Sled Driver

The skin of the aircraft was rough, resembling a fine grade of sandpaper in places.
Other parts of its body felt like smooth plastic. I began to realize that titanium did
not cover every surface ofthe aircraft. The exterior was surprisingly irregular for an
airplane built for speed; it had many grooves and expansion joints. The actual skin
of the aircraft made up the shell of the fuel tanks. There were no bladders inside
these fuel storage areas. Instead, as the aircraft reached its cruising speed and
heated up, the skin expanded and tightly sealed the fuel inside the airplane. On the
ground, fuel seeped through numerous joints and seams along the aircraft creating
pools of fuel (J P-7) on the hangar floor. It was messy, but not a fire hazard since J P-7
did not ignite easily. As I stood there near the mess of fluids oozing from the seams
of the aircraft, I realized how closely the real SR-71 resembled the glue stained
model I had built as a boy.
The flared edge of the fuselage, called the chine, curved back gracefully into the
wings, creating a lifting body that helped reduce fuel consumption at high speeds. I
closely inspected this beast with a mixture of awe and respect and realized the
Blackbird was more than an assembly of aircraft parts; it had a strong presence,
more powerful than any airplane I had ever known. I studied the spikes: the large
black cones leading into the engine intakes. Their tips were sharp to the touch. I
understood little about their function, oniy that they were part of an advanced inlet
design. The immense engines alluded to speeds above Mach 3 (Mach 1 equals
he speed of sound.)
Looking up into the back end of the jet, I noticed the huge afterburner (AB)
sections of the J-58 engines. Most fighter jets have afterburners. It is an extended
section of the engine that produces augmented thrust beyond normal 100 percent
military power. The normal throttle range is from idle power to military power. The
throttles then slide over a detent to engage the afterburner. The afterburner range
goes from minimum to maximum afterburner, or mm AB to max AB. When the pilot
selects afterburner, raw fuel is dumped into the burner section ofthe engine. When
the fuel ignites, the afterburner lights off, giving the aircraft a surge of power.
Depending on the size of the engine, a long flame extends from the tail end. I began
to wonder what full AB would feel like in this jet, from a cockpit located 100 feet
forward of the engines. I also wondered if I would ever think flying three times the
speed of sound as routine. I left that quiet hangar and felt a nervous anticipation as
I imagined piloting this beast. The crew had arrived in their support van at a
nearby hangar, and it was time to watch an SR-71 1aunch.
The sights and sounds of the start sequence resembled a combination of a NASA
space launch and a Daytona 500 pit crew in action. The start cart used to turn the