Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!apple!veritas!amdcad!amdcad!military
From: rteasdal@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Falconer)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: D-21 drone
Message-ID: <1991May7.062738.13326@amd.com>
Date: 4 May 91 00:53:21 GMT
References: <1991May3.063259.5277@amd.com>
Sender: military@amd.com
Organization: CalPoly, San Luis Obispo
Lines: 21
Approved: military@amd.com


From: rteasdal@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Falconer)


[The same quoted text you read in the previous article, deleted. --CDR]
	
	No, not still flying. The D21 was a supersonic ramjet drone
about a quarter of the size and length of an SR71, carried to speed and
height aboard an A-12 (11?), the CIA reconnaisance version of the
Blackbird. They were apparently used for high speed, high altitude
flyovers of mainland China in the mid-to-late sixties. An A-12 was lost
in the course of a D21 launch when the drone wobbled and took the
vertical stabilizers off the parent craft, breaking the whole fuselage
in two. Pilot and drone control officer ejected; former survived,
latter drowned. There are still D21s in desert storage at Lockheed in
Palmdale, California, but they're not flyable. The A-12s were the only
Blackbird family members rigged for drone carriage and they went out of
service long ago. Interesting relics, no more than that.

-- 
Russ Teasdale -- rteasdal@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU  --  (Falconer)