USAF Developing New "SR-72" Supersonic Spy?

Kadin2048 writes "According to an Air Force Times article, the famed Lockheed Martin 'Skunk Works' may be hard at work on a new supersonic spy plane (with 'artist concept') for the U.S. military, to replace the SR-71 'Blackbird' retired a decade ago. Dubbed by some the SR-72, the jet would be unmanned and travel at about 4,000 MPH at as much as 100,000 feet, with 'transcontinental' range. Some have speculated that new high-speed spy planes could be a U.S. response to anti-satellite weapons deployed by China, in order to preserve reconnaissance capabilities in the event of a loss of satellite coverage. Neither the Air Force nor Lockheed Martin would comment on the program, or lack thereof."

Comments

Already got one of these

[Skreech]

I already have an SR-72.

http://www.apogeerockets.com/SR72_Darkbird_Kit.asp

It doesn't go 4,000mph, though. It just sits there. I think I was ripped off.

erm if you look at the picture

[Anonymous Coward]

that's clearly a submarine. And at 4000MPH, a flaming fast submarine too!

Re:Particle beam weapon

[MrNaz]

It's also vulnerable to psionic telekinetic mutants who could pull the thing to Earth and then disassemble it with their minds.

Re:Particle beam weapon

[Kagura]

I hope you get modded up to at least Insightful +3.

That's no plane...

[popo]

... its SeaQuest DSV!

USAF + Skunkworks + Google

[meccaneko]

*I* heard it was going to be used by Gooogle to do the next run of Street views...

1. supersonic stealth spy plane
2. Google Streets
3. ???
4. Profit!

Re:fsdf 53tgvzxcreahb fg agasgdgu nbcxfharefdawsgg

[CommunistHamster]

Gentlemen, this may be the very first sighting of this new spyplane on Slashdot. Observe the shape made by the bold text under a resolution of 640*480 @ 60Hz.

remember kids...

[Thaelon]

If the headline ends in a question mark, it's not news.

Re:Particle beam weapon

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting comment. I think it should also be pointed out that this plan would be vulnerable to magic, dragons that can fly really fast, and UFOs.

Classified

[R3d M3rcury]

FTFA:

"As a matter of policy, we don't talk about classified programs -- whether or not they exist," Lockheed's Tom Jurkowsky said. If the program doesn't exist, how can it be classified? Or has the military classified everything that doesn't exist?

I'm confused.

Re:better hope it's real stealthy

[WED Fan]

Google has been flying this thing for photo recon already. How the hell do you think they get those shots of women with those ever lovely thong handles?

Re:Particle beam weapon

[ffoiii]

I, for one, welcome our new psionic telekinetic mutant overlords.

Re:better hope it's real stealthy

[Anonymous Coward]

The Air Force is not 'hard at work' developing this craft. It has been in use for at least a decade now.


Chris Carter called. He said you're paranoid.

WOW! *drool*

[kermit1221]

That artist's rendering image just makes me so excited. Pretty impressive design there. Very imaginative too! It's like they took a picture of an SR-71, cut off the wings and moved the vertical stabilizers to the fuselage. Wow! Almost as cool as this image of the fabled Miata SR-71.

Re:Obligatory linguistic correction

[CaseyB]

Guess that makes me a German Nazi...

You just Godwinned yourself. I've never seen that before.

Re:I think the AC's point was retaliation

[cayenne8]

"The Israelis have a couple hundred missiles that can be nuclear tipped and reach any point of Iran. They can completely destroy Iran if they choose to do so. One can only hope that it doesn't come to that...."

Hmm...if that happened, all that oil over there would be A). Radio active B). Up for grabs?

Just was wondering if that happened, if we could somehow use radioactive oil in some kind of combo internal combustion/nuclear engine....talk about efficient,eh?

:-)