Triangle Shaped Aircraft - As far back as the late 1970s, unmanned systems were thought to have been ideal for the penetrating persistent reconnaissance mission, but the technological know-how and communications infrastructure just was not mature enough to make such a system pilotless.
The possibility that the aircraft photographed over Texas and Kansas are manned would most likely be a result of the lack of high-bandwidth satellite data transfer capabilities, command and control architecture and computer processing at the time of their development.
Triangle Shaped Aircraft
If these aircraft were built within the last decade and a half, the fact that they are manned may mean a rush from initial design to operational capability due to an immediate set of needs, such as an interim stop-gap measure before an unmanned system,
Our Rating Altered
like the RQ-170, came online. In other words, if an aircraft like the TR-3A could have been unmanned it would have been. Standoff jamming was often used for F-117 operations against capable enemies, but an aircraft that could jam radars selectively, over the short periods of time while the F-117 was vulnerable, with great precision and lower power than their traditional standoff cousins (EF
-111 and EA-6B) may have proven the difference for F-117 crews between coming back alive or not. Such an aircraft may have remained of great use after the F-117 retired and could have been adapted as a delivery vehicle for "Suter" air defense network hacking capability and for jamming assistance for other clandestine assets, and thus may only now just be emerging
out of the "black world" as unmanned technologies take their place. For use as a CIA light strike and surveillance platform, or even supporting special forces, an aircraft like this would make great sense as having the ability to attack in direct support of special forces operating inside enemy territory, or being able to rapidly engage high value
targets of opportunity during penetrating surveillance missions, would be a "game changing" capability. Additionally, such a capability may have been of urgent need in the years immediately following the attacks on 9/11. Under such a requirement it is possible that even a small lot of surplus stealth technology demonstrators were re-rolled and shoved into operation as a stop-gap measure until stealthy unmanned systems were able to take their place, a time which has almost certainly come.
Theory Classified Penetrating Tactical Manned Attack Aircraft
The reality is that the flying triangle, otherwise known as a "spanloader," is a well known modern aircraft design planform that is known for its potential low observable nature and aerodynamic efficiency. One place where this unique design has been rumored to have been employed above all others is for a manned tactical penetrating reconnaissance aircraft.
Such an aircraft is also at the very top of the "capability gap" list when it comes to suspected aircraft that could have, or even should have, been secretly developed and tested. One particular rumored designation stands out among all others when it comes to such a mission and a design is the TR-3A "Black Manta."
Steve Douglass has done some great in-depth reporting on his website and for many other mainstream publications in the past. Over the years I have occasionally been in contact with him about topics for which our interests overlap.
I have always found that my interactions with him, albeit limited in nature, as well as his written work, give every indication that he is an honest, thoughtful, and highly intelligent guy who cares a ton about aerospace issues.
Shadowy Manned Aircraft Murky Conclusions
Additionally, I know that others in the small world of defense journalism also share my impressions of Steve. As for his book, it is all but free to enjoy, so I doubt any monetary motive is large enough for him to ruin his reputation by executing some ridiculous ruse or charade.
This aircraft has had a few distinct missions rumored to have been assigned to it. The first was as a laser designator aircraft for the F-117. This makes little sense as the F-117 had just about the finest laser designation and infra-red sensor capabilities available during the late 1980's and early 1990's.
Having this single role as its central mission would seem extremely redundant, but having it as a secondary mission is plausible, especially considering the limitations of laser guidance during inclement weather. The other missions, and the ones that seem much more plausible, were as a penetrating and persistent manned reconnaissance platform and possibly as a tactical jamming and electronic warfare aircraft.
I think it is extremely safe to say that the DoD has had many more secret aerospace projects over the last 30+ years than the few that have been disclosed. In fact, there is rumored to be a good portion of a massive hangar at Area 51 full of these long retired but still shadowy programs.
Theory They Are Airliners B- Spirits Or Some Other Known Aircraft
There have been so many in fact that the USAF and industry have been known to just bury these historical but obscure aircraft as there is simply no room to store them at the sprawling Area 51 and Tonopah Air Force Base installations.
We will explore all these possibilities deeply in part two of this expansive essay. In the meantime keep your eyes looking up at the sky, maybe you too will spot one of America's secretive flying triangles carving its way across the stratosphere...
In other words, some twenty plus years would pass between the last flight of Tacit Blue and the emergence of the RQ-170 Sentinel. Seeing as persistent, penetrating reconnaissance was clearly the wave of the future, which was highlighted by the retirement of the SR-71 Blackbird and the introduction to the unmanned "Tier" requirements of the mid 1990s, are we to believe that the USAF opted
not to build a stealthy manned vehicle instead of waiting for decades until unmanned technology had come of age? This theory would state that the pictures, personal accounts and radio transmissions posted on Steve Douglass's website are a total or partial fabrication.
For a layman just looking at these pictures, which are arguably not of the best optical quality, I could totally understand how they could say that they are the result of a creative Photoshop session. If he sold me on these pictures wrongfully, then he also sold Aviation Week and many others as well.
So I can say with high, but not absolute certainty, that what you see in these pictures did fly within telephoto lens reach of Steve and his friend Dean on that day. As to how Steve has also been able to film or photograph bizarre aircraft flying around America's southwest on occasion, the best answer I can give is that he is the guy that is looking the hardest for them.
Todd ruled out a meteor since the American Meteor Society Fireball had not made any observations that day. The International Space Station was not visible at that time and there were no bright stars. The object was seen hovering in the sky for quite a while, which meant it was not a satellite or commercial airplane.
We know that the days of manned combat aircraft are slowly coming to an end, especially for those missions that require aircraft to operate deep inside enemy territory. If indeed this aircraft is manned, and is a size synonymous with a tactical aircraft, it would be of little surprise that it is now emerging from the classified world as its years of viability are most likely coming to an end.
Based on our research, we like ALTERED a video that claims to show a UFO stationed aboard an aircraft carrier. An official video posted by the U.S. Navy shows the ship's deck was clear of any triangular-shaped aircraft.
The video has been around since early 2018 when it gained traction after Iranian media wrote about it. According to FighterJetsWorld.com there have been a couple of unverified sightings of what may or may not have been an SR-91.
The most "well-known instance" that could suggest the aircraft is real was the sighting of a triangular aircraft over the North Sea in August 1989 by oil-exploration engineer Chris Gibson, but this could be a case of trying to suggest that what was
sighted was a hypothetical plane rather than an existing aircraft such as a B-2 Spirit – which certainly has a triangular shape and did in fact have its first flight earlier that year. There have allegedly been multiple UFO sightings of the same triangular-shaped UFO in the skies over the Portland area on August 29. The black triangle UFO has lights on both wings.
The mysterious aircraft was allegedly spotted near the Portland Air National Guard Base (PANG) and the strange sighting was reported in the UK's Express and Russia's Sputnik. So what exactly were those mysterious "flying Doritos" booking it high over the Texas Panhandle, and more recently, Wichita, Kansas?
Nobody may be able, or willing, to give you a definitive answer, but Foxtrot Alpha is here to lay out all of the possibilities of what's almost certainly one of the military's big secrets. Finally, is this aircraft actually unmanned or not of a tactical size at all?
Maybe it's a prototype for the upcoming Long Range Strike-Bomber (LRS-B), or a shadowy tactical transport of some type. Maybe there is nobody inside the aircraft at all and they are in fact advanced stealthy drones.
There is also the possibility that Steve and Dean actually believe what they saw was really an unidentified aircraft, but are mistaken for some reason. As I stated in an earlier piece, I highly doubt this.
If they were not B-2s then there is nothing else known to be flying that looks like this aside from the diminutive, unmanned and shy RQ-170 Sentinel. Additionally, three triangular flying wings weaving high across the Texas sky is not "swamp gas" or some shared "hallucination."
The A-12 Avenger was supposed to be carrier capable, with folding wings, slow speed approach capability, heavy payload and large fuel volume, all of which came at the price of a very robust yet complex composite structure.
When you take away these aggressive design goals you have an aircraft that is fairly feasible to build, even if just for testing and developmental purposes. The "unidentified flying triangle" happens to also be a craze among the UFO crowd, and of all the sightings reported of various UFOs, the ones related to triangular craft often times seem the most believable, and/or corroborated.
Maybe some of these people were really seeing the triangular shaped aircraft that have been recently spotted. For years, people in and around the Southwestern US reported UFOs that have now turned out to be declassified secret projects such as the F-117 and SR-71 programs.
What is to say that some of these spotting were not in fact secret flying wing aircraft belonging to the boys in blue, not little green men? I am not saying that these aircraft were necessarily the prototypes for the A-12 aircraft, as officially none are said to exist, although over half a dozen were funded, but the timing is very odd.
Could the aircraft in question be a lighter, simpler surveillance forerunner to the A-12 Avenger, or even a technology demonstrator such as the "Sneaky Pete" aircraft that many said flew during the mid to late 1980's?
I have spent many years behind many types of camera bodies and lenses, shooting almost exclusively aircraft, and I have never taken a picture of an aircraft at altitude and thought "hey is that a secret flying wing aircraft," nor have any other aviation photographers
I know. Sure, once in a while those "hey what is up there" shots can be puzzling as to what type of airliner it is, but not where it clearly shows a flying wing, yet alone three of them in trailing formation!
I have also photographed the B-2 at altitude on multiple occasions, and none were even interesting enough to post or keep. Then there are the billions upon billions of dollars that are spent annually on these "black budget" programs, and certainly some have resulted in flying prototypes, if not production aircraft.
We were reminded of this in 2011 when a previously unheard of stealth helicopter's tail was left totally intact outside Bin Laden's backyard wall. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) could also have great use for an aircraft that could provide streaming video and general over-watch of special forces missions underway, or soon to be underway, deep inside enemy territory.
Such an aircraft could have also worked as a beyond line of sight communications relay platform that would allow forces operating below it to communicate with command personnel over the horizon and even around the globe.
The government hides so much from the GP, not too much is known of the TR-3B, but I am sure she is for real, the folks at the Skunk Works, are always far ahead of anybody else, when that photo was taken withe
F-111's an the triangle aircraft it didn't look like it was photoshopped, Plus the guy that saw it, was an expert in recolizing that sort of thing, I am looking forward, if I am still around to full disclosure to the ufo's
from outerspace to come out. Such a capability is less likely than a reconnaissance/jamming aircraft as described earlier, although that is not to say that a penetrating reconnaissance design could not be adapted to have a secondary strike capability.
This would be especially useful for engaging targets of opportunity that are time sensitive in nature. Then there is the possibility that it is an interim, albeit lower density partial replacement for the F-117, one that is becoming less relevant now that the F-35A is slowly making progress towards initial operating capability (IOC) and unmanned deep strike systems
are on the horizon (or more likely already here). Finally, this machine could be a stealthy "wild weasel," built not just to suppress and jam enemy radar sites but to destroy them long before the age of miniaturized GPS guided glide bombs and other standoff weapons.
An aircraft whose clandestine existence may be less than a top priority now that the F-22 provides a similar, if not more potent capability DEAD capability. In the accounts little is noted about speed and if the aircraft were traveling at Mach 5 it would have been hard to even determine its shape, while there is also no reason to suggest why a prototype of a truly top-secret aircraft was flying slow enough
and low enough to be witnessed over the North Sea. Wouldn't there have been a danger that Soviet aircraft, submarines or other vessels would have seen such a plane? The Agency has had an Air Force for the better part of the century, made up of everything from down and dirty transports to the most advanced aircraft man has ever built.
Are we really to believe that they left the higher end of the spectrum after the A-12 Oxcart program of the 1960's and never looked back until the unmanned RQ-170 Sentinel arrived in their drone stable?
An aircraft with almost the identical mission set as a theoretical Black Manta, aside from the fact that it is unmanned. The goal of the project was to develop a replacement for the aging and expensive to maintain a fleet of SR-71 Blackbirds, which cost around $200 - $300 million a year to operate.
Technically known as a Special Access Program (SAP) - a "black program" that isn't generally for public knowledge - little has been released about the SR-91. Even the name "Aurora" was only disclosed when censors failed to catch a reference to it in a 1985 budget request that also discussed the state of the SR-71 and U-2 programs.
What is even more odd, and possibly telling in its own right, is that the public affairs officer at Whiteman AFB, where all but one of 20 B-2s live (aside from any getting work done at Plant 42 in Palmdale CA or temporarily deployed
), unequivocally denied that their aircraft were flying over Texas at the time of the original flying triangle formation sighting. Maybe this original denial was premature as it seems likely that the DoD now wants to confuse and/or discredit Steve's account of the original event by presenting the same exact activity by a formation of very unclassified B-2 Spirits.
For the purposes of this article, we will use the rumored TR-3A "Black Manta" designation to describe a manned, deep penetrating, stealth reconnaissance aircraft even though the designation and name may be totally false, and yes I am aware that "TR
-3A" could have been a discombobulation of the "Tier 3" unmanned requirement of the mid 1990s, but that is an entirely different story altogether that has no impact on the conceptual nature of this piece. This is known as destruction of enemy air defenses (DEAD), and nowadays it can be done from tens of miles away using glide bombs such as the small diameter bomb (SBD) and wind corrected munitions dispenser (WCMD), but two decades ago this
technology was not available. Or is it possible that the A-12 Avenger prototypes that some have claimed were in fact built and housed at NAWS China Lake, have finally come out of the black in spectacular fashion now that the court proceedings surrounding the defunct program have finally been ended?
Having even a few low observable aircraft that could be used for different testing duties may have been beneficial for the Navy as the promise of fielding any low observable aircraft in any numbers has been unfulfilled since the cancellation of the A-12 some twenty plus years ago
. Even using these aircraft as stealthy aggressors for which to test new radars and other systems may have been worth the money spent to keep them flying or to get them flying in the first place.
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