Aurora Aircraft Research Project

Aurora - Secret Hypersonic Spyplane

GOAL
To prove/disprove the existance of the aurora by researching aircraft thought to be connected (why the sr-71 couldn't do the job), and research possible sightings and then make a timeline of the sightings(also where they happened is important.).
Investigate and prove/disprove possible bases of the aurora, prove/disprove if satellites could do the job, and research documents containing information on the aurora.
Research PDWEs, research pictures, depictions and drawings. Contact groups such as NASA and request photos and question it's existance. Put together a chart of statistics.

PURPOSE
To create one accessible source of proof/disproof of the auroras' existance that is credible and reliable.

TEAM MEMBERS
PeanutButterJellyTime -

- TL
Investigate if sightings of the aurora are real and take note of them (date, location). Make a timeline of sightings (give details,location/heading,date).
Prove why satellites couldn't do the job, help out others upon request.

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Investigate possible bases, investigate pictures, depictions, and drawings and determine if pictures are real or not/Use of the aurora in space.

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Research connections with other aircraft and other names of the aurora, research PDWEs.

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Obtain documents, research how the auroras' speed would affect the human body and if the human body could survive at such speeds.

[edit on 12-4-2005 by ADVISOR]

Alright... I'm still waiting on a few e-mails with information to come in on some reports of Aurora Sightings that have occurred within the last 6 years.

But, that shouldn't stop me from posting my personal sightings, or the local claims that identify such a plane.

DAVENPORT, IOWA
1.) October 30, 2000

7:29 PM CDT
It was located out in a local school field, where this sighting took place. 45 people did whiteness a triangular black aircraft flyby at high altitudes followed by an earth-shattering sonic-boom. The plane left behind, a contrail that so long, the end of it could not be seen, and the doughnut-on-a-rope was in effect. Another 30 people heard the sonic-boom in Bettendorf, the next city to the East.

ELDRIDGE, IOWA
2.)August 10, 2003

9:18 PM CDT
This was a trained-for night. 3 witnessed actually got a good look at this plane after just barely passing over to make a turn. 90 other people got a brief "eye" of the plane. The 3 people claimed the following:

- It was very loud, even at the slow speed, and altitude it was at.
- The afterburners/engines were on the bottom of the plane.
- The flames that were coming out of the afterburners, were blue.
- It appeared just as it disappeared, but long enough for us to get a good look.

Other people claims to have seen/heard the plane this night included, very loud... large, dark, and black looking aircraft.

9:39 PM CDT
Soon after this first sighting... a large noise was heard from where the plane had disappeared. The 3 people who were on what they call "Patrol" said it sounded to some kind of charge up. This was immediately followed by a massive sonic-boom and a very fast flyby of the plane once again. This time making it so the entire city and its surrounding edges to hear the massive sound of this plane, 2,950 people total.

An e-mail report here, in his own words, as follows after the header:

HARRISBURG, PENNSYLVANIA
July 2003

I witnessed along with my father in law what appeared to be an exceptionally fast moving aircraft. This occurred during the summer of 2003. I observed it in Harrisburg, PA. The craft was traveling SW. I barely saw the craft, which was black, it was out of sight before I could fix my vision on it. I did not notice any wings. It appeared "missile like" in appearance. In that the standard wing set was not present. After the craft was gone I did notice a ringed vapor trail with another line vapor trail running inside of the rings. Without even being able to take a guess at the altitude I cannot guess how far a part the rings were. I have never seen the craft again and in fact I was surprised to see something like it over the East coast. I question if I did not see a regular craft. However it was not behaving like a regular airplane and the vapor trail was also odd. I was in the Army and have some basic skill in plane recognition but I cannot even guess what I saw.

These are just a slight few of the many, many reports to come, and that have occured, it almost hard to say that such an aircraft does not exist, when so many people have seen it or heard it.

(EDITED FOR QUOTING)



[Edited on 11-5-2004 by Shugo]

alright daddios this is whats up first and foremost we need to thank ADVISOR for putting this together because he did a lot to help me get it right
I encourage everyone to go to the library and get a book called aurora by bill sweetman he is an expert. and his depiction is the best.
also in the november 2002 issue of populsr science there is something about scramjet engines similar to pdwes , i borrowed it from school so i will post info about it soon.
also everyone read threads on this site in the aircraft project forum

Edit made to condense posts made:
5-5-2004 at 12:14 Post Number: 513594
5-5-2004 at 12:55 Post Number: 513641

cmdrkeenkid

okay some bases to start with
Area 51
wallops island test range
NASA langley facility
also one thread on this site that claims to be picturs of the aurora has some of the realist looking pictures ive seen it is clearly the aurora but it is flawed and could easily be a model and some people claim the person said he faked them

Shugo

okay shugo the first sighting and the most credible is the cris gibson north sea sighting . he was educated on aircraft and drew a picture of the aurora he is a reliable and credible man. and include your sightings.
work with cmdrkeenkid if the sighting seems real to you and there are pictures tell cmdrkeenkid.
do me favor that J.T. bitrol field place if you find time try to get up by it maybe get some pictures that kind of thing, but that is if you get time.

silQ

okay so i know you are busy with work so if you need help i will do what i can .
anyways check out suntan, brilliant buzzard (some people say the buzzard is the super valkiyrie and some say it is an airborne aircraft carrier and carries the aurora others say it is just the xb70), and check out lockheed martin the people that most likely build it.
the pdwe thing , well here is a start not long ago an aircraft dropped a uav that set the speed record it was using a rocket engine but it also had what was clearly a pdwe. the aurora could use a scramjet to and the possible fuels are hydrogen and methane.

infinite

try to obtain some document through freedom of information act and if you have the nards try to find someone on the inside thats willing to smuggle documents out. also contact a really high up medical person and question them if the human body could survive between mach6 and mach 20 the mach 20 i doubt but that is what one website says.

deltanine

so you have been busy with work when you are not busy i can try to give you a real job but other than that just help out if you dont have time i can take over for you

ghost
try to find proof that the aurora could be used in space

infinite is busy and would like someone to take over, any takers?

final "get started" post

okay last thing if anyone needs help ask me or deltanine

here we go

okay so satelites couldnt do the job because when a bombing campaign is going on and a pilot needs to know if he needs to make a run when a satelite tries to get a picture it depends on the weather, if the weather is bad it has to wait a whole day to get the picture and we definitely dont have so many satelites that we can get that picture no matter what so some aircraft would have to get the picture, that aircraft is the aurora

[Edited on 6-5-2004 by ADVISOR]

[Edited on 8-5-2004 by machinegunjordan]

Interesting site with LOTS of info on names that was given to the Aurora and similar projects.

Aurora

In the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) Fiscal Year 1986 budget request, there was a line item labeled "Aurora" listed under the heading "air breathing reconnaissance." It was funded for $80 million with a projected spending level in FY 1987 of $2.272 billion. In his 1994 biography Skunk Works, Ben Rich claimed that the line item for Aurora was for the Advanced Technology Bomber competition. The ATB competition was won by Northrop over Lockheed's bid in late 1981, producing the B-2 Spirit bomber. By 1983 it had already received funding for construction. So the theory that the Aurora line item was a cover for ATB competition funds is a myth.

At that time, the Advanced Technology Bomber was being funded under the SABRE PENETRATOR program, and soon after the SENIOR ICE program. Interestingly, it appears that the Aurora line items in both FY 1986 and 1987 were never funded. However, the items "Special Update Program" and "Selected Activities" both received increases in funding that seem consistent with the amounts of the Aurora line items. The widely held rumor that "Selected Activities" is funding for the Central Intelligence Agency has been refuted by a number of very reliable sources. Instead, they indicate that it is either a "slush fund" for undisclosed DOD programs or funding for USAF managed intelligence collection systems. The Central Intelligence Agency derives its funding from a variety of other sources outside of the DOD -- in accordance with the National Security Act.

The Aurora name itself is quite significant. Aurora had a place in Greco-Roman mythology. She was the goddess of the dawn (also known as Eos) who created the stars and set them out at night. Lockheed programs, recce systems in particular, have had a long history of being named after astrological figures and constellations. The original name for the A-12 was Cygnus, the SR-71 Oxcart (the European name for the Big Dipper), the U-2 carried the name Isis. So the Aurora name suggests a Lockheed recce program. The fact that it is a single word codename is also worthy of note. Single word designations indicate a much higher level of classification than other programs -- more secret than even SENIOR TREND, the F-117A program. Generally, only a few kinds of things are grouped into single codeword compartment groups.


SENIOR CITIZEN

The F-117A stealth fighter program was hardly the first use of the word SENIOR as a code name. SENIOR has been used to designate many classified U.S. aircraft projects. In the early 1970s, U-2 flights near Chinese airspace carried the designation SENIOR BOOK. The highly secret D-21 was developed under the name SENIOR BOWL. SENIOR LANCE referred to a modified U-2. Other U-2 programs were identified as SENIOR STRETCH and SENIOR SPAN.

More recently, SENIOR was still used to designate classified aircraft projects. Just after the Have Blue stealth prototype in 1977, the F-117A was referred to by the code name SENIOR TREND. Later, the Advanced Tactical Fighter program (which produced Lockheed's YF-22 and Northrop's YF-23 as competitive prototypes) was designated SENIOR SKY. Today, SENIOR YEAR is the operational code name for current U-2 flights. SENIOR YEAR carries the program element identification number 0301317F.

Aviation analysts believe that when the Aurora line item was shown in the budget, its code name was changed to SENIOR CITIZEN. Historically, SENIOR CITIZEN made sense simply because the SR-71 code name was OXCART. Both names seem to have been specifically chosen to imply a gentle, somewhat slow, nondescript project, in an attempt to baffle curious people from looking further into the name. SENIOR CITIZEN may have the same intent when it comes to the hypersonic spy plane that is commonly referred to as Aurora.

Another conjecture (from the Freedom Ridge Oversight Group) is that SENIOR CITIZEN is a low-observable, V/STOL turbofan powered aircraft. It is not designed to carry heavy cargo, like tanks, which a C-5 can carry, but for troops (probably Special Operations Forces) and their equipment. The aircraft is probably manufactured by Boeing Company. It should also be pointed out that Boeing has a fairly elaborate radar cross section (RCS) range that can be used to test the stealth characteristics of the design.

SENIOR CITIZEN is reliably believed to have been a classified U.S. military program, with a program element identification number of 0401316F. SENIOR CITIZEN may be the codename for the program that developed the Aurora aircraft, if not the aircraft itself.


XR-7

A possible designation for the supposed Aurora was believed to be the XR-7 Thunder Dart. The Thunder Dart was said to be the second part in a two part reconnaissance mission, riding piggy-back aboard the SR-75 Penetrator -- an aircraft that resembles another secret project code named BRILLIANT BUZZARD.


GRANDFATHER

This is another possible code-name for the Aurora project. Origin is unknown.


DARKSTAR MIKE and DARKSTAR NOVEMBER

In 1992, Steve Douglass, who is believed to be the first to photograph the now-famous "donuts on a rope" contrails associated with the Aurora, heard a radio communication to two aircraft identified over the air as DARKSTAR MIKE and DARKSTAR NOVEMBER. However, in late 1996, the USAF unveiled an unmanned spy plane called the Darkstar, which has no relation to the Aurora. Whether these radio calls referred to this Lockheed Skunk Works-developed aircraft is open to speculation. Some claim that the radio call and the Darkstar project are too far apart chronologically to definitively link the two.

According to an avid shortwave radio listener, DARKSTAR MIKE and DARKSTAR NOVEMBER are references to individual controller consoles aboard E-3 AWACS aircraft controlling the actions of fighter aircraft in wargames being played out in the skies on a regular basis. They could be heard on military shortwave frequencies such as 9.014 and 11.214 Mhz USB (upper sideband).


SR-91

Since the Aurora was thought to be a replacement to the SR-71 plane, it has been suggested that the Aurora is actually named SR-91.


What's in a name?

Does this aircraft exist, and if it does, what is its name? Aurora? SENIOR CITIZEN? The SR-91? We don't know for certain, but the circumstantial evidence is certainly persuasive. There are some observers who believe that if it exists, it is no longer called Aurora. Even if the mystery item in the 1985 budget did refer to this project, the name would almost certainly have been changed after the security leak. But by any name, the Aurora is one of the most publicly-known classified aircraft of all time


Code names

ggod job silQ were making progress i saw that website a long time ago and put it on my favs and looked for it today and it wasnt there

This could be a possilbe video of the Aurora! It has a string in donut contrail and everything!
Aurora

here's where i got the video:
www.firstscience.com...

okay one thing here this will probably be a better thread so lets try to keep it organized and not post bits and pieces of information and try to organize sections of the info. but it is no big deal so dont worry about it too much

yea silQ that video is on ATS and i meant to tell everyone about it but forgot thanks for posting that but it is bad quality on real player so you cant tell if it is real maybe there is another way to view it, the aircraft looks white though

also daddios there is a few pages on the home page of ATS about Aurora

In order to cut down bandwidth on ATS (and due to lack of upload space ) I've created a picture hosting website at this URL. In the captions of the pictures I will post the original source for the image.

Anyway, here is the URL: community.webshots.com...

From there I will link images into this thread with my thoughts and my determination.

nice nice cmdrkeenkid this will make things easier good job shugo has a post on the way pretty big too

Note, this is not a timeline with sightings, it is just a timeline of events that have occured.

1989 - 1990

August 1989
Cris Gibson whiteness a black aircraft refueling from a U.S. KC-135, accompanied by two U.S. F-111s, over the North Sea. He then create pictures, both resembling the Aurora Aircraft.

March 1990
Observers in Nevada begin witnessing and hearing the believed to be Aurora Hypersonic Aircraft. Also first noting the doughnuts-on-rope contrails. People describe the sonic booms as "the sky ripping".

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 feet. Normally, no engine noise or sonic boom is heard from that altitude.

1991

May 1991
Aviation Week & Space Technology reports that classified 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".

Suggested Specs and Design of Aurora Reveiled
Article found in Aviation Week for May 1991

It is only a "theoretical possibility", claims that one of the Aurora aircraft has an airframe like a flattened American football, about 110 feet long and 60 feet 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.

June 1991
The first of a series of unusual, earthquake-like rumblings were detected in Southern California. On at least five occasions, these rumblings were recorded by at least 25 of the 220 U.S. Geological Survey sensors across Southern California used to pinpoint earthquake epicenters. Seismologists quickly say that these were sonic booms, not earthquakes.

November 1991
Reports of "unusually loud, rumbling sonic booms" near Pensacola, Florida in November 1991 have been associated with the Aurora program.

Sometime in Late 1991
An anonymous arms control analyst says he examined a late-1991 Landsat image of Dreamland (Area 51) that shows three white triangles sitting by the main runway. Each was about the size of a Boeing 747.

1992-1996

February 1992
At Beale Air Force Base, on two consecutive nights in late February 1992, observers reported sighting a triangular aircraft displaying a diamond-shaped lighting pattern, with light appearance similar to the F-117 configuration, two 'whitish' lights near what would be conventional wingtips and an amber light near the tail.

Sometime in 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.

Later on, sonic-booms were heard across the entire state of Washington, including Seattle.

In Early 1992 a number of houses (+/- 25) in the northern Netherlands were damaged as a result of a sonic boom. No aircraft were reported in the region, Dutch Newspapers suggested the noise came from a top secret plane, that was in a nearby base.

Sometime in Mid 1992
Increasing knowledge of the Aurora has led observers to believe that the aircraft is not a prototype, but rather on full flight status. By mid-1992, Jane's editor Bill Sweetman suggested 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 final approach to a secret Lockheed-operated RCS range in the Mojave desert one night.

February 1993
The USAF applied to buy over 4,000 acres of land overlooking Area 51 in Nevada. Local residents have reported hearing loud engines being tested inside the area.

July 1996
A report is made of a mysterious sonic boom over Orange County, California, coming on July 20, 1996. The loud sonic boom matches the ear shattering noise heard in 1991.

Full Timeline

[Edited on 5-5-2004 by Shugo]

good job Shugo, the website shugo linked too has a good amount of information that could help all of you,
well as for me my progress isnt as good because what i am researching is hard to get good results on google , first i tried just putting in satelites and got info on how satelites work and stuff and thats where i got my one post about them from and i borrowed some from bill sweetmans book aurora, but to get anything else is hard because it is kind of a indirect and random search subject so i have tried actually typing in the question but didnt get much so i will reword the question and keep trying but i think i will need to hit the library for this one and i dont think i will get there because this weekend i will be busy but i can probably squeeze some time in because i live about 2 miles away. but i have it under control so dont worry

The following are news articles from 1990 to 1993... these all in some way link to Aurora, or it's code operation:

February 28, 1992
"Mystery contact may be Aurora" by: Bill Sweetman

Mounting evidence suggests that the US Government has secretly developed and deployed a hypersonic reconnaissance aircraft, probably as a replacement for the SR-71.

A Royal Air Force air traffic controller tracked a target leaving the NATO RAF base at Machrihanish, Scotland at an estimated speed of Mach 3 last November, according to 'The Scotsman' newspaper last week. Another witness heard an extremely loud jet noise near the base around the same time, it said.

Drawing shows 2 aircraft from 10 O'clock low.

Highly swept delta platform, with 2 long rectangular engine ducts underneath and twin verticals. It is not an all-body design. It's probably a blended body but it's too hard to tell, because a top view is missing.

August 25, 1992
Mystery Craft Spotted by Jetliner By Ken Leiser

The cockpit crew of a London-bound 747 reported a close encounter with a fast-moving aircraft near a Southern California Air Force Base earlier this
month, but federal officials said Monday that the mysterious second craft never showed up on radar screens.

George Air Farce Base is about 55 miles south of Edwards Air Farce Base and was a training area for pilots of the F-4G, an aircraft whose mission is to eliminate surface-to-air missile sites.

More Articals from 1990 to 1993

[Edited on 6-5-2004 by Shugo]

Here's one for the books, Something I found ... typing this out here:

Rumors and reported sightings of a secret American superplane have been proliferating lately almost as abundantly as yarns about UFO's. But despite the acknowledged yearning of many American aviation experts and buffs for an ultrafast spy plane, it appears that development of even the engine needed for such a plane is moving faster in Russia than in this country. The possible existence of a American intel-gathering plane capable of flying at Mach 8 has been suggested in recent articles in the British periodical Jane's Defense Weekly (JDW), the American magazine Aviation Week & Space Technology (AWST) and other respected technical publications.

These reports are based partly on sightings of large and unusually shaped airplanes, peculiar looking condensation trails left by high-flying aircraft and strange rumbling sounds near Edwards AFB, Calif., and other places around the world.

Secret Project of the 1980's
Some experts believe the purported sightings of a hypersonic (ultra-high speed) recon plane are credible in light of some mysterious DoD budget items in the 1980's called 'Aurora' or perhaps 'Senior Citizen'.

The theory is that Aurora was intended to produce a new spy plane to succeed the Lockheed SR-71 'Blackbird', which was retired in 1990. During the 1950's into the 1960's the SR-71 served America's intel agencies, it routinely flew at speeds up to 2600 mph above 100,000 feet, and none of the countries it scouted ever succeeded in shooting it down, despite hundreds of attempts.

The Air Force, which operated the SR-71, the U-2 spy plane (which gained notoriety in 1960 when one was shot down over Russia) and recon satellites on behalf of the CIA, emphatically denies the existence of a super spy plane. Donald B. Rice, Secretary of the Air Force, said last month that reports of such an aircraft are 'fantasy'.

An AF spokesman said: "We have looked into all such sightings, as we have for UFO reports, and we cannot explain them. No AF were operating at the times and places of the alleged sightings." William Sweetman, author of the report published in December by (JDW), still believes in the existence of some kind of secret, high-speed spy plane.

"Many of these sightings were from highly qualified and credible observers", he said, "and even if the AF is not directly involved, the plane might be operated by some other organization, such as the National Reconnaissance Office. That office has coordinated intel from satellites and for decades, but its very existence was denied by the Government until recently."

Another writer on secret intel-gathering and satellites, William E. Burrows, author of Deep Black, also believes Aurora (or its equivalent under another name) may exist. "If you put all the evidence together", he said, "you have to conclude that some kind of high-speed plane is flying. But it might not be a dedicated recon plane. It might also operate as a bomber or in some other high-speed mission."

Dr. John E. Pike, who analyzed the Aurora case for the federation's newsletter, wrote that 'an understanding of the mystery phenomena is impossible outside the context of the UFO phenomena.

"Belief in the existence of marvelously capable and highly secret resonates with some of the deeper anxieties of contemporary American ociety", he wrote. "Aviation has long been one of the distinguishing ttributes of American greatness."

But he added: "The declining fortunes of the American aerospace industry have created growing uncertainties about the future. It would be comforting to believe that the decline of America and American aerospace was more apparent than real."

Such sentiments were echoed in a speech Dec. 9 by Daniel S. Goldin, the Administrator of NASA, who declared, "America's historic lead in aeronautics is in a nose dive."

EDIT: Wording

[edit on 7-6-2004 by Shugo]

I'll write up a thing about why the Hubu is obsolete and needed to be replaced.

Be in in a couple of days.

Franco-Russian Test

Russia and its French aerospace partners, meanwhile, have announced the successful test-firing of a 'scramjet' engine, which operates at speeds starting at mach 5 and is capable of lifting an airplane toward orbit outside the atmosphere.

The Franco-Russian test, as reported by AWST, was carried out Nov. 17 in Kazahkhstan. Reps of the French aerospace company Onera, a partner in the project, said they successfully operated for 15 seconds at mach 5.5 in a test using a modified Russian SAM. The French said progress with the scramjet meant that development of a test using the jet could begin in 1995.

A scramjet differs from an ordinary jet engine in that it can only operate at a very high speed. Air entering a scramjet at high supersonic speed compresses itself in the engine's reaction chamber, where hydrogen fuel is injected, mixed with air and ignited, producing a rocket-like thrust. An aircraft using such an engine would require a conventional power plant to take off and reach supersonic speed before igniting its scramjet.

Operating at mach 8, such an aircraft could serve as a recon spy plane, a penetration bomber, or even an ultra-high speed commercial airliner. It could also fly to the top of the earth's atmosphere and then fire rockets lofting it in the final stage into orbital flight.

Place for Space Plane
Two American companies, Rockwell International's Rocketdyne (RD) and United Technology's Pratt & Whitney (P&W) are trying to develop scramjets, or some other possible powerplants, for the projected National Air and Space Plane, a NASA project. But neither project officials nor aircraft industry experts profess to know anything about the mystery high-speed spy plane.

Vincent Rausch, director of the project, said that the development of power plants for a hypersonic air and space plane was still one of the major stumbling blocks, and that development of a flying prototype was nowhere in sight.

"We don't know anything about it here," Paul Sewell, a spokesman for RD, said of a mystery spy plane, "but it would sure be great if there was something like that flying."

[Edited on 6-5-2004 by Shugo]

okay daddios it is good to see this project is now completely underway
you do that delta nine
ghost should soon be joining us.
i will now get my research going.

okeydoke so anyways for satelites to do the job there would have to be a giant sum of satellites in space and along with the space schedule we already have space would become pretty hectic to launch other things through. the aurora would take better quality pictures. but here is the downside the satellites would get the pictures to who needs to see them faster.

everyone here should already know this but the sr-71 was retired with no usaf opposition that has never happened before. and also during the time the aurora project would have started groom lake had a massive upgrading and a big set of hydrogen feul storage units, also a runways lenth is detirmend by how much room an aircraft needs to take off and land the worlds longest is 6 miles at area 51, sounds like aurora to me ,other things i want to say are the aurora could use a pulsejet also cruises at about mach 6 one website claims it tops at mach 20 but i doubt that but it is a good site , with no crap there are also claims that the super valkyrie if it exists operated under the codename aurora cmdrkeenkid when i was doing my research i found some more bases for you to check out (cape canveral) and shugo there was also a sighting from an oil platform at galveston key my newb ihmotep who will join soon made a point that the original codename may have had something to do with something the aircraft has on it like most code names reffer to but lockheed uses astrological codenames a lot like silQ said

my fault shugo galvelston key was the northsea sighting

[Edited on 6-5-2004 by machinegunjordan]

[Edited on 6-5-2004 by machinegunjordan]

[Edited on 6-5-2004 by machinegunjordan]

[Edited on 6-5-2004 by machinegunjordan]

[Edited on 7-5-2004 by machinegunjordan]