I think that the Martin X-24, Hl-10 and M2-F2 could be Aurora prototypes, what do you think?

Do you have any pictures to help moi decide?

the lifting bodies were prototypes for kinda spaceshuttle research !

please bear in mind that in the newest aviation designs the weakest link,the pilote,is obsolete !
now they have to limit the abilities of an airplane because of the pilot onboard and the sophisticated cockpit for him...if they leave the pilote and sophisticated cockpit for him out the airplane can do much much more without problems!
faster,higher and more brutal g-pulling maneuvers are only possible with an unmanned aircraft.

it can be done already !
the global hawk,a slow aircraft,took off from an afb in USA and flew the whole distance to AUSTRALIA without aerial refueling and landed succesfull at an australian afb

all the way the pilot(s) were just sitting in a room in the usa ! because unmanned and piloted from a distance gives also the oportunity to CHANGE the pilots while the aircraft keeps on flying !!
this is a very important factor ofcourse the strategic way because the pilots will be released BEFORE the
fatique would play an obstacle ! (as it does when manned aircraft have to fly long distances !)

[Edited on 20-5-2004 by NOGODSINTHEUNIVERSE]

Absolutely not, you should do you research.

Shattered OUT...

the engineless spaceshuttle that was piggiebacked
on top of the NASA B-747 did use same glidepaterns to return from the engineless flight !
check it out.

I know that the X-24 was a spaceplane research aircraft but this is only what the government said. It could also be the Aroura prototype and they (the government) just needed an excuse to make it.

Hey everyone,
I'm new here and just thought I would share some info that you may find interesting about the Aurora.
I live in Toronto Canada, there is a company here called Lindt ( or something like that, I unfortunately can't remember the name, it is however in the Guinness Book of world records of 2000 for the largest patent legal case ). I know a guy who use to work for them, he has since moved to California after being forced from his job as the chemicals seem to have caused Cancer. I will not disclose his name, but he responsible in part for the design of the head's up display in the F-16. A few years back ( about 8 or so ), he was telling me about a secret US project called the Aurora he was working on a radar/heads up display he was working on. About 2 years later, he told me that the project go cancelled and that he was no longer working on it. It seemed to me at the time to be either a cover up as it was secret and did not want anything to leak, or the company lost the contract to the project. As I was rather ignorant at the time, I thought nothing of it, nor did I do any research. As the time pasted, I became more and more interested in the aircraft and decided to do some research, landing me here a while back. I have read on this sight roughly 3 years, and had never bothered signing up for the forum, but I thought I would give it a shot. If anyone has any input or questions, please let me know, and I will try to answer them, as I do still have some what of a connection with him. In my opinion, this does prove that the Aurora exists, or did at the bare minimum.!

The Pentagon said that Project Aurora was an upgrade for the B-52 Stratofortress Bomber, not a Top Secret Airplane.

There may have been another project called that for a plane, but why would they wanna keep it a secret for so long anyway?

They finally revealed what the F-117 Nighthawk looked like .

The A-12 Avenger 2 or Flying Dorito was cancelled.

The B-2 Spirit Bomber, Tacit Blue, The Bird of Prey,The Pegasus, The X-45, The Predator and Global Hawk,The F-22 Raptor, The F-35 JSF, all these were top secret stealth planes and they revealed them!

Why would they continue to hide Aurora unless it was cancelled or it had some features that were too secret to let out?

Why have so many come forward about sightings of strange craft being refueled?

The HL-10 and the M2-F2 and X-24 A & B were test vehicles for Space Shuttle research.

They were launched from Cape Canaveral into orbit on the tops of Titan rockets and landed safely.

They could have been developed into mini shuttles but it was cancelled in favor of the larger Shuttle.

In the late 70's and early 80's The USSR test launced similar vehicles and The Reagan Whitehouse came to the conclusion that the were building fleets of Mini Shuttles so the Pentagon built them and cancelled them because they cost too much and the USSR broke up and Russia went broke!

[Edited on 30-5-2004 by Supercool]

[Edited on 30-5-2004 by Supercool]

Actually, no x-24's were ever launched into space. The X-24 was a joint Nasa/USAF project to study the flight regimes of high performance lifting body aircraft for atmospheric reentry. The X-23, which was a small scale model of the X-24 was launched on several occasions from Vandenburg AFB on Atlas rockets. Only one was recovered and it now resides in the USAF Museum at Wright Pat AFB next to the X-24B, which was built from the X-24A.

As for the HL-10 and the M2F1/2/3 aircraft, they were strictly Nasa projects. Nasa engineer Dale Reed and Test pilot Milt Thompson developed the concept of the lifting body and convinced Nasa leadership to build the M2F1.

For more information, read "Flying Without Wings" by Milt Thompson, "Wingless Flight" by Dale Reed, and "The X-Planes, X-1 to X-45" by Jay Miller.

Originally posted by Supercool
Why would they continue to hide Aurora unless it was cancelled or it had some features that were too secret to let out?

That is the whole point. Just admitting we actually have the plane would tell countries that they need to start making defense systems that are able to track target and kill hypersonic aircraft.

If you don't tell them, they have no reason to spend the money to defend against it. Thus, if it came down to war, you would still have your advantage.

Also, if you released pictures, this alone would give people a head start in developing their own plane, not to mention give an indication of it's stealth atributes.

reset33 - If you still ahve contact with this guy, you should have him describe the plane. Also have you thought that he might of saw stuff about it on the internet and was just yanking your chain?

Or did he just build the HUD without seeing what it went on?

SuperCool, we know you played Generals, the Aurora is not meant to be a bomber, the game Generals shows that unfortunetly, very misleading.

Shattered OUT...

I personally think that your source is lying and this is the reason. The F-117 used much recycled parts and only developeed new technology because of its requirement, to preserve both secrecy, price, and to reduce the development time. I imagine that they would do the same thing with the Aurora, and since a HUD would not really need to be special they would probably use an F-16 one instead.