This is the amazing Lockheed Martin SR-72—the space Blackbird

reply to post by darksidius


Things will get really interesting soon. Boeing will bring something out soon enough I'm sure.

In Theory, If this new Sr 72 dropped a Bomb...how far away from the target could it be before detonation...let's say the Bomb in question is a Nuke and it's fitted with a chute...could the SR 72 release and land before the Bomb goes off..??

reply to post by Soloprotocol


No, but it would be well clear or the area before it was even halfway down.

reply to post by Zaphod58


Would they even be able to release munitions at M6?

reply to post by Sammamishman


Yes. You could deploy a screen system to shield the weapon from the initial slipstream impact, and give it long enough to get out of the turbulent airflow around the aircraft. It wouldn't be easy to do, but it's been done in the past.

reply to post by Zaphod58


I'd image the lead time to target would be horrendous for a gravity munition release.

reply to post by Sammamishman


Oh, absolutely. But the ER range for a JDAM or JASSM would be absolutely insane.

Zaphod58
reply to post by Soloprotocol

 

No, but it would be well clear or the area before it was even halfway down.

What's it's ceiling..?

reply to post by Soloprotocol


100,000+ feet. Probably close to 115,000 or even higher.

reply to post by Zaphod58


I would think that alone would be worth the R&D on this project. Being able to deliver conventional munitions on target deep inside enemy territory from outside or just inside enemy airspace. By the time the enemy know or saw what was going on, the SR-72 could maneuver away from enemy controlled airspace.

reply to post by Sammamishman


Oh yeah, that's huge right there. You could target something and hit it without having to go anywhere near defenses. Twelve Mile Limit? What's that?

reply to post by Soloprotocol


With no pilot and the need for life support systems the ceiling is only limited to the engines ability to breath and/or accelerate short of orbital altitude.

sorry guy i've been out awhile so what are we discussing now which aircraft or part of and aircraft are we debating about now?

reply to post by grey580


G,day mate. I'm with you on this one. 3pm/1500HRS wednesday prior to Christmas last year i was sitting under the back verandah having a beer and looking out into a clear blue sky and a shadow went across the back yard.
i jumped up stepped out onto the lawn searching the sky for a massive mob of either galahs or corellas but stopped that thought line as there was no sound and those birds fill the sky with both a massive splash of colour and ear splitting sound plus i have never caught their shadow.
i quartered the sky and saw a trail of what from my angle was a cross between smoke rings and a cork screw effect smoke/contrail in the sky in the direction of Adelaide the state capitol. WOW i thought.
mates wife was hanging out the washing at the same time and saw the same. this was confirmation for me that i was neither 3 parts cut (drunk) nor was i going troppo.
her remark was that at first she thought it to be the shadow of a mob of racing pigeons, but quickly cast the thought aside as impossible and was left thinking she had just imagined the whole event.

Zaphod58
reply to post by Sammamishman

 

Oh yeah, that's huge right there. You could target something and hit it without having to go anywhere near defenses. Twelve Mile Limit? What's that?

edit on 12/6/2013 by Zaphod58 because: (no reason given)

Yes, but wouldn't an adversary with sufficient capability to be worth using this also have good enough SAM or AA capability to shoot down the non-stealthy, non-hypersonic munition?

reply to post by mbkennel


I would think that it would come down to the adversary's reaction time to intercept the SR-72 before it released its munitions at the very edge of their effective defense shields. Once it was detected at the outskirts of the adversary's AA defenses it is too late, the SR-72 has already released its weapon payload (at 100k+ altitude), that would carry most of the SR-72's hypersonic momentum to target and the SR-72 was already out bound from the target.

reply to post by Sammamishman


I haven't had to do any physics calculations for at least18 years, so if anyone on this forum is familier with the calculations required to calculate the distance from a target an aircraft traveling at 4500mph, at 110K altitude would be when releasing a gravity bomb, not compensating for air resistance?

Sammamishman
reply to post by mbkennel

 

I would think that it would come down to the adversary's reaction time to intercept the SR-72 before it released its munitions at the very edge of their effective defense shields. Once it was detected at the outskirts of the adversary's AA defenses it is too late, the SR-72 has already released its weapon payload (at 100k+ altitude), that would carry most of the SR-72's hypersonic momentum to target and the SR-72 was already out bound from the target.

I meant the SAM and AA capabilities attacking the non-hypersonic, non-stealth munitions & missiles, not the SR-72 which would be very hard to get.

It wouldn't necessarily be "too late" and attacking a cruise missile might not be such a bad idea.

reply to post by mbkennel


Hmmm...not sure. I suppose if an adversary's AA capabilities were advanced enough they could hit munitions (GPS/dumb bombs) coming at them (hitting a bullet with a bullet so to speak) but I would think that LM would need to develop new types of munitions that could handle being deployed at hypersonic speeds and be able to maintain a fair amount of that momentum traveling to the target.
A normal JDAM would also have a very small RCS and the in service AGM-158 JASSM and the LRASM will be stealthy by nature and hard to detect as long as they could be deployed at hypersonic speeds.

Just a little tease to throw out there. There are....a small number of aircraft flying (operationally from what I hear) that require a KC-135T to refuel from. An applause to the first person to tell me why this is interesting.