Is this a top secret plane?

Originally posted by Erasurehead
Looks like a Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk stealth fighter to me.
Its been around for years.

[edit on 6-11-2008 by Erasurehead]

yea i agree with Erasurehead, if the plane was coming at the photographer the tail wouldnt be in the shot. so i say its a F-117 nighthawk as well

i know i shouldnt be double posting but the second pic looks like a aurora....

reply to post by SW phsyco


I've looked at both pics as big as they will go, and it's definitely not an F-117. It's all wrong from any angle. I don't know if it's a real project, but there is no doubt in my mind that it definitely is NOT a Nighthawk.

It's been a while since I last logged in to ATS. Let me say again that this aircraft was definitely not an F117. I can see how the first image might look like one, but it is just the angle of the shot.

I am not sure why the images are only 2 megapixels instead of 7. I used my cousin's camera to take these and I had him put the pics on a cd for me. I then took the cd home with me and I took the images off of it. They should be exactly like they were on the cd. Thank you once again for all of you replies!

For those people claiming these pics were taken with a 7mp camera but the pics are only 2mp maybe the op used digital zoom, I have a 10mp digital cam and when I use my 10x digital zoom the pictures turn out to be like 1.8mp the less digital zoom I use the Higher the mp is ie when I don't use any digital zoom or I just use the optical zoom the pics are a true 10mp, when any digital zoom is used the pics tend to be at a lower mp and a poor quality, not clear and tons of jagged edges esp if the image is taken from a distance.

I think it is not definitely, an F-117 . It s maybe a hypersonic demonstrator. The three lights can be a propulsion or control system, may be with electrical discharge.

I talked to a guy I know who works for Lockheed. I showed him these pictures and he confirmed that it is a current "black project" being tested. The craft uses similar technology that was used in the famous TR3B triangle (hence the 3 points of light at at the bottom.) The scope of this project , he claimed, is to adapt the TR3B technology into more of a fighter design capable of hypersonic speeds. He also said that these photos must be from a very early test flight, as there have been significant changes to the airframe since these shots were taken.

reply to post by thetruthisouthere837


I hope your friend knows he could lose his clearance when he goes in for his next poly for saying that.

No defense to these pics but just a bit of common sense to a possible cause of the size.

My canon 400D has 8 different options for pic quality
the best 2 I never use are
Large+RAW
RAW

now the higher the quality the less pics you can continuelys take do to the demand on the memory card, so its a balance of speed vs quality

95% of the time i use medium which has a resolution of 2816x1880 vs large of 3888x2592

So this may be an explination as to the size, but in saying that personally I would use the straight RAW and download direct to PC without any software touching it, then copy it and put the origianl RAW somewhere safe then play with the copy, as the RAW needs to go throuh software to be even able to view it

For those not sure what a untouched RAW file (i think i have this correct) in simple terms its a undeveloped picture from what I understand is that if you have a straight RAW file, it is the real deal or extremely hard to fake.

It seems to have been concluded in this thread

( www.abovetopsecret.com... )

that that craft is a TR-3B, I've experienced one myself about 8-9 years ago while attending at the F.A.E. ( Ecuadorian Air Force ) in Ecuador.

reply to post by f3rm1N


Why on earth does that thread conclude anything?

The only absolute conclusions I can draw from this thread are

1. The OP has provided original EXIF data, which shows the file was at least opened or resized in Photoshop Elements (not the pro version of PS, the basic home version) Based on this it may have been edited to add a fake object, or simply resized.

2. The photo's were taken in the vicinity of tonopah/groom, verified by Whitesides Hill in the background.

3. The airframe is definitely not that of an F-117 due to the shape and also the date of the photo being after the last flight of a nighthawk.

OP, could you not copy the file from the camera flash card directly in to an email, or somewhere online without opening it? I understand that even opening a file and resizing in PS Elements would leave a trace on the JPEG stored on your HDD but surely the original on the flash card should be left unchanged? Most people would copy the files from the camera to their HDD before doing anything to them, therefore the original should be intact.



Cheers

Robbie

Originally posted by Zaphod58
SB is a designation that has never been used before. According to you the Aurora is a Prototype Antisubmarine Bomber. S is antisubmarine, and B is bomber.

This made me laugh - so I guess it can operate underwater as well?

Antisubmarine bomber - that brought a tear to my eye.

reply to post by crisko


Where do you get "operate underwater" from? You have heard of the P-3 and S-3 right? Both of those have an antisubmarine mission.

reply to post by Zaphod58


Well said Zaphod, the Irony of that poster laughing at your post when it was really them making a fool of themselves amused me!#

Cheers

Robbie

we still havent reached a coclusion have we?
still now theres more problems.... one is with the camera the other is with the planes....

Looks kinda fake, but if not it's definitely not top secret otherwise they wouldn't fly it during the day.

iv seen videos and pictures -youtube
of the same thing i think iv seen one before just wanted to know if it had a destinct noise to it or if it was silent
because to me that looks like a back engineered ufo to me with the distinct lights underneath if it was a stealth anything what are the lights for ????
i think the fact u saw this over area 51 doesnt supprise me or anyone on this site
but anywer else it would be unexplained
me i think ufo

My honest opinion (if anyone cares to hear it)

Hoax.

The 'aircraft' just doesn't fit.

Furthermore, 'we' don't test this stuff where people can just whip out a camera and take a picture of it flying within visual range from the ground. I firmly believe governments are incompetent. Thankfully, programs such as this only rely on government spending, and like to keep their distance from the steaming pile of incompetence.

For the last time - the aircraft in the picture is not an F-117, for God's sake. I'm losing faith in humanity with each post that says "looks like an F-117!" I'll rant a bit - the F-117, great for its time, was a product of compromise. Computers didn't have the processing capability to simulate radar return dynamics on curved surfaces. Although we'll not even approach the difficulty imposed on even this by the fact that no radar beam is 'flat' to begin with. So, they could compute a bunch of flat, faceted edges. Remember old computer/console games? Same idea - they built what they could work with in a computer.

The F-117 was an out-dated airframe not ten years after it was flown. We had the technological capability to develop the curved surfaces used today - the B-2, F-23, F-22, etc. We would not be building 'updated' versions of the F-117 anymore than we'd be building upgraded versions of vacuum tube radios. We've got far better things to build.

That said - I don't doubt there is a -similar- type of airframe to the 'aurora.' It doesn't take the brightest cookie in the tool-shed to figure out a 'sharp triangle' is better at going fast than 'box wings.' I don't have a degree - I'm not going to try and make it sound like you need twenty years of schooling to realize the pointy airplane can fly faster, especially if it has much larger and menacing looking jet-blasts coming out of the back of it.

I expect there have been several research-oriented airframes designed that would fit the description of the "aurora." Steak knives are serrated, butter knives aren't sharp. Fast-flying planes will have some features they share in common, even if they are completely different models completed under different contracts.

As for the "aurora" - whatever prompted the original concept is older than I am. I recently 'decommissioned' a bunch of communications gear that was built about that same time - it had sat in storage for half an eternity before it finally was stricken from inventory. Whatever the 'original aurora' was is ancient and probably gone, broken up as per OIC and personnel instructions and sent to the facilities that handle disposal of classified materials.

And for God's sake, even if the photo is 'real' - there's very little that can be learned from it. There are no distinct features, other than some weir 'lobes' (which could be anything from ground-search radars to star-trek warp cores or portals to Mario World) - which are really nothing more than pixels colored more lightly than the rest of the subject image. There's pretty much nothing to use as a scaling reference (not that there is in real photos of aircraft, in many cases - stuff in the sky is just difficult to tell how big it actually is). So it could be anything from a paper airplane to Jean-Luc Picard in the Enterprise. It could also be anywhere between five feet and fifty kilometers away.

At best - it's a pointy airplane. It goes fast. There's only a hundred declassified documents showing funding for aircraft meeting such criteria.

the pictures look fake in my opinion but i could be wrong.

BUT the most irritating thing is people keep saying "it looks like aurora"!.

how does anyone know it looks like aurora when nobody even knows if aurora even exists never mind what it looks like!.

thanks

rich

Originally posted by Erasurehead
Looks like a Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk stealth fighter to me.
Its been around for years.



[edit on 6-11-2008 by Erasurehead]

no, this thing is a solid triangle, has no upward wingtips and has 3 lights at the bottom which match other UFO reports. Since this is area 51 this is likely to be a secret aircraft, nice pics

I would put my money on this being the TR3B triangle. It fits the pictures and description perfectly