A-17

here is a sighting of the a-17

A new swing-wing stealth aircraft has been spotted
undergoing test. In September of 1994 it was seen circling
high over Anarillo, Texas. While it was circling, a radio
scanner picked up a military UHF channel with the call sign
Omega. This call sign has never been heard before. The pilot
was talking about a hydraulic malfunction and was saying he
was dumping fuel to prepare for an emergency landing. If
there is a new plane like this, it will probably be called
the A-17 and will replace the F-111 which has been in
service since 1967. Recently there have been millions of
dollars spent expanding the Cannon Air Force Base and a new
plane might be undergoing testing there. It has also been
said that high ranking officials have gathered there to look
at the new aircraft. The Pentagon has announced that the
F-111 will be retired by the end of 1995. The new swing-wing
aircraft spotted will most likely replace it. Swing-wing
aircraft add weight and make a plane more complex, but give
many advantages. When the wing is swung forward the plane
can travel farther and can land and takeoff on shorter
runways. When swung forward it can reach supersonic speeds.
It was noticed that the new airplane spotted was armed with
bombs and self-defense missiles. The A-17 has many things in
common with the YF-23 like the air inlets and the humps on
top of the fuselage that hide its engines. The engines on it
are probably General Electric YF-120 turbo fan-turbojet
engines which can reach speeds up to Mach 2.

A friend of mine worked on that plane.
I think he said it was canceled in 96.
He now works on the JSF.

A-17 is actually a fictitious designation coined in an article in a January 1995 Popular Science magazine regarding an alleged stealthy swing-wing bomber because the writers of that article claimed without any evidence that A-14 and A-15 were probably used for competing designs in the Navy's ATA competition that was won by the A-12 Avenger II, which was cancelled in January 1991 before any airframes could be built, while noting that A-16 was the unofficial designation for a proposed ground attack version of the F-16 Fighting Falcon. The article also claimed that the 1989 North Sea sighting could have been of a swing-wing aircraft rather than a hypersonic replacement for the SR-71 (the late aviation historian Curtis Peebles wrote in his book Dark Eagles that the aircraft that was seen by Chris Gibson refueling from a KC-135 over the North Sea was an F-111 with its wings swept back).

The engine layout of the alleged "A-17" reminds me of that of the purported Advanced Stealth Technology Reconnaissance Aircraft (ASTRA), which according to a 1997 issue of the Air Force Magazine was said to have been built by Northrop Grumman and based on the YF-23. That said, the true replacement for the F-111 was the F-15E Strike Eagle.

a reply to: Potlatch

thanks for the info
(wow, quite a thread resurrection!)

there was an A-17 built in the 1930s. some were still in use in WWII.

can't find much about the proposed A-16/17

I think that stuff is outdated as soon as built.

I think some F-16 Falcons were made as A-16s