One SR‑71 crew finding themselves at the ‘pointy end’ of the debate between satellites and the SR‑71’s capabilities was Maj ‘Mac’ McKendree and his RSO Randy Shelhorse, as Mac now explains: My interview at Beale for possible selection to the SR programme was in September ’85. This consisted of two days of medical evaluation, two T‑38 flights, a four‑hour session in the SR simulator, several one‑on‑one interviews, and social gatherings. In conversation, the demise of the SR programme due to future new satellite capabilities was discussed. My options for an assignment at that juncture in my career were either a staff job at Langley AFB, or possibly pilot of the most sophisticated, highest flying, and fastest manned aircraft in history. Did I really want to hitch my horse to that wagon? Well, yeah!

Now at Det 4 in March ’89, during a six‑week TDY, all was progressing at a normal pace when Lt Col Bill Orcutt, the 1SRS Commander, arrived unannounced via a KC‑135 rotation aircraft. First thoughts among the two crews at Mildenhall were, who is in trouble and what do we do now? Randy Shelhorse and I were on top of the ladder to fly the next Giant Reach sortie, and as it turned out, Bill was there to oversee the planning, preparation, and mostly to impress upon us the importance of our next particular mission – the SR‑71 versus a KH‑11 satellite [during this time frame, there were three KH‑11s in operational orbit, USA‑6, USA‑27 and USA‑33]. The basic premise was to have both platforms image the same targets at the same time, to evaluate which had the highest resolution and functionality. The Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASARS) would be the primary sensor for the SR. Planning progressed as the Time Over Target (TOT) was dependent on when the satellite was in a position in its orbit to obtain data. The KH‑11 would be looking relatively from south to north, while the SR would be collecting looking from north to south from over the Barents Sea.

Mac McKendree, followed by Randy Shelhorse step from the PSD van en-route to their aircraft and another SR-71 mission. (USAF)

Mac McKendree, followed by Randy Shelhorse step from the PSD van en-route to their aircraft and another SR-71 mission. (USAF)

Backing up from the TOT, our take-off time out of RAF Mildenhall came to 2:00am. Between tanker support and our departure, the local residents would certainly be deprived of sleep that night! All briefed and ready, word came down of a 24‑hour slip. And then another 24‑hour slip. Seems the ‘Overhead Mafia’ could not get their machine far enough north to be in position. Functionality…? Their solution: ‘They’ want the SR to fly at 15,000ft to have the same look‑angle as their superior technology…Aaah – NO! [This last point demonstrates an ignorance of the SR‑71’s flight envelope that’s jaw‑droppingly inept at best]. By this time, the US Navy was in need of the delayed imagery of the Soviet Northern fleet and were demanding us to launch. Bill went over some last‑minute details with Randy regarding abort criteria. So, at 2:00am on Monday 20 March 1989, we flew ’964 on mission GR104G. Due to our launch time and the time of year in the Arctic Circle, the mission consisted of one night air‑air refuelling and a Mach 3+ night pass through the collection area. This was followed by two daylight air refuellings and two further Mach 3+ day passes through the sensitive area. In the process we defeated numerous SA‑2, SA‑5, SA‑10, SA‑12 threats, along with outrunning and outclimbing four airborne interceptors (AIs), with data collected on all 95 targets. Our aircraft, SR‑71 17964, returned to base Code 1 [no write‑ups]. Mission duration, 3.8 hours. We received no word on the results of compared imagery – if there ever was any to compare our data to!