*Hunting the Fast Movers*... back to the past!

In the beginning of 2011, a group of aviation enthusiast from England(and possibly from other places too) came with interesting topic on MilitaryPhotos forum. There was a specific member "2495" that led all the discussion. Howewer, soon afterwards he disappeared from the scene. Group from England had one aim - to disocver the fastmover that roves through UK airspace by the decades. They've spent over 14 years on watching and making conclusions and finally they decided to show results of their work.

Their thread called "Hunting the Fast Movers" included photos of supposed fastmover(s) that were roaring through the UK airspace. The file included 6 pics. Unfortunatelly, OP post was deleted later.

Here is original "2495" post that I've found using Internet archive.

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First a point I'd like to make – very important point actually. At no time has any serving member of the UK (or any other nations) Armed Forces spoken to, engaged in, or in any way assisted us on our project. It has been done exclusively by civilians who have acted within the laws of the United Kingdom at all times – this includes remaining on public land / waters for all excursions. (Please note also that the photos clearly are not the originals nor high resolution and the hi res will never become available either. Reason being that this wasn't an exercise based in malice / monetary gain in any way shape or form).

The second point I'd like to draw to peoples attention is that for many decades it has been proven beyond all doubt that the CIA, NSA, NRO and all other agencies protect their SAP (Special Access Projects) behind a wall of obfuscation and deceit, and since the 'U-2' and A-12 (later to become SR-71) they have used the field of ufology as an effective counter intelligence firewall. The murkier the better as far as these agencies are concerned, and for us it is a validation of the fact that this area is a very valid research tool if you are selective about the materials you gather.

It was after years (literal years) of sifting, sieving, discarding, interviewing and traveling to follow the most promising leads we got a focus target area. This was the 'Black Triangles' mystery – and what a can of worms. There is enough material in that alone to chase a potential 8 in test / operational vehicles of varying forms / uses. However the work served a purpose and funneled us downwards to the core of what we wanted to investigate. I am sure many are familiar with the topic.

What appeared after a time was a very resounding pattern.

Cornwall – Mysterious sonic booms shaking windows and high altitude lights heading towards Wales.

Wales – high altitude black triangles rushing over head with a single strobing red light light on the underside. North Wales sightings were of particular clarity.

Scotland. The cluster of sightings and audio reports from here was astounding in detail, witness integrity and sheer numbers. Reports ranged from 'Space shuttles with snubbed noses' , 'Massive 'S' shaped curves being carved in the skies', night time 'express trains' roaring through the air and the sudden rash of 'Low level Tornado flights deep in the night along side a deeper more rumbling engine sound heading East'. Girvan, Stranraer, they all started to trickle in reports. Oh one snippet from a report of interest from 2008 - “If a C-17 goes low westward in the day time over Girvan wheels down, its an absolute100% caste iron guarantee of a night time rumbling roaring sound”. We are not sure why this is so urgent unless its bringing in fuel / fresh crews or other needed items for the mission but it actually did assist us some what.

Pattern became clear enough – It comes in high, very high over Cornwall, gets lower over wales and hits Scotland at altitudes low enough to be visible. We decided we should start to organize a hill walking holiday.

Then the tragic events of 9-11 in New York and the Global War On Terror. Fast Black triangles and air quakes didn't just hit the UK any longer – they moved down the eastern coast of the UK and started to creep across Europe, into eastern Europe and aimed right at the middle east.

Eye witnesses from the North Sea into Europe once again reported an extreme fast ' black arrow head with a single red light' and the characteristic shaking windows. Further into Europe it again became a single extreme speed pulsing red light and no noise. Climbs to altitude and races off is our boys signature and we knew it had in all probability gone from test article / dust off research craft to fully pressed into use – but we had no concrete sightings in the ME or Afghanistan.

Then pay dirt dropped into our laps.
First the grape vine started to rumble with rumors of a very unusual airframe making sporadic stops in Afghanistan.

What ever this was it came in with zero engine noise onto a blacked out runway – just a rush of air and thumping heavy landing. On take off it sounded like a 'B-1b with an attitude problem' – again though when it lifted off it was on an all blacked out runway.

Then a Civilian in Afghanistan was taking photos of the stars in long exposure, and there it was – the single fading in and out red light crossing the skies. Taking the exposure length we knew it then.

If it was a test article, it was now operational and we knew for certain why the black triangle low level sightings had it as silent; it is, but only when landing approach is being made.

Hope you like the montage. Yes the engines are mounted above the wings, yes the hull is a flattened shallow 'V', and it indeed has a single tail not a pair unlike the SR-71. (The pictures are free to share / use but please remember they are low res for a very valid reason – the underside thermal protection system and hull shape is unique and we agreed that for the time being is should stay under wraps. We were not looking to damage any assets, just to find them).

The picture on the top left shows the shovel nose to perfection and the top right is one of the rarer out at sea 'Space shuttle like' 's' curves and airframe re-entry like flight profile. These really were baffling and the last reported sighting was yesterday evening (28th Feb. 2011).#1

Is it loud? Ungodly bastards yes it is. Is it fast? Jaw dropping acceleration into the night sky. Does it land in silence? Yes it does.

I saved the best till last.

It might have two of the biggest loudest jet engines I have ever heard that fling it skywards, but theres a third engine on board – the ear splitting roar? Its a rocket engine. Yes you read that right – the airframe climbs into the dark sky and away, then a sudden 'pop – rolling boom followed by a deep bass rumbling' and the bright exhaust signature Sprints into the night.

If you do hunt it, take a stop watch. The numbers are beautiful.

Thats all folks – a twin seat manned high speed aircraft getting lots of use – airframe numbers are low, 6 at the very most from sighting frequency / locations but they getting lots of air time. If you think all this is pie in the skies?

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Source of the photo: deepbluehorizon.blogspot.com...

Upper left photo seems to be a fake, and the right down seems shows SR-71... but who knows? These pics weren't proven to be either fake or real ones..

What this 'fastmover' would be? Any suggestions? Maybe it is related to the Swiss guys sighting from Tikaboo in 1999?

a reply to: SpeedFanatic

Very interesting. Thank you for posting this.

Great thread and a very interesting read!!
The pics don't seem legit and I also don't think it has a very aerodynamic nose for a high supersonic/hypersonic aircraft (I'm no expert!) but the rumors of a "black project" aircraft landing in Scotland have been doing the rounds for years and also don't forget the Boscombe down crash.

a reply to: SpeedFanatic

"2495" posted some earlier stuff that apparently checked out and other bits that were lifted from Secretprojects/other such sites...

The OP highlighted post seems to be fluff according to the folks at SP who noticed 2495's posts on MP.com were coinciding with another identity that was posting on SP at the time ..... meaning some degree of shenanigans.

Also re-read 2495's posts - they may remind you of someone who used to post here.

a reply to: Jukiodone

I think I may know about what person you are talking, Jukiodone Are you talking about A***0 member? lol

a reply to: Jukiodone

Also re-read 2495's posts - they may remind you of someone who used to post here.

To whom would you be referring? They bare a very slight similarity to an individual who used to post here and is well known in military blogs and forums for appearing and disappearing. Usually leaving very long winded and sometimes difficult to follow posts filled with a great deal of detail and techno jargon but well knowledged nonetheless. I have personally conversed with him quite a few times. Perhaps I'm thinking of the wrong individual though?

the pictures look fake and the black triangles arent earthly imo

originally posted by: Kurokage
Great thread and a very interesting read!!
The pics don't seem legit and I also don't think it has a very aerodynamic nose for a high supersonic/hypersonic aircraft (I'm no expert!) but the rumors of a "black project" aircraft landing in Scotland have been doing the rounds for years and also don't forget the Boscombe down crash.

It would be a hypersonic aircraft, like the NASA X-43A/Hyper-X
www.dfrc.nasa.gov...

www.dfrc.nasa.gov...

Hi, new member / long time lurker here.

at least two of the pics are genuine, that platform was on the ground in Scotland at least 3 times during the time they indicated, the nose design is fine for very high speed (remember X43a)

From my understanding and contact with an old service friend (RAF) it and another bigger platform were regular visitors to Scotland during testing, from his description the yanks managing the european sections of the development were amazed at the success of both and hence it went into limited operational usage in the ME and further afield but no UK personnel were allowed anywhere near either and even the ATC's were swapped out for yanks when those beauties were in town.

As for the other black triangles, one was an early BAe project that was manned initially and then heavily modified to become a fully fledged (and operational at least twice) UCAV, and it's little slow brother became the Taranis sub scale demonstrator. I can confirm the operational bit because I saw it at a remote base in UAE during my time there, far side of the base and we were simply told, "don't ask" but it was armed (internal weapons bay) and an unusual take off profile, stayed below 100ft until out of sight unlike the Typhoons and Tornados which always wanted height fast, didn't matter to the UCAV though as it was obviously very stealthy.

Very interesting thread. This vehicle may be very active lately. Can hear it several times a month in many places.

Any speculation as to what it is?

a reply to: GrumpyBollocks

Which pics are you saying are real?

Pretty sure all of these pics were debunked at one point or another (except the real one of a SR 71).

The shovel nose triangle is a shoop of the underside of a Typhoon with upper section and identifiers removed.

You say an old service friend...were you in the RAF?

For clarification my post is regarding the rumbling sound the OPs link is talking about not the photos.

a reply to: GrumpyBollocks

Welcome to the ATS community, GrumpyBollocks! Nice to see you here.

As for your post, I have some questions.

originally posted by: GrumpyBollocks
at least two of the pics are genuine, that platform was on the ground in Scotland at least 3 times during the time they indicated, the nose design is fine for very high speed (remember X43a)

Which one from the pics are genuine ones?
Is that platform a manned one? How long is it operational?

BTW Have you ever heard about Swiss guys "Fastmover" sighting from Tikaboo in 1999? Here you have a link to the Swiss report: www.dreamlandresort.com...

Keep posting, mate

a reply to: SpeedFanatic

Hi SF,

Yeah I'm fully aware of the Tikaboo sighting, pity they weren't alert enough to get imagery

As for the other pics, I was never happy with folks saying "that's definitely a SR-71 or A12" , even accounting for varying angles (bank / turn etc) the proportions are wrong, nose is too long to the canopy, nacelles are too short and above the fuselage line. see comparison pic below

a reply to: GrumpyBollocks



there were a few different noses the A12 had. i will admit it does look a little different

Well, this is an interesting little piece of detective work from a British group that that I’ve not heard of before.

Whenever I sit down to reverse engineer a supposed “black” project, one of the first things I look for is internal consistency in the story. This story has a lot of internal consistency.

Take, for instance, the observations that the craft has been observed making high altitude S-turns and has been observed making completely silent landings. These claims are both indicative of a craft that is a maneuvering hypersonic glider during the final phase of its mission (just like the Space Shuttle and/or X37B).

The shape depicted is a slender, sharp-edged, narrow-angle double-wedge—a shape that was studied extensively during the last 20 years or so as a candidate for a lifting, hypersonic glider. (See, spacegrant.montana.edu... for example, for a look at an unclassified version of the concept.) This family of shapes was known to the people I worked with at NASA Ames as a “Henke” wedge, after the German-named scientist who first proposed it. These shapes are known to yield good hypersonic L/D and also good subsonic L/D, which is exactly what you would want for a reusable craft capable of hypersonic gliding followed by a roll-on landing on a runway. The sharp leading edge would require the use of an advanced thermal protection material at that location; one of the Diborides (Hafnium, for example) would be an obvious speculation.

I can’t say anything definitive about the authenticity of the photos, but the 3 that show a wedge shaped craft all seem to my eye to show the same shape as seen from slightly different angles. The leading edge sweep angle appears (again, to my eye) to be about 75 degrees back from the lateral. That is much, much steeper than the wing sweep of a conventional transonic fighter (like the Typhoon) and approximates the overall planform aspect ratio of the X43A (which has been noted by a previous commenter).

All three photos show the presence of a short beavertail flap located at the extreme rear underside of the planform—a feature in common with the Space Shuttle and the X37. On those 2 vehicles, the body flap serves to protect the rocket thrust chambers from direct impingement of the hot plasma field around the craft as well as to provide pitch and roll control during the prolonged, hot entry phase. This suggests that the flap on the craft in the photos (which might actually be a split flap) is intended for the same purposes.

The witness reports describe the vehicle taking off under its own power with turbojet engines and then converting to a different, noisier propulsion mode characterized by a noticeably higher acceleration rate and the presence of a single, bright red source of luminousity. The simplest explanation is that this would be a rocket propulsion system.

Taken together, all these considerations point almost uniquely to this being a Trans Atmospheric Vehicle (TAV). It takes off under its own power using conventional turbojet engines, climbs and cruises to its launch location and altitude (probably including one or more aerial refuelings), uses an onboard rocket propulsion system to launch onto a pre-selected sub-orbital arc, re-enters the atmosphere (presumably thousands of miles downrange) using a nose-up lifting ballistic entry (like the Shuttle), and then levels off into a long hypersonic glide (presumably over its target) using hypersonic aerodynamic lift. During the hypersonic glide, it can maintain a pretty level flight path by continually increasing the angle of attack while continually decelerating. In various simulations that I have been involved in over the years, it generally works out that hypersonic gliders like this run out of aerodynamic pressure (designated “q”) right around Mach 2.0). At that point, they have to start descending to thicker parts of the atmosphere and (ultimately) land (or crash). Like any glider, they have to start managing their energy (speed and altitude) quite a bit before that point to make sure they can make it to the runway. The traditional way to do this is by performing S-turns while near the end of the hypersonic phase. Down near sea level, the terminal glide velocity can easily be less than 200 knots, especially if (as appears to be true in this case) there are leading edge slats on thin wings. This eliminates the need for exceptionally long runways. In this case, it would appear to be theoretically possible to restart the turbojets and execute a go around. This is a luxury that neither the Space Shuttle nor the X37A had and-for that matter-did not need.

One last note. No rocket engine bells are visible in any of the photos protruding beyond the edge of the body flap. This could be because the engine bells are too small to be seen, but this seems unlikely to me. Small rocket engine bells are inconsistent with the rapid acceleration that was reported. Going efficiently from subsonic speeds at tens of thousands of feet onto a suborbital arc requires accelerations starting initially around 2.5 G, and steadily increasing from that point. Any conventional rocket engines large enough to provide 2.5 G initially should be visible from the side. This suggests either the use of a linear aerospike engine or (less likely) an external burning engine (using the underside of the vehicle as one wall of the exhaust nozzle). Either of these approaches would move the bulk of the rocket combustion process outside the vehicle where it would become more easily vehicle.

I was going to end this by saying "I want one!" However, since I am a taxpayer I guess I already own part of one.

a reply to: SpeedFanatic

a reply to: 1947boomer

Always good to have you here. Your contributions are always of high quality.

a reply to: 1947boomer

ill relay a sighting of my own, seems like it kind of matches up here.


I was standing out side with a friend of mine in the drive way. We were just chating and smoking, i always look at the sky late at night(or in general).

I saw a yellowish light low on the horizon, it got my attention because of the strange color, like a HPS highway light yellow-orange.

i pointed it out to my friend and as i did so, it started to step almost like a zig zag up and across the horizon at a constant pace. FAST but not un-naturally fast.

I assumed it wa in orbit by the speed and apparent height of this light, and no sound.

i obviously cant prove what i saw but the constant speed and the strange stepping motion seemed like someone was at the controls.

so something is up there....maybe this finally answers what i saw

Thing I find with Rocket propelled planes is "fuel usage"...The Me163 had about 3min fuel and something like the shuttle or X38b had to have external tanks to achieve altitude.. A hybrid engine system is the only thing I think of.

a reply to: SpeedFanatic
Ahh, I hadn't considered that person but now you mention it I can see the similarity. It very well could be them.