An SR-71 pilot told this story from his first flight with a new co-pilot(SR-71 was the USAF advanced ‘stealth’ reconnaissance aircraft known as the Blackbird).
An SR-71 and crew were flying over Southern California when a bug smasher came on the airwaves in a dorky voice:
Cessna 152: Ground Control, What’s my airspeed?
Ground Control: 100 at FL 100. A few moments later a cocky voice came on;
Mooney M20: Ground Control, What’s MY airspeed?
Ground Control: 240 at FL 240.
By this time the SR pilot was seething, but since communications were the duty of his new co-pilot, he remained silent. A few moments of radio silence passed, and in the calmest voice imaginable the co-pilot keyed in:
SR-71: Ground Control, What’s our airspeed?
Ground Control: 1875 at FL 800.
There were no more speed checks called in that afternoon, and the pilot knew that he had a cool partner in the back seat.
ahahah! nice one
Sorry but I have some issues with this one. 🙂
1. Pilots do not check in with ATC for “air speed” only the pilot would know that they do check in for “ground speed” if not GPS or DME equipped.
2. What is a 152 doing at 10000?
3. Ground control does not handle en-route traffic. That’s center or approach / departure.
4. If the SR22 actually talked to ATC as this story says, they would use the UHF radio and couldn’t be heard by other VHF civilian users.
Good premiss though
This was told in one of Brian Shul’s books about the SR-71. I’m moderately sure it came from ‘Sled Driver’.
It was ‘speed over ground’ that was requested.
Brian wasn’t ‘seething’. He wrote that he knew his RSO (not co-pilot) and he had clicked as a team because Walter (the RSO) got on the air just as Brian was thinking about doing the same thing.
Google ‘sled driver speed check’, and one of the first hits you’ll get is this: http://wesclark.com/burbank/sr_71.html
comeon mike..its a joke..for fun sake we can assume all this really happened :))))
C-152 can go to fl100, its ceiling is over 140. th
Tower is the one to call for questions, approach is when your landing/depatureing (correct me if im wrong) im EK
Sr22 is a civil cirrus one engine aircraft..
millitary use civil radio too..
But i would think the boys got spooked 🙂
I just heard the real story from the actual SR71 pilot today at the AOPA Aviation summit and he really makes the story come alive. This story is not even close to the way it really happened. If you want to read the real story pick up the book Sled Driver.
Yeah, they wouldn’t be asking for airspeed, but a 152 *can* climb up to 10,000 feet. I know because that was my training aircraft for my Private certificate.
Comedic license, perhaps.
1. Right about ground control. They can’t possibly know airspeed. In fact only the aircraft can, since airspeed is an abstract number displayed on the aircraft indicator only and changes specific to air density, altitude and temperature. 2. There is no such thing as FL100. Flight levels start at 180. 3. The only Mooney M20 that could reach FL240 is the M20TN that didn’t come out until 2006. The SR71’s last official flight was 1999. 4. SR71s never talk to civilian “ground control”. 5. SR71 missions were top secret. Every time they keyed the mike it would give away their… Read more »