Credit to Sarongsong for first-post, within Conspiracy Theories, but I'm not sure it got enough visibilty there.

This is from the very very credible Aviation Week and Space Technology: Two-Stage-to-Orbit 'Blackstar' System Shelved at Groom Lake?

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OK, this is a minor point and doesn't directly negate anything else in the story, but...

In the Aviation Week story, at http://www.aviationnow.com/avnow/new...s/030606p1.xml there is the paragraph

"The spaceplane is capable of carrying an advanced imaging suite that features 1-meter-aperture adaptive optics with an integral sodium-ion-sensing laser. By compensating in real-time for atmospheric turbulence-caused aberrations sensed by the laser, the system is capable of acquiring very detailed images of ground targets or in-space objects, according to industry officials familiar with the package."

Unless I completely misunderstand the physics alluded to here, that won't work. The sodium laser trick involves firing off a laser to excite sodium atoms way up in the atmosphere (or better said, above just about all of it), something like 60 miles? up. Yup. just found it. http://www.astro.caltech.edu/palomar/AO/
This creates an artificial "star." By monitoring the artificial star's behavior, one can compensate a ground-based optical system in real time (one form of "adaptive optics") to correct for atmospheric aberration.

But if you are already above the atmosphere, firing a laser at sodium atoms at the top of the atmosphere, below you, will do you absolutely no good in imaging ground-based targets. The aberrations are caused by stuff happening well past the atoms you've just excited, almost all of it in the first few miles above the surface. And I can't see it helping image space objects either unless for some reason one is trying to shoot obliquely through the atmosphere.

As for the rest, well, there have always been secret projects, it's a fairly safe bet that there are recent secret projects we don't know about, and others underway right now, and that when we finally, inevitably hear about them, we'll be amazed. Maybe this is real. Maybe not. We'll know when they let us know. And by the time they let us know, they'll already be working on something even more amazing.

Pete

It is quite a trick to develop a carrier craft of that proportions (valkyrie size and performance) and an orbital spaceplane launching from an aircraft completely secret. That's a technology that has never been done before. Now if it would be sub-orbital, that's something different.

I'm not saying it ain't possible. But it's amazing there are no pics of it, while in my impression other supersecret projects did leak in form of "caught on tape/CCD ". I would suspect that the carrier craft in fact is a modified Valkyrie. That would reduce the amount of test flights enormously, decreasing chances of being "caught" a lot. That would be amazing news as well, the Valkyrie finally being used beyond research flights. They would have had to build a new one or complete airframe 3 though, otherwise a certain museum would notice something missing in the collection (btw they recently acquired a B2, that museum is totally over the top) . As for the space plane itself: the Russians had official aircraft launched orbital craft plans, I'm sure the US had as well. The plans seemed quite realistic. And the russian plans were even based on a subsonic Mryia launch.

But still, to do it all secretly...it would be truly amazing if the spacecraft was truly orbital. Suborbital would still be nice an easier to explain how it was kept secret.

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To the regular visitor of internet bulletin boards it is clear that it's an excellent idea your parents get to choose your real name.

Even with a starting velocity of over Mach 1, you'd need something really good in the way of fuel to get the upper stage to orbit. (Pegasus needs three stages from high subsonic). I'm inclined to say suborbital, too.

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"The truth may be out there, but lies are inside your head" Terry Pratchett

Something the size of that plane would have been caught. And I find it hard to believe that it would still be in use 20 years after Nasa stopped flying it's lone model. Then again some aircrafts have longer lifes than others, but I still believe that with it's dated technology it would have been a money pit.

I would love it to be real, just as I would love that they hadn't dropped the Avro Arrow, but all that I believe is just wishful thinking. And as I said, it's mammoth size would have made it a very good photographic targed, and a recognizable one with it's unique geometry.

Those planes however we're mean machines in their days.

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The impossible often has a kind of integrity which the merely improbable lacks.

Mantiss: just to be clear, it is impossible that they used one of the original XB-70's.

Reason: Airframe 2 crashed in a photoshoot, airframe 1 has been retired from Nasa to a museum and airframe 3 never was finished. So the closest to an original Valkyrie would be finishing airframe 3. If they'd build a new airframe, they might as well incorporate some newer technology. So the age of the technology would be less relevant, and as it would be a new airframe the age of the aircraft would be no issue.

But it remains one huge aircraft to hide.

Well, there's a lot of wild stories out there (secret continued development of YF-23 in some sort of small bomber). AW&ST clearly says they do not have the rigid sources they require for a "real" storyon Black Star. In fact, there are very little to no sources that can be investigated as it seems, it all seems to boil down to stories.

Wait and see... .

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To the regular visitor of internet bulletin boards it is clear that it's an excellent idea your parents get to choose your real name.

Yes I was thinking of Airframe No.3 and the partially started No. 4 that might have been combined, and just like the SR-71, updated with newer technology as years passed. Still one massive mammoth plane to hide as you point out =)

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The impossible often has a kind of integrity which the merely improbable lacks.

MSNBC, James Oberg: Did Pentagon create orbital space plane? Magazine reports evidence for classified project, sparking some skepticism

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The boron-gel propellant interests me as a non-radioactive way to melt Europa ice. A compact zip propellant lander with such a gel equipped glider with some sodium mixed in would be a perfect CaLV payload.

Even if this craft is real--it was probably "all sound and fury..." and you know the rest.

So the next time some fighter jock tells you that "we don't spent enough on aviation/aeronautics" you have my permission to punch him dead in the face.

In the nearly 30-40 years between the start of the ICBM programs and the EELVs only now replacing them--ask yourself this? How many other LVs came out of this country? Now, ask how many airplanes were fielded in that same time frame.

Same with the "NASA hurts science" folks. In the past 25 years since STS, how many new manned spacecraft have we had?

And how many robotic probes have launched in that same time frame?

We have spent too little on rockets folks--and too much on droids and fly-boy play-toys. A Delta II could put more in orbit than Blackstar--to hazard a guess.

Please.

But you can't launch a Delta2 fast and everywhere without everyone knowing it.

Though I have doubts on launching anything into space without somebody knowing it; even a blackstar concept.

Also, a rocket is not a goal but a means, so I don't think you can really compare them the way you do.

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To the regular visitor of internet bulletin boards it is clear that it's an excellent idea your parents get to choose your real name.

Blackstar was hardly stealthy and was hot enough to be noticed--if by no one else but the "alien tourist" (or the local drunk) on the KGB payroll who lived over a couple of mountains away and got on his rotary phone every time screaming mimi left the ground.

"But loud planes land and take off there all the time."

Even so... even so...

Link:
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/for...d=1794&start=1

And you thought Jeff Bell was harsh:
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/576/1
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Bl...room_Lake.html