies For Future Military Use," Aviation Week & Space Technology, 1 October 1990, page 21.
<53> Sweetman, Bill, "Aurora - is Mach 5 a reality?" Interavia Aerospace Review, 11 1990, page 1009.
<54> Petley, Dennis, "Thermal Management for a Mach 5 Cruise Aircraft Using Endothermic Fuel," Journal of Aircraft, vol. 29, no. 3, May-June 1992, pages 384-38
<55> Woods, E.J. et al, "Advanced Aircraft Secondary Power System Design," Proceedings of the 25th Intersociety Energy Conversion Engineering Conference, Reno, Nevada, 12-17 August 1990, volume 1, pages 505-510.
<56> Kaufmann, H.G., et al, "Control Strategy for Maximizing Reconnaissance Range of Hypersonic Cruise Vehicles," Journal of Aircraft, vol. 29, no. 3, May- June 1992, pages 360-365.
<57> Sweetman, Bill, "Aurora - is Mach 5 a reality?" Interavia Aerospace Review, 11 1990, page 1009.
<58> Petley, Dennis, "Thermal Management for a Mach 5 Cruise Aircraft Using Endothermic Fuel," Journal of Aircraft, vol. 29, no. 3, May-June 1992, pages 384-389.
<59> Woods, E.J. et al, "Advanced Aircraft Secondary Power System Design," Proceedings of the 25th Intersociety Energy Conversion Engineering Conference, Reno, Nevada, 12-17 August 1990, volume 1, pages 505-510.
<60> Kaufmann, H.G., et al, "Control Strategy for Maximizing Reconnaissance Range of Hypersonic Cruise Vehicles," Journal of Aircraft, vol. 29, no. 3, May- June 1992, pages 360-365.
<61> "Air Force Issues RFP for Mach 4-6 Aircraft Propulsion Development," Star Wars Intelligence Report, 21 January 1986, page 10.
<62> "Boeing Designs Interceptor Aircraft Capable of Sustained Supersonic Speeds," Aviation Week & Space Technology, 11 February 1985, page 61.
<63> Woods, E.J. et al, "Advanced Aircraft Secondary Power System Design," Proceedings of the 25th Intersociety Energy Conversion Engineering Conference, Reno, Nevada, 12-17 August 1990, volume 1, pages 505-510.
<64> Petley, Dennis, "Thermal Management for a Mach 5 Cruise Aircraft Using Endothermic Fuel," Journal of Aircraft, vol. 29, no. 3, May-June 1992, pages 384-389.
<65> Gasner, James, et al, "Evaluation of Thermal Management for a Mach 5.5 Hypersonic Vehicle," AIAA/SAE/ASME/ASEE 28th Joint Propulsion Conference, 6-8 July 1992, Nashville, TN, AIAA paper 92-3721.
<66> Gasner, James et al. "Evaluation of a Thermal Management System for a Mach 5.5 Hypersonic Vehicle." AIAA/SAE/ASME/ASEE 28th joint conference and exhibit, July 6-8, 1992. page 2.
Woods, E.J. et al. "Advanced Aircraft Secondary Power System Design." Proceedings of the 25th Intersociety Energy Conversion Engineering Conference, August 12-17, 1990. volume 1, pages 506-507.
<67> "Endothermic-Fueled Jet could Break Mach 5," Popular Mechanics, August 1991, page 15.
<68> Gasner. ibid. page 3.
<69> ibid.
<70> Petley, Dennis H. and Stuart C. Jones. "Thermal Management for a Mach 5 Cruise Aircraft Using Endothermic Fuel." Journal of Aircraft. May-June 1992, page 385.
<71> ibid.
<72> "Update on Aurora," Aerospace World Weekly, 9 March 1990, page 5.
<73> Department of Defense, Procurement Programs (P-1), 4 February 1985, page F-6, line 28.
<74> "Secret Advanced Vehicles Demonstrate Technologies For Future Military Use," Aviation Week & Space Technology, 1 October 1990, page 20.
<75> "Aurora Myth," Aerospace Daily, 9 October 1990, page 34.
<76> "Update on Aurora," Aerospace World Weekly, 9 March 1990, page 5.
<77> Pope, Gregory, "America's New Secret Aircraft," Popular Mechanics, December 1991, page 35.
<78> "Secret Advanced Vehicles Demonstrate Technologies For Future Military Use," Aviation Week & Space Technology, 1 October 1990, page 20.
<79> Department of Defense, Procurement Programs (P-1), 4 February 1985, page F-31, line 308.
<80> Sweetman, Bill, "Mystery contact may be Aurora," Jane's Defense Weekly, 29 February 1992, page 33
<81> "Secret Advanced Vehicles Demonstrate Technologies For Future Military Use," Aviation Week & Space Technology, 1 October 1990, page 20.
<82> ibid.
<83> ibid.
<84> Marshal, Jonathan, "In Plane Sight? Washington City Paper, 3 July 1992, page 12-13.
<85> Scott, William, "New Evidence Bolsters Reports of Secret, High-Speed Aircraft," Aviation Week & Space Technology, 11 May 1992, pages 62-63.
<86> "Possible Black Aircraft Seen Flying In Formation With F-117s, KC-13s," Aviation Week & Space Technology, 9 March 1992, page 66.
<87> ibid, page 67.
<88> "Blast From The Past," Aviation Week & Space Technology, 25 November 1991, page 23.
<89> Scott, William, "New Evidence Bolsters Reports of Secret, High-Speed Aircraft," Aviation Week & Space Technology, 11 May 1992, pages 62-63.
<90> Campbell, Christy, "Secret US Spy Plane is Kintyre's Dark Visitor," Sunday Telegraph, 26 July 1992, page 1.
<91> Rogers, Jim, "RAF Radar Tracked 'Aurora' Over Scotland at Speeds From Mach 3 to Mach 6," Inside the Air Force, 24 April 1992, pages 1, 10-11.
<92> "Successor Relies on Stealth Not Speed," Defense Daily, 30 May 1990, page 503.
<92a> From: mdembinski@delphi.com (Mike Dembinski), Newsgroups: rec.aviation.military,alt.war,sci.space.policy,alt.conspiracy.area51 Subject: Re: Mary Shafer: What about "Aurora"?, Date: Mon, 05 Feb 1996 21:37:05 +0000, Message-ID:
<93> "Classified System Seen Providing Timely Intelligence Data," Aerospace Daily, 17 January 1990, pages 92-93.
<94> United States Senate Armed Services Committee, National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1991, 101st Congress, 2nd Session, 20 July 1990, page 138.
<95> "Classified System Seen Providing Timely Intelligence Data," Aerospace Daily, 17 January 1990, pages 92-9
<96> ibid.
Courtesy of FAS
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Out Of The Black - A Secret Mach 6 Spy Plane |
Popular Science March 1993
An eyewitness description, a secret test site, and a new analysis of advanced aeronautics paint a portrait of Aurora
* By Bill Sweetman.
Does the U.S. Air Force - or perhaps one of America's intelligences agencies - have a new secret spy plane in action? A growing body of evidence suggest that the answer is yes. A startling disclose came recently when Chris Gibson, a British oil engineer and highly trained aircraft-spotter produced a sketch that captured the shape and size of an unusual aircraft he saw during daylight hours in August 1989, flying over his drilling rig in the North Sea. The expert eye-witness's drawing is the keystone that, with other evidence, provides an understanding of a secret hypersonic reconnaissance aircraft that is widely rumored to exist, but routinely denied by U.S. officials. Its nickname is Aurora.
Gibson - a former member of the disbanded Royal Observer Corps, a group of volunteer aircraft-spotters - was able to estimate the strange airplane's length and width by comparing it with the known dimensions of the K-135 refueling tanker and two F-111 bombers flying alongside. But it wasn't until last year, when he came across a magazine design, that Gibson suddenly made sense of the sharp triangular silhouette he saw.
Analysts believe that Aurora is an operational spy plane that replaces the retired Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird. Like its predecessor, Aurora costs several million dollars per flight, and is sent out only in missions where the plane's sensors can gather vital information unobtainable by satellite reconnaissance or other means.
It's plausible that Aurora was used to photograph Iraq during Operation Desert Storm in an attempt to provide tactical intelligence to ground-based military commanders. Aurora's unique capabilities also equip it for surveillance of nuclear proliferation. The list of nations of varying political complexions that covertly possess or are pursuing nuclear arms capabilities include India, Iran, Iraq, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan, and South Africa. Surprise visits by an reconnaissance aircraft can give intelligence analysts clues - such as the presence of military trucks at an ostensibly civilian plant - which wouldn't be left out in the open when a spy satellite is scheduled to make its pass overhead.
Aurora overflights of Russia have probably not occurred. Such missions would violate an agreement in place since a Lockheed U-2 plane was shot down over the Soviet Union in 1960. It is likely, that the Aurora monitors the submarine-building programs of Russia, China and other nations from well outside their airspace using side-looking sensors.
Gibson's North Sea sighting completes a puzzle that has obsessed military-aircraft analysts for several years. Consider the following pieces of evidence hinting at the existence of something unacknowledged that flies high and fast:
* In February 1990, the Air Force retired its SR-71 spy planes. The official reason was saving the $200 million to $300 million a year it cost to operate the fleet of Blackbirds. Reporters were told tha the SR-71's role had been taken over by advanced spy satellites.
* The money saved was less than 7 percent of the approximately $4 billion the Air Force spends yearly on satellite reconnaissance - mere chicken feed by Pentagon standards. Keeping the SR-71's in service would have provided cheap insurance against an unlucky string of satellite and rocket failures, such as the ones that occurred in 1985-'86.
* The Air Force actually discouraged congressional attempts to reverse this termination of its most glamorous aircraft mission. Never in its history had the flying service walked away from a manned mission without a fight.
* The pace of activity at the Air Force's top-secret Groom Lake test site in the Nevada desert has increased dramatically in recent years, suggesting the presence there of one or more secret aircraft programs. By comparing recent photos of the base with ones taken in the late 1970s, its apparent that several large new buildings were added during the 1980s. Always visible in the recent pictures are a number of chartered Boeing 737 airliners that ferry workers in from other defense-industry towns such as Palmdale, Burbank, or Edwards in Southern California, or from Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada.
* Since mid-1990, unexplained sonic booms have periodically rattled Southern California. Officials at the United States Geological Survey, the agency that monitors earth-quake activity, no doubt irked the military with their public statements that a very fast, high-flying aircraft was causing the "air-quakes" registered on their array of seismographs.
* The federation of American Scientists, a private Washington, D.C.-based policy group, issued a report late last year on the likelihood that unacknowledged military aircraft might exists. The cautious review of unclassified literature on the subject concluded that several new types of aircraft may indeed be covertly flying around.
"It is close to midnight, but all the clocks are set to 0730 Greenwich time. In a closed and guarded hangar, ground crews help two men into orange pressure suits clamber into a delta-shaped, dull black airplane. The pilot touches keys that tell computers to start the engines. At first, the aircraft emits a subdued whine, which builds up quickly and is joined by the sound of rushing air. Then there is a flash of light from the intake and exhaust ducts as a wave of noise explodes, rolling harshly over across the dry lake bed. Within the roar are the scream of small rockets, the cracking thunder of a huge fighter engine, and a massive pulsing - as low as one cycle per second - that shakes the entire desert base."
Gibon's sighting now makes it possible to reconstruct the Aurora program's history. The spy plane was operational, or nearly so, by August 1989, just before the Air Force parked its SR-71s for the last time. Aurora would have made its first flight by 1986 at the latest, following a development effort that was launched in 1981.
This analysis elicited denials by high officials involved in defense and intelligence matters. Ohio Democratic Sen. John Glenn asserted that his sources in the intelligence community told him there was no such aircraft. "I think they're telling the truth", he said.
Pete Williams, chief spokesman for the Bush administration's Secretary of Defense, Dick Cheney, gave a standard answer to a query about Aurora. "If there were such a program, we wouldn't discuss it". Williams explained that Pentagon policy says the same answer "must always be given" to queries about secret programs - whether or not they actually exist - to avoid revealing the truth. Donald B. Rice, Bush's Secretary of the Air Force, stated :"There's no program in the Air Force, none anywhere else that I know of. It simply doesn't exist." To some observers the stridency of Rice's response was puzzling. Why didn't he simply utter the usual Pentagon disclaimer?
Black us the adjective most often applied to the hidden world in which such engineering activates unfold. In a 1985 Pentagon budget document requesting production funds for 1987, a censor's lip let the line item "Aurora" appear, grouped with the SR-71 and U-2 programs. Even if Aurora actually was the project's name at the time, it almost certainly would have been changed after being thus compromised; "Senior Citizen" is one of new label that has been reported. Rated by the Pentagon as an "unacknowledged special-access program," the plane's existence and real name are secret, and therefore deniable.
Unconfirmed reports of Aurora's existence first surfaced in 1986 and POPULAR SCIENCE conjectured about the airplane's likely design in the November 1988 issue. Now, fresh reports from secret-airplane hunters such as James Goodall, who heard the and felt bone-shaking sounds coming from the Groom Lake facility late in December, continue to flesh out the picture of Aurora and the technology that makes it work.
Armed with patience and braced for occasional confrontation with no-nonsense security patrols, resolute observers like Goodall trek through the harsh Nevada desert to a mountainside overlooking desiccated Groom Lake. From several miles away - as close as they can get without entering off-limits government land - the watchers can see the large air base eith its motley collection of hangars. Some of the buildings are vast.
Yet, like a mirage the isolated facility with its six-mile runway doesn't exist - officially, that is. And its non-existence is longstanding. A 1992 Lockheed Corp. paper on the early days of the U-2 program refers to flight-testing at Groom Lake 35 years ago as having occurred merely at "a remote location"
For some, monitoring events on the dry lake bed provides the excitement of pursuing a mystery. Author and photographer Goodall, who has been chasing classified programs for almost 30 years, is motivated by enthusiasm for aircraft and a conviction that he's entitled to know how his taxes are being spent. His ear witness account indicates that the airplane's propulsion system is unconventional to say the least. "We heard Aurora from 18 miles away. The sound was so intense that you feel it. It was quite something else - a pulsing noise that you'll never forget"
"The airplane begins rolling forward at half-past midnight, then accelerates and noses up into the sky like a hot fighter. Seconds later it is gone, trailing a shattering roar across the desert. In the cockpit, the pilot sees his course overlaid on a detailed map as the craft climbs through 60.000 feet at a steep 70-degree angle. Just minutes after takeoff, the plane is cruising northeast at six times the speed of sound, covering almost one mile per second. More than 20 miles above the ground, it passes unheard over Montana and North Dakota into Canadian airspace. Five thousand miles away, a loaded KC-135 tanker lifts heavily into the early morning sky from a secure air base in western Scotland. At a second base farther south, four F-111 crewmen walk toward their pair of aircraft. Only the crew and their base commander knows this will not be a routine training flight."
Aurora was almost certainly built Lockheed's fabled Skunk Works, now called the Lockheed Advanced Development Co. Of all known design organizations, only the Skunk Works has the proven ability to manage large programs incorporating breakthrough technology in total secrecy. Analysis of Lockheed's financial statements makes it possible to estimate Aurora's price tag at about $1 billion per aircraft. At most, 10 to 20 of the new spy planes have been built.
A hypersonic prototype paved the way for Aurora. In 1975, Lockheed proposed a small hypersonic research aircraft that would be launched from the back of an early version of the SR-71. And a definite survey of Lockheed aircraft, published in 1982, stated that the company have already flown a mach 6 experimental craft. By the late 1970s the US government probably had two main reasons for going ahead with Aurora. The first: improved Soviet surface-to-air missile (SAM) systems posed an increasing threath to the SR-71, which flies at Mach 3.2 (2.100 mph) and reaches altitudes above 80.000 feet. By 1980, two potent new Soviet antiaircraft weapons, the SA-10 Grumble and the SA-12 Gladiator/Giant, were under development. Both have a maximum altitude of about 100.000 feet and feature advanced tracking and guidance systems. The second reason for building Aurora was that the satellites alone are not the best solution to reconnaissance requirements. While they take superb pictures, satellites also have inherent limitations. They follow fixed, predictable orbits, which make their appearance no surprise to a shrewd adversary. Although earthbound controllers can command satellites to fire thrusters to adjust their orbits, this ability is strictly limited by a finite on-board fuel supply. In addition, because it is difficult to supply the amount of power needed to operate an all-weather radar, most satellites carry only daylight or low-light cameras.
Although they cost several hundred million dollars apiece, spy satellites last, on average, only five years before they are dumped into the atmosphere and replaced. And it is difficult to increase surveillance quickly in a crisis unless a stockpile of reserve satellites and launchers is kept ready - as the former Soviet Union once did.
Aircraft are much more flexible. They can be dispatched exactly where and when they are needed, and they can be fitted with day, night, or bad-weather sensors, depending on the conditions in the target area.
"During the hour it takes to reach the initial point for descent, the pilot and reconnaissance systems officer (RSO) in the backseat are fully occupied with checking equipment to see how it operates in the 1,000 Fahrenheit friction heat soaking into their aircraft's structure - a delicate balance between speed, altitude, and deceleration rate. Over the North Sea, the tanker and the F-111s gather into a loose formation and follow a racetrack pattern. Appearing suddenly, the black jet turns in behind the KC-135 and connects with its refueling boom, wavering a little while matching the tanker's low speed. During the next ten minutes, 40 tons of liquid methane flow into the spy plane before it turns away and hurtles skyward. Already, another loaded methane tanker and two more F-111s are preparing to depart from their base in Britain."
An analysis of Aurora's three-dimensional shape can be extrapolated from its 75-degree swept triangular outline. The aircraft corresponds almost exactly in form and size to hypersonic reconnaissance aircraft studied in the 1970s and 1980s by McDonnel Douglas, according to Paul Czysz, now a professor of aerospace engineering at St. Louis University. Czysz worked on hypersonic while at McDonnel Douglas, including the company's proposal for the National Aerospace Plane program, and is an acknowledged expert in the field. Efferent hypersonic planes "are basically air-breathing propulsion systems," he says.
Like the SR-71, Aurora has a crew of two. Flying it is quite unlike piloting a conventional aircraft. There is little if any outside view, because a normally angled windshield causes to much drag and gets too hot. For these reasons, Aurora may have a retractable windshield used only for takeoffs and landings; at other times, the windshield would be covered by a heat shield. Aurora's pilot is really a mission manager, monitoring the aircraft and its systems and following the course of the flight on large-format video displays. His or her most important function is to cope with the unexpected; shifts in upper-atmospheric temperature, weather developments over the target area or refueling zone, or developments with the plane's mechanical or electronic systems. The RSO supervises a battery of sensors. The most important is a synthetic-aperture radar (SAR), a side-looking instrument that takes a sequence of snapshots of the target as the aircraft moves and compiles them into a single radar image that is as sharp as if had been acquired using an antenna hundreds of feet wide. The best SAR images are classified, but have benn described as "near-photographic," allowing different types of land vehicles to be easily distinguished from more than 100 miles away, regardless of clouds or smoke.
In clear weather, Aurora uses daylight and infrared cameras for ultra-detailed work. And unlike a satellite, the craft can be scheduled to make its reconnaissance passes at the golden hour for covert imaging; early morning, when the low sun provides even illumination and long shadows that highlight features on the ground, before heat-induced haze forms. A phased-array antenna built into Aurora's upper surface - near the tail end, where aerodynamic heating is minimal - allows the airplane to transmit real-time or near real-time imagery to the Pentagon's satellite network.
"In a Middle Eastern country, a bored radar operator in an underground shelter fails to notice a faint blip on one edge of his screen. The system's computer can't make sense of an echo that's too high to be an airplane and stops displaying it. A few miles from a medium-size city lies a walled, heavily guarded compound containing equipment test stands and several small factory buildings. From time to time a siren sounds, and temporary covers thrown over sensitive equipment. All activity ceases for the few minutes it takes a known spy satellite's imaging path to pass over the base. But no warning is given this morning. Technicians, including two blond Caucasians, are busily preparing a rocket motor for testing on an open stand, and a truck that left a Czech machine-tool factory several days earlier is being unloaded. All of this detail is faithfully stored on a battery of hard-disk memories by a camera with a 48-inch telephoto lens. Three hours and 15 minutes after its takeoff from Nevada, the spy plane makes a wide turn back toward Northern Europe. The RSO selects the clearest image and transmits them to a satellite with a few keystrokes. In five minutes, hard copies as sharp as an original negative are rolling out of a processing machine 6.000 miles away."
Aurora uses ramjet engines, because no other type can work as efficiently at the speeds the plane travels. In its simplest form, a ramjet is a pinched tube that slows, compresses, and heats the incoming supersonic airs tram before adding fuel to it, producing enormous thrust from the hot gas expanding out the exhaust nozzle. However, the compression process also generates tremendous drag. The ramjet designer's challenge is to keep the level of drag from canceling out the slim margin of thrust that propels the aircraft. One way to make a ramjet engine efficient is to stretch it along the entire length of the vehicle. In a hypersonic ramjet aircraft, the underside of the forward body is a ramp that initially compresses the air before it enters the inlet ducts, and the curved underside of the after body guides the expansion of the exhaust gas.
Its A Lifting Body
The compressed air underneath the body serves a second purpose: It holds the airplane up. At Mach 6, conventional wings would be superfluous appendages creating horrendous drag. Accordingly, the tips of Aurora's delta platform are mainly there to provide stability and control. The basic problem with ramjets is that they don't work at all unless the aircraft is moving quite fast, and they are not very efficient at speeds less than Mach 2.5. Therefore, Aurora needs some other systems to reach this speed. There are two clues to the way Aurora's designers solved the low-speed propulsion problem. The team for the X-30/National Aerospace Plane (NASP), though tight-lipped about the "accelerator" portion of the NASP engine design, has indicated that it functions as a ducted rocket in parts of its operating cycle. The seconds clue is that Aurora has been associated with two unusual noises: very-low-frequency pulsing sounds and an extremely loud roar on takeoff.
Super Cold Fuel
Even though Aurora is 80 to 90 feet long, which is about 20 feet shorter than the SR-71, it could weigh more - as much as 170.000 pounds when fully loaded. A clear two-thirds of its total mass would be fuel. Choosing the right fuel was crucial to Aurora's design. Because various sections of the craft will reoccurring-speed temperatures ranging from 1.000 Fahrenheit to more than 1.400 Fahrenheit, its fuel must both provide energy for the engines and extract destructive heat from the airplane's structures. This is done on the SR-71, but at hypersonic speeds even an exotic kerosene, such as the special high-flashpoint JP-7 fuel used by the Blackbird, cannot absorb enough heat. The solution for Aurora is a cryogenic fuel - a cold liquefied gas.
The best candidates identified so far are methane and hydrogen. liquid hydrogen provides more than twice as much energy and absorbs six times more heat per pound than any other fuel. The snag is its low density, which means bigger fuel tanks, a large airframe, and more drag. While liquid hydrogen is the fuel of choice for a space launch vehicle that accelerates quickly out of the atmosphere, studies have shown that liquid methane is better for an aircraft cruising at Mach 5 to Mach 7. Methane (natural gas) is widely available, provides more energy than jet fuels, and can absorb five times as much heat as kerosene. Compared with liquid hydrogen, it is three times denser and easier to handle - in-flight refueling has been studied and poses no problem. Aurora can fly at subsonic speeds because its entire body, which has a great deal of area, is a lifting surface. Also, its sharply swept leading edge - like the Concorde's wing - generates a powerful vortex at nose-high flight angles, which clings to the leading edge and boosts the body's lift. Unencumbered by aerodynamic freeloaders such as a conventional fuselage, Aurora's shape is structurally efficient. It packs a lot of fuel and useful equipment into a relatively small volume that saves weight and minimizes friction drag.
The spy plane's airframe may incorporate some stealth technology, but it hardly needs it. Hypersonic aircraft are actually much harder to shoot down than a ballistic missile, Although a hypersonic plane isn't very maneuverable in the traditional sense, its velocity is such that, within tens of seconds, even a gentle turn puts it miles away from a SAM's projected interception point. So why bother with stealth?
"Having refueled a seconds time from a tanker over the North Sea after its Mid-east photo session, the black plane heads east at high altitude across the Atlantic Ocean, North America, and beyond the California coast. Decelerating and descending above the Pacific Ocean, the craft drags a sonic boom over the water behind it. As it turns back towards its Nevada base, part of the inevitable shock wave bends through the upper atmosphere and rumbles across Southern California as Angelenos are getting ready for work. "There goes another one," they say, wondering whether it's a minor earthquake or "that plane we hear about." Time elapsed from takeoff to landing: 6.5 hours. Distance traveled: 15,500 miles"
Aurora Timeline
A Chronology of Significant Aurora Events
August 1989
A former Royal Observer Corps member working on a North Sea gas rig, 100 km off the Norfolk coast spotted a matte-black aircraft refueling from a KC-135, accompanied by two F-111s. The aircraft was "a perfect triangle", slightly bigger than an F-111. The formation was heading towards the UK coast. (This may have either been a prototype of the canceled US Navy A-12 Avenger II, several of which are reported to have flown, or more likely the Northrop(?) TR-3A Black Manta Recce aircraft).
March 1990
Aviation Week and Space Technology first broke the news that Aurora was inadvertently released in the 1985 US budget, as an allocation of $455 Million for Black aircraft PRODUCTION in FY 1987. Note that this was for building aircraft, not R&D.
Observers in Nevada have seen and heard a distinctive aircraft flying over the Mojave desert at high altitude and speed, usually in the early morning. The contrail has been described as "doughnuts on a rope." Engine note at take-off "sounds like the sky ripping." Officials on the inside say "it's so black you won't hear anything about it for 10-15 years. "
October 1990
Aviation Week & Space Technology published reports of: "A high altitude aircraft that crosses the night sky at extremely high speed.... The vehicle typically is observed as a single, bright light - sometimes pulsating - flying at speeds far exceeding other aircraft in the area, and at altitudes estimated to be above 50,000 ft.... Normally, no engine noise or sonic boom is heard."
May 1991
"Aviation Week" claims that briefings have been given to selected members of Congress, and high-ranking Government officials suggest that some of these aircraft might be "the ultimate weapons featured in comic books- the ones so devastating that any potential adversary would never think of disturbing the peace for fear of the "Good Guys" retaliation. Aviation Week, stressing that it is only a "theoretical possibility", claims that one of the Aurora aircraft has an airframe like a flattened American football, about 110 ft long and 60 ft wide, smoothly contoured, and covered in ceramic tiles similar to those used on the Space Shuttle which seem to be coated with "a crystalline patina indicative of sustained exposure to high temperature. . . a burnt carbon odor exudes from the surface." Power comes from conventional jet engines in the lower fuselage, fed by inlet ducts which open in the tiled surface. Once at supersonic speed, the engines are shut down, and Pulse Detonation Wave Engines take over, ejecting liquid methane or liquid hydrogen onto the fuselage, where the fuel mist is ignited, possibly by surface heating. Speeds are reported to be in the region Mach 6-8. Beneath the fuselage are 121 tile-covered ports, housing nuclear or conventional munitions. These are ejected downwards at subsonic speed. The aircraft is reported to have a minimal RCS (Radar Cross Section), and a dedicated recon version is possibly already in service.
June 1991
A series of unusual sonic booms were detected in Southern California, beginning in mid to late 1991. On at least five occasions, these sonic booms were recorded by at least 25 of the 220 US Geological Survey sensors across Southern California used to pinpoint earthquake epicenters. The incidents were recorded in June, October, November, and late January 1991. Seismologists estimate that the aircraft were flying at speeds between Mach 3 and 4 and at altitudes of 8 to 10 kilometers. The aircraft's flight path was in a North North-East direction, consistent with flight paths to secret test ranges in Nevada. Seismologists say that the sonic booms were characteristic of a smaller vehicle than the 37 meter long shuttle orbiter. Furthermore, neither the shuttle nor NASA's single SR-71B were operating on the days the booms were registered.
In the article "In Plane Sight?" which appeared in the Washington City Paper on the 3rd of July 1992 (pg. 12-13) one of the seismologists, Jim Mori, noted: "We can't tell anything about the vehicle. They seem stronger than other sonic booms that we record once in a while. They've all come on Thursday mornings about the same time, between 6 and 7 in the morning."
November 1991
Reports of "unusually loud, rumbling sonic booms" near Pensacola, Florida in November 1991 have been associated with the Aurora program.
Late 1991
An anonymous arms-control analyst says he examined a late-1991 Landsat image of Dreamland that shows three white triangles sitting by the main- runway. Each was about the size of a Boeing 747.
February 1992
At Beale Air Force Base, the California facility that was long home to the SR-71, on two consecutive nights in late February 1992, observers reported sighting a triangular aircraft displaying a distinctive diamond-shaped lighting pattern, comprised of a red light near the nose - similar to the F-117 configuration - two 'whitish' lights near what would be conventional wingtips and an amber light near the tail. While the wing lights are reportedly much brighter than normal navigation lamps, they do not illuminate the aircraft's platform. Observers claim the vehicle's wing lights are approximately twice as far apart as those on the F-117, and nose-to-tail light spacing is about 50 percent longer than that on the stealth fighter.
Early 1992
An aircraft fitting the description of the Aurora was seen being loaded into a C-5 at night at Lockheed's Skunk Works. The C-5 then departed for Boeing Field in Seattle. Speculation is that this aircraft is a hypersonic drone launched from the larger Aurora aircraft, like the SR-71/D-21A system.
"... RAF radars have acquired the hypersonic target traveling at speeds ranging from about Mach 6 to Mach 3 over a NATO-RAF base at Machrihanish, Scotland, near the tip of the Kintyre peninsula, last November and again this past January."
[Rogers, Jim, "RAF Radar Tracked 'Aurora' Over Scotland at Speeds From Mach 3 to Mach 6," Inside the Air Force, 24 April 1992, pages 1, 10-11.]In early 1992 a number of houses (+/- 25) in the northern Netherlands were damaged as a result of a sonic boom. The strange thing was that there were no aircraft in the region that could have caused the boom... A Dutch newspapers suggested it came from a top secret plane temporarily based in Scotland for testing.
Mid 1992
By mid-1992 noted aviation observer Bill Sweetman concluded that, "The frequency of the sonic booms indicates that whatever is making them is now an operational aircraft."
Summer 1992
An observer saw an Aurora type aircraft on finals to a secret Lockheed- operated RCS range in the Mojave desert one night in the summer of 1992. Because it was a moonlit night, he was able from a range of about one mile to discern a prominent raised-dorsal spine, two rectangular exhaust nozzles and a light-colored paint job with darker leading and trailing edges. Other observers who have claimed to have seen a similar aircraft flying near Edwards AFT say it "dwarfed" an F-16 chase plane, and reckoned it was about 200ft long.
August 1992
The crew of a London-bound United 747 on climb out from LAX filed an Air miss after an "unidentified supersonic aircraft" passed within 500- 1000ft vertically of them near George AFB in California. The crew described it as "a lifting-body, like the forward fuselage of an SR-71 but without wings."
Further sightings have been made in the US: Observers in California have reported seeing an aircraft with a similar platform to the XB-70 Valkyrie, with a clipped delta wing with winglets, narrow blended fuselage with a clear canopy, sharp nose and possibly a retractable canard.
October 1992
A night sighting was made near Beale AFT in California, ex-home of the 9th SRW flying the SR-71. The aircraft was seen in company with F-117s and a KC-135Q. (The KC-135Q was a dedicated version specifically for carrying the SR-71s special JP-7 fuel.) Because it was night, the exact shape of the "Aurora" aircraft could not be determined, but sported an unusual diamond shaped navigation light pattern, which when compared to the formatting of F-117s suggest that it was about fifty percent longer with twice the wingspan. The engine note was described as being "like a very low rumble, like air being passed over a very large bottle."
Several reports have been received from the LA area of double sonic booms, minutes apart, which are characteristic of two aircraft flying slightly different tracks. The booms were recorded by the US Geological Survey's seismic monitors, and when compared with baseline data obtained from Space Shuttle re-entries and SR-71 operations suggest a speed in excess of Mach 3. A senior USAF officer hinted that Beale AFT would be assigned a new mission within two years. It is thought that "Auroras" have visited the base, probably as transients, in recent months. Local residents report hearing a series of "booms like artillery firing" emanating from within the base perimeter. Propulsion experts confirm that these booms are consistent with light-off testing of Pulse Detonation Wave Engines.
In Amarillo, Texas, Steven Douglas photographed the "doughnuts on a rope" contrail pattern of Aurora passing overhead. Shortly after, he picked-up digitally encrypted speech on a narrow-band frequency used by the USAF for special missions, and as a Comsat downlink. He also intercepted Air/Air R/T between a USAF AWACS and two unknown aircraft using the call signs "Darkstar Mike" and "Darkstar November."
A month later, radio enthusiasts in California monitoring Edwards AFT Radar, c/s "Joshua Control", heard early morning R/T between Joshua and a high flying aircraft using the call sign "Gaspipe." Joshua controllers were vectoring Gaspipe into Edwards AFT, using terminology usually used during Space Shuttle recoveries. "You're at 67000 ft, 81 miles out." was heard, followed by "Seventy miles out now, 36000 ft, above glide slope. " Now, at the time, NASA was operating both the SR-71 and the U2-R from Edwards, but it has been confirmed that neither of these types were operating at the time Gaspipe was heard.
Financial analysts Kemper Securities have examined Lockheed Advanced Development Company's declared revenues from Black programs: Returns for 1987 were $65 Million. Returns for 1993 were $475 Million. The only declared Lockheed Black Projects are U2-R and F117A upgrade programs, and nothing new has been announced between 1987 and 1993. It was also discovered that the TOTAL US budget allocation for Project Aurora for 1987 was no less than $2. 27 Billion. According to Kemper, this would indicate a first flight of around 1989. The spread of US Government payments to Lockheed indicate that the aircraft is probably about one-fifth of the way through it's development program, or has been "extensively prototyped." Around $4. 5 Billion has already been spent.
February 1993
The USAF has applied to buy over 4000 acres of land overlooking Area 51.
Local residents have reported hearing Pulse Detonation Wave Engines being tested inside the perimeter. These tests have also been reported from Edwards AFB. One local pilot who lives near Edwards said that the engines could be heard 25 miles away when being ground tested.
March 1994
Further evidence of Aurora comes with details of a new hangar which has been built, several stories high, with a large gantry crane inside. Apparently this is used to mate the hypersonic drones to the Aurora mother ship. Huge cryogenic storage tanks containing liquid methane or liquid hydrogen have been built. These are the two fuels that Pulse Detonation Wave Engines would use.
January 1995
A sighting by two British Airways pilots and other witnesses at Manchester Airport on January 6 1995 has been attributed to the Aurora aircraft.
April 1995
Freedom Ridge Shut Down- A hill overlooking Area 51 is shut down by the government.
July 1996
Report of a sonic boom over Orange County, CA coming on 20 July 1996. It is reported that the "quake" occurred around 3pm PST, fitting the "sky quake" pattern of previous reports.
November 1996
Aviation Week magazine is reporting that SR-71 operations have resumed. The first flight was a week ago today. The fiscal 1997 budget provides $30 mil for operations, which will result in about 250 flight hours. Three crews are assigned to operations, not known how many aircraft are available.
December 1996
In the Dec 2 issue of Aviation Week a small column about a "screaming roaring take off" sound heard Nov. 25th in Palmdale around 6am that morning. Article quote an old aviation hand who lives there as it being unlike anything he'd ever heard.
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