WTF was that refueling

originally posted by: dzeleniak
It's not the Green Lady. She or something similar was spotted in Nevada down by Tonopah heading southwest a couple days ago.

Maybe I’m not understanding you, but you seem to be saying that because a Mach 5 to 6 aircraft was seen near Tonopah on one day, it could not have been seen in Tennessee a day or two earlier. That makes no sense. A Mach 5 to 6 aircraft could be seen basically any place on the planet on one day and practically any place else on the planet the next day.

That’s kinda the whole point, actually.

The sighting of a very big, fast-looking aircraft reminds me of something that my roommate and I saw back circa 2002 on approach to Kelly Air Force Base in San Antonio Texas around 4 a.m. It was witnessing this aircraft that sparked my interest in unacknowledged airframes. For context, we were both in our senior year at Texas State University in San Marcos, which is about 50 miles northeast of Kelly and about 40 miles northeast of Randolph AFB. We were accustomed to seeing and hearing C-5s, KC-10s, B-1Bs, C-130s, T-38s, and occasional F-16s and 15s on approach (we had a good sense of the sounds and sizes of different aircraft, even at night). The C-5s and B-1s on approach to Kelly would descend over San Marcos at around 20,000 feet – lower than cruising airliner traffic and above the local traffic. C-5s are based at Kelly and are particularly common. The growl of their turbofans was unmistakable and we could recognize their lighting patterns at night.

Anyways, like many college kids, we stayed up late. I remember this vividly: we were cleaning the kitchen at around 4 a.m. and were not drunk/high. My roommate and I would get into these weird cleaning frenzies and just tear the place up. While talking and cleaning, we heard what I can only describe as a hissing/whooshing sound like air moving through a pipe (not a jet sound). We actually thought it was our neighbors upstairs using a rental steam cleaner on their carpet and were laughing about them being up cleaning at the same ridiculous hour. This gives you some idea of the sound, as we mistook it for a steam cleaner. We did not associate this sound as coming from an aircraft or even being a form of propulsion. However, the sound got “bigger” if you will, and transitioned into a very low-pitched rumbling – not unlike the sound an F-22 makes or a beefier B-1B.

Both being into aviation (he had taken flying lessons) we ran outside to see what the heck this was. Just past 12 o’clock, nearly directly overhead and on the very same flight path the C-5s took was a very large, diamond-shaped lighting pattern (elongated towards the front). The front light was white, the wingtip lights normal red/green, and the tail light was a duller amber/yellow color. None of the lights strobed or were blinking. Even though it was night, the plane looked and sounded huge. We only had the aforementioned aircraft for comparison, and I would estimate this bird to be close in size to the C-5s (maybe a bit smaller) and bigger than a B-1B – maybe 180-200 feet long if I had to guess. My impression was that it was a Concord SST, B-70, or jumbo SR-71. It was definitely an airliner-sized platform. Assuming it was as high as the other traffic we were used to seeing, I’m guessing its speed was about 250-350 knots (not traveling very fast for making such a deep rumble).

We lived on a hill facing south and watched the plane continue to descend southeast towards San Antonio and Kelly AFB. We stood mesmerized and watched it for about 5 minutes (I’m guessing 20-30 miles downrange). The sound became a very low rumble as it flew away from us. Knowing we were seeing something special by the sound, we paid attention. It didn’t appear to be on autopilot as it was doing very gentle, lazy s-turns (seemed like it was being hand flown). Eventualy we lost sight of it. And that was it!

We did a lot of research about this online (of course it was 2003). I always assumed it was what people call the brilliant buzzard. There were some news stories we encountered (long gone I think) about people calling the police somewhere back east reporting a plane making a “loud whooshing sound.” A poster on one ATS thread talked about some secret near-space bomber called an XB-176 (interestingly, if you search for this nothing comes up), he guarded while in Nevada in the late 80s. Somewhere later in the forum, someone talks about a large, house-shaking aircraft that flew over their house near Edwards (I think) and described a lighting pattern similar to what we saw. This thread intrigues me about the OP's sighting, as unlike the famous north sea "Aurora/F-121" refueling sighting, if you believe that's what it was, this plane was the same size or bigger than the refueling craft.

I’ve wondered about the weird hissing/whooshing sound. I suspect its either some sort of fluidic thrust vectoring, pressurized oxygen/fuel source being offloaded before landing to lighten the thing, some sort of ramjet/scramjet/combined cycle engine in a low-speed phase (almost like air is being pumped into it), or something aerodynamic such as swing wing moving, flaps deploying, etc. Why Kelly AFB? We assumed it was to “hide” for some unplanned repairs or conduct a secret show-and-tell as Kelly AFB has enormous hangers for the C-5s.

I would sure love to know what we saw some day – quite an unforgettable machine from the sound and big from the lights. Maybe it was what the poster saw refueling? I can’t imagine the US operating too many airliner-sized, classified aircraft. Where would they keep them? After college, I served in the military, and though I saw a few strange aircraft at night over my base, nothing like this. I'd love to see this plane again someday.

a reply to: 1947boomer Mach 3 will get you from Tennessee to Nevada in only a hour or so,if it`s based at Groom it might have been topping off on it`s way t wherever.Or heading back there.

Anything like this. Was floating around internet awhile back www.theblackvault.com...#

a reply to: Wgeorge9876
No, fuselage looked longer

originally posted by: Moohide
I cant post photos, but could it have been the Brilliant Buzzard? Also known as Super XB70.

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Long time lurker here.

I have heard of this!

The artist John MacNeill created his rendering of he Brilliant Buzzard as noted in the link below from Dreamlandresort:

www.dreamlandresort.com...

Scroll right to the bottom of the webpage looking at the bottom two images.

and this website "Schenkenberg":

www.schenkenberg.ch...

See the first three images.


I don't know who created the 2nd rendering but I saw it on the bibliotecapleyades.net website article titled "Super Valkyrie":

www.bibliotecapleyades.net...

I think the USA does have a secret space program but it's been kept secret a very long time probably since the Ronald Reagan presidency of the 1980's. Didn't he start the so-called Star Wars program? All I know is this plane is supposed to be huge at the length of a 747!

a reply to: PhotonicsTechnologist
The Shenkenberg site you posted , the top center and right pic looked extremely close to whatever it was, couldn’t see good enough to say if it had canards or not.

originally posted by: ridgerunner
a reply to: PhotonicsTechnologist
The Shenkenberg site you posted , the top center and right pic looked extremely close to whatever it was, couldn’t see good enough to say if it had canards or not.

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When my cousin was working as a food contractor on an FOB base in Iraq, he saw something on his airfield at night that looked a lot like the two images on the Shenkenberg site! When he asked an enlisted friend, he said that he was told that it was nicknamed "The Black Buzzard" and carried a spaceplane on its back and the enlisted guy told my cousin never to mention what he saw to anyone else on the FOB. I dunno if that's true or not. Why would you have a spaceplane in Iraq? Wouldn't you fly it from the USA or over an ocean to hide it?

a reply to: ThePeaceMaker I`m gonna sit on the porch with my Camcorder ever once in a while and hope.40x won`t get a close up, but it would do pretty good. I might get some cool planes like a B2 or f35 refueling or catch some other black project. Besides,there are all kinds of wildlife to video around here.