Check back for updates to the content as I improve methods and demonstrations.
Introduction
Cruising Mach 5+ at 200,000 feet is a little bit like flying a Cessna; if it were a brick with an F-18’s power plants strapped to it. - Colonel McCregor.
Copyright 2032
You’ve been selected to fly the fastest, highest flying plane, in the longest most arduous war the world has ever seen. Photo-reconnaissance has been crucial ever since biplanes were trying to map trenches over WW1. From 70,000 photos of Auschwitz in WW2, to the 100s of thousands of flight hours over Nazi Germany, getting accurate information on the ground has been a critical part of warmaking.
The New Cold War, if it had a definition, is thought to have begun when Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine; but really it never ended. This 87 year old challenge between two superpowers has only ebbed and flowed in its characteristics since the end of WW2. Since the Russians have established ground-based optical jamming stations against satellites, we’ve had to rely more upon pilots like you to get the photos our men and women analysts need to provide informed decisions to Washington.
There has never been a more purpose built aircraft for the job than the SR-72: DARKSTAR
It is a highly capable craft - with training - you can unlock its abilities, but more importantly, you will be asked to pushed its limits.
Cold and Dark
The cold and dark of space lies just up ahead. But first, you need to get your aircraft hot and in the air. The grueling demands of the loss of our earliest warning satellite capabilities means forward stationed SR-72s in Thule and Kaneda Air Bases will need to be ready to go from cold and dark to Mach 5 cruising at 200,000 feet in under 15 minutes. Nothing is more crucial in a nuclear crisis than having as much time and space as possible to make decisions.
It can be done.
First familiarize yourself with the systems.
- Battery, APU, Generators. Spin up the power plant and taxi to departure.
- The Button 1 center display contains your synthetic forward view, your fuel and balance and CG, a NAV map with Menu for terrain, weather, and other data, and a downward view for taking pictures over target.
- The Button 2 center display contains your artificial horizon; fuel and power plant systems. These fuel systems must be understood if atmospheric conditions and temperature conditions in the power plants cause a spontaneous reignition of the STD-air-breathing power plants.
Fuel conservation is critical. This isn’t your standard training mission field guide. If asked to fly deep over Russian Airspace you will be asked to push the SR-72 to its fuel range limits. Depending on your efficiency in maneuvers; the full operating range of the Darkstar is still unknown.
Landing Final Approach
No sense in taking off if you can’t land. Familiarize yourself with the training videos. The landings are precise and they have to be or you will need to cancel and go around and try again. Two absolute hard rules:
- You need 1 nautical mile for every 1,000 feet of altitude for your glide slope.
- If you aren’t lined up within 7 nautical miles, don’t try except with rudder and if that isn’t enough, go around.
How to execute the HAC Maneuver: an important maneuver for shortening your fly-over area when landing and for correcting your heading before landing.
Ascent to Cruise Level
The SR-72 is highly efficient and rarely requires maneuvers above 10 degree pitches. That being said; some of the prior instructions you may have learned were for your safety. As long as you don’t hurt the aircraft we expect you to outperform those methods.
- Maneuver to stratospheric injection vector while maintaining upwards of 15deg bank, positive vertical speed, sufficient rate of climb (approximately 4,000feet/min) and power plants at 85% - 90% thrust not greater. For aggressive climb move to 100% thrust at 30deg up-pitch, then afterburner at 40deg up-pitch. Allow pitch to fall in order to keep airspeed stable about 220kt.
- This procedure is similar to the Concorde which maintains 250kt airspeed reducing thrust. Source: https://youtu.be/1bjzoh3iQJc?t=225
- Gear up. Achieve 20,000feet by roll into last leg approach of vector.
- Proceed to aggressive climb procedure (see above).
- Achieve 42,000feet.
By now you should be around 0.6Mach and struggling to climb above 42,000 feet at 10deg up-pitch. You are ready to trim the aircraft for stratospheric injection.
- Aggressive climb procedure will have you already in afterburner thrust.
Here it is important to mention that when to throttle is crucial. Going from 85%throttle cruising on air-breathers to 100% throttle is a maneuver for after you’ve gained positive vertical speed or else you will exacerbate your altitude problems when maneuvering.
- Once throttled to 100% - push into Afterburner at pitch which is neutral to speed changes. Pitch down while still maintaining vertical speed of about 4000ft/min to as low as 200ft/min if at 42,000 feet altitude to keep under approximately positive 10deg pitch while reaching 0.98Mach and at 0.98Mach then let the nose come up slightly but roll to inverted at or about 10 deg up pitch.
- Aft yoke to bring pitch to up 30deg (inverted). Your G should be positive (+) 1.2 or 1.3.
(Elaborated steps 7 through 10.)
This is correctly trimmed for inversion - Roll as hard as possible to left or right until inverted. You should hit an inverted pitch down (toward sky) of 10deg. Focus on stabilizing aircraft to level flight while trim takes care of pushing you to positive pitch (toward ground) of 10deg. If you do not get a quick reaction: YOU WERE NOT CORRECTLY TRIMMED and result in lack of stratospheric insertion in a timely, fuel efficient manner, a mission fail.
- Pull pitch up to 20deg then stabilize while reaching Mach 1.5+ in this configuration.
- You should be descending from about 41,000 feet and hit Mach 1.5+ at about 25,000 feet.
- Roll out as hard in same direction as you rolled in.
This will keep you as close to stratospheric injection vector as possible requiring less adjustments when stable. - Once stable at 10deg up, pulling approximately 1.8G and continuing to accelerate, arm beacons, close the fuel cell circuits, and lift the guard to the Scramjet.
- By about 50,000 feet you should be 3.5+ Mach.
- Flip the switch to engage the Scramjet and lower the guard.
- Wait for warning signal to clear and for Scramjet to begin engaging - temperature of jet should be rising continuously. If yes then:
- Panel 2 - kill the fuel pumps to right and left engines
- Right panel - turn off right and left engines.
This conserves more fuel than the standard procedures and autopilot will allow for.
Our test pilots are still working on keeping fuel in the forward and aft centerline tanks - but for now use max afterburner to achieve these maneuvers which should drain the centerline forward and aft tanks but you should have ~76%+ fuel remaining.
The stratospheric injection maneuver is complete, in a timely and fuel efficient manner. GOTO NAV Panel and adjust range to 1NM or to the lowest range needed to acquire your pink vector line. Maneuver to line up with it as best as possible while ascending to cruising altitude of 220,000 feet.
Your hard deck will be 140,000 feet.
Your hard ceiling will be 240,000 feet. (IMPORTANT above 240,000 feet possibility of skipping out of the atmosphere and catastrophically bouncing off it, similar to skimming over water in a high speed boat, increases dramatically.)
[In actuality operating above 275,000 feet simulator limits can cause some wonky things to happen or in flight glitches or just clipping out of the universe]
- As soon as 9.0Mach is achieved, cut throttle to Scramjet to NEAR IDLE, here after referred to as near idle.
Stratospheric Flight and Maneuvering
You’ve done the easy part, the plane was designed to make it hard to NOT achieve 220,000 @ 5.0+ Mach cruise. Now comes the hard part.
To Be Continued…
Screenshots to be added…