Lockheed Sr-71 Blackbird

by Paul F. Crickmore

Book Overview

Throughout its 34-year Cold War career with the USAF and CIA, the top secret Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird spy plane was the world's fastest and highest-flying operational manned aircraft. Dedicated to... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0850456533
• ISBN13: 9780850456530
• Release Date: November 1986
• Publisher: Osprey Publishing (UK)
• Length: 200 Pages
• Weight: 1.44 lbs.

Customer Reviews

A fine introduction to a trully legendary plane

Paul Crickmore is among the top experts on the Blackbird and with this book he presents many facts about the design, the construction and the operational history of the A-12 and the SR-71 without suffocating the reader in a sea of details, like his other books on the subject. While the account of the various missions flown by the SR-71s was very interesting, I found the technical chapter "Design Accomplishments" a real marvel. Crickmore gives also interesting appendices with the serial numbers and the fate of every single A-12, F-12 and SR-71, some guide to modellers looking for available kits, information on the NASA use of the aircraft and the world records set by the Blackbird that still stand. The photographs are very good (most of them black and white) with highly informative captions, the drawings are excellent, but there is the serious omission of not including in the book a table of technical characteristics.