Wonderful.....thanks for sharing.

I love the length of the takeoff roll for an aircraft that big! Power, lift or a combo? Must be plenty of power IAW May's comment.

That ride would be THE thrill of a lifetime, to hitch a ride in a aircraft like that and to ride along at the edge of space.

I saw that on TV, James May is so lucky to have got that ride.

I can only wish !!!

Great video. The training wheels fall off during takeoff. Outboard wheels are not needed on landing? Couldn't see that part in the video.

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Originally posted by D Humbarger:
Great video. The training wheels fall off during takeoff. Outboard wheels are not needed on landing? Couldn't see that part in the video.

Let's say that the landings can be quite interesting !!!

Have a look on U tube, their are some superb videos of landing cock ups !!!

Spy planes hhave become less exciting.

I thought it was gonna be some guy in Dockers and a polo shirt walking into a nondescript office building going into an office amd stepping into a booth and taking over an RPV aircraft somewhere in the world and keeping an eye on the program to be sure it is "flying the proper paths". A pilot on board . . . NO way that is SO old school

The vid is much kooler than the TV, you can replay bits again & again for the wow factor.

The U2 design has to have masses of lift capability at low altitude to have enough lift to fly in the low atmosphere density at 70,000ft.
anything that can STOL in flight mode has heaps of lift at low velocity.

78 knots landing speed for a jet ............awesome, when it did touch down it just stalled & fell out of the air the last few feet.
I guess they have developed that technique to minimise touchdown velocity to minimise damage if they dip a wing on landing.
such long wings require very precise attitude control and mighty fast reflexes to wind conditions at low speed.

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such long wings requires very precise attitude control and mighty fast reflexes to wind conditions at low speed.

That particular aircraft has a very small window of "flyability" at all elevations.

Airspeed must be VERY precisely controlled within VERY narrow parameters, along with everything else, at all elevations, to keep it from tearing itself apart. I had a close friend who retired in Myrtle Creek, Oregon, that was a retired AF Bird Colonel, who spent much of his career as a U-2 jockey.


He found Cowboy Action Shooting after he retired to be not only more fun in a lot of ways, but incomparably safer! A lot of his flying took him over "eastern Europe".

Flying those critters was real WORK.

For him the "pleasure" part was mainly in knowing he had the skills to do it and come home alive.

What is really good now is the US has released so much information about the U2 and what it did, where it went etc as opposed to keeping everything classified for years.

Their is some great reading on who flew it, where from etc with only minor details classified.

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Wow.


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