Identifying an unknown aircraft

talkin to a collegue yesterday, he was telling me about an unusual aircraft he saw flying over norwich norfolk,uk,about 12ish years ago.

i have been trying to find out about this but with no luck,so ive found this place in a hope to give him some good news.

the plane was a triangle shaped object,no cut outs,true triangle,it had a mattgold underside with quite clear paneling type marks,like blocks,i can only think of like the shuttle has for heat resistancy.

this plane was low enough for him to make it out,he thought there was something up with it, it was making loud bang type noises followed by a dohnut shaped and spiral vapour trail.
i have found the araurer(spelling) project to have these characteristics,from the info on the internet i have found,i printed a picture of this and took it to him today but he says it wasnt like that,the only visable engine arangement was a beak type assembly on the rear of it opening and clsing,emitting these bangs,it was flying slow apparently,we have us airforce bases nearby,could this be a black project,but what was it?

if it was a black project,surely theyd build it up so people digging in the garden wouldnt see or hear it.

any advice gratefully recieved,if ive been unclear on anything please ask.

Strange, I have never heard of that description of an aircraft before. It sounds to me like the alledged "Aurora." However, we do not know what the aircraft spawned from the "Aurora" Project looks like. It may as well be that aircraft your friend witnessed.

The only clue that I think we can dismiss it as not being the Aurora, is the fact that it was going slow. So with that, the only other kind of aircraft with a triangle shape I can think of is the F-117 Night Hawk, but it doesn't fit the color scheme. Or the contrails made by the engines, the Night Hawk does not create a donut-on-the rope contrail.

So as you can see, it can many things, perhaps someone else will have better luck trying to place this aircraft with its proper designation.

Shattered OUT...

[edit on 28-7-2005 by ShatteredSkies]

thanks for the reply talking today to workmate again about this, he said the movement was a like a rowboat, when it jerks forward each stroke,could be due to the pulse jet/scram jet type engine i have read about it may have this characteristic at slow speeds most witness reports seem to be at high altitude and very fast.

If it was forming a contrail I would be interested to know exactly how high you buddy thought it was over top of him? Due to the fact that contrails aren't usally formed at low altitude.

good point,i shall ask monday,from his description in quite accurate detail it would sound it was low,but then would need to be high to make the vapour

asked him today how low was it?.
his reply "high enough for it to make vapour trails" and hear it making pulsing boom/bangs and enough to see the beak type assembly opeing and shutting.
and see the panelling underneath

Originally posted by BZ
asked him today how low was it?.
his reply "high enough for it to make vapour trails" and hear it making pulsing boom/bangs and enough to see the beak type assembly opeing and shutting.
and see the panelling underneath

Now I'm completely dumbfounded, I have never heard of an aircraft who's nose shaped like a beak would open and close. And for it to make vapour trails? You don't need to be that high, it depends how humid it is, afterall water vapour condenses onto particles, so if the air is saturated enough, the exhaust from the aircraft will be a sufficient surface for water to condense on.

Shattered OUT...

hmmmz.. it wouldn't surprise me... in my opinion the aurora was a testbed of some kind.. and i don't think it's flying anymore.. but thats just my opinion...i don't have anything to back that up with..i think maybe there were design problems with it or it just cost to much.. i guess we'll all find out in like 50 years hey?lol..

reminds me of the whole nuclear flying russian plane..we only found out a few years ago that they actually had one which could fly and could stay in the air for months at a time..

An opening and closing nose? wow..that would be some new radical plane design..i mean wow.. who knows though...

I saw something a few weeks ago..can't be sure what it was.. it had a very faint light on it...it made a lot of noise then went silent... it use to fly over here every week on a tuesday... but it's stopped now..i wish i'd filmed it.. it made a noise like no other plane ive ever heard make!!

Sounds like the aurora spy plane

Originally posted by Jaypeth
Sounds like the aurora spy plane

Well, read the descriptions again, all aledged reports of the Aurora do not coenside with this description.

Shattered OUT...

Thanks for sharing, was it a symetric triangle or was it stretched out?

Did you see the cockpit at all and such?

was a perfect triangle shape with a beak type asembly at the rear(just to clarify)

but deffo wasnt aurora as he's seen a pic and refused it was straight away,would the matt gold underneath be caused by the sunlight shining on it?

Sounds a bit like an Aurora to mee, but I'am not sure...

Beak opening and closing? Sounds creepy.
By your decryptions I imagine some sort of home-made flying car that puffs out smoke every 2 seconds.

Originally posted by BZ


was a perfect triangle shape with a beak type asembly at the rear(just to clarify)

but deffo wasnt aurora as he's seen a pic and refused it was straight away,would the matt gold underneath be caused by the sunlight shining on it?

What you describe there, it is very possible that it's not opening and closing, but moving, it could be TVC pedals. But I'm not sure to what degree they can move at for it to appear as opening and closing.

And the way your friend describes the aircraft, it sounds more like a lifting body than anything else. There are many aircraft in that area that look triangular from the bottom. I don't know, but some of them look like their exhaust pedals may open and close.

Shattered OUT...

[edit on 2-8-2005 by BZ]


damn its too small,could i email this to someone maybe you can make it a decent size.
mate drew me a picture that ive drawn onto microsoft paint.
it isnt a true triangle like i thought it was,it has a naca duct on the bottom that may help explain things,the beak assembly is weird

[edit on 2-8-2005 by BZ]

[email protected]

[edit on 2-8-2005 by BZ]

[edit on 2-8-2005 by BZ]

Too small?
Upload it to www.imageshack.us and post the link here.

[edit on 3-8-2005 by BZ]

there ya go hope this is clearer

[edit on 3-8-2005 by BZ]

Interesting. Did it look a bit like this?

sorry it looks completely different to what has been described to me and from the pic i have,apparently it was flying very very slow,why matey had a good chance to see clearly the underneath.

apparently you could count a few seconds between the exhaust beak opening,and it shot forward and emmited a bang,like it was building up pressure and releasing it.

glad ive stumped people,but would be very pleased to be able to go into work and tell pete what it was.its made him wonder for years.

the underneath was matt gold,nothing to do with the sunshine, but it was a hot sunny day.