Does “Maverick” Eject From An SR-72 in “Top Gun: Maverick”?

Interesting photos hit Hollywood social media via TheHollywoodPipeline.com this morning showing actor Tom Cruise on the set of “Top Gun: Maverick”. The photos, that appear to be “leaked” spy shots from a smartphone but could also be intentional studio publicity plants intended for social media to hype the upcoming 2020 release of the “Top Gun” sequel, may provide clues about a possible plot for the movie.

Before you keep reading, this article may contain plot spoilers for “Top Gun: Maverick” and is entirely speculative. We’ve received no insider information from script writers and the ideas expressed here are strictly those of this writer based on daily research of the media surrounding the ongoing production of the film. This is Hollywood entertainment reporting, not military aviation journalism. We’re taking some creative license with speculation we wouldn’t do with factual military aviation reporting. This is all about entertainment.

That said, continue under your own responsibility and don’t complain too much.

The set of photos that originally appeared on TheHollywoodPipeline.com show Cruise in his character as Pete “Maverick” Mitchell wearing an all-black flight suit. The interesting thing is that the flight suit appears to be a high-altitude pressure suit similar to the actual ones worn by high altitude reconnaissance pilots in aircraft like the U-2 and SR-71. Notice the wide, round neck ring for a pressure suit helmet and the two fittings to the suit for life support and pressurization.

It gets more interesting. Cruise appears to have make-up on and weathering to his high-altitude pressure suit that recall several scenes from previous aviation movies like “The Right Stuff” where a pilot has ejected from an aircraft. Cruise looks slightly “singed” in his costume and make-up, as if he survived ejection from an aircraft mishap in the plot of the story.

Let’s think about this: In the last “Top Gun”, U.S. Navy fighter pilot Lt. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell rises to prominence as a renegade fighter pilot but suffers personal loss in a training accident when his Radar Intercept Officer in an F-14 Tomcat, Lt. JG Nick “Goose” Bradshaw dies in a training accident. Maverick goes on to find redemption in combat and the arms of lilting civilian Top Gun instructor and astrophysicist Charlotte “Charlie” Blackwood. Further plot twists provide secret revelations about how Maverick’s father and how he died a hero in combat due to classified circumstances.

Fast Forward to the production of the upcoming sequel, “Top Gun: Maverick”. Several observers of photos of the F/A-18F Super Hornet painted with Maverick’s callsign and MiG kills (although they look oddly like F/A-18 “kills”) noticed that Maverick has only progressed to a Navy Captain based on what is written on the aircraft. Was Maverick busted down for some additional transgression? Has he been held back in promotion because of involvement in some classified program? It has been 32 years since Lt. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell went to Top Gun fighter weapons school and scored his first MiG kill. You’d think a career that long that started with so much promise combined with his Navy family heritage may have gotten him to flag rank by now. But according to what is stenciled on his canopy coaming, Maverick languishes along as an officer at a lower pay grade. Why?

Today actor Tom Cruise as “Maverick” was photographed on set wearing a singed high altitude pressure suit with smoke smeared on his face as though he just survived an ejection. This scene is being filmed at the leading edge of the movie’s production, and at the start of a break from filming on U.S. Navy ships that has been speculated as waiting for Navy F-35C capability to come online and be included in the film’s plot and production along with some use of remotely piloted aircraft or drones.

Will we see (now) Capt. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell as a secret test pilot for a highly classified yet-to-be released stealthy experimental hypersonic aircraft?

Think about the context of the black space suit photos here. It’s just a guess, but the elements of the plot could fit together- and again this is a total guess: The story may open with Capt. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell now part of the secret development of the SR-72 hypersonic reconnaissance spy plane. Even more sensationally, his back-seater is a civilian test pilot and astrophysicist named Charlotte “Charlie” Blackwood, Maverick’s old flame from the 1986 “Top Gun”. There is another accident for Maverick in the secret test aircraft over a classified test range. Maverick manages to eject at ultra-high altitude and speed and barely survives, but his civilian test systems operator on board the aircraft does not survive the mishap. Remember; in a scene like this we would not have to see Charlotte “Charlie” Blackwood’s face, it would be concealed beneath a high-altitude flight suit helmet. Capt. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell is thrown back into despair over the loss of “Charlie” in the accident and the plot accelerates from there. This plot guess meshes with additional scenes where Tom Cruise is shown on a new motorcycle with actress Jennifer Connelly who will play a single mother who runs a bar near the base. It could make sense that Maverick seeks consolation with Jennifer Connelly’s character in the film. This also may completely wrong- it’s all just speculation based on today’s “leaked” photos.

Following the template for “hooking” audiences in movie plots that has been successful in every James Bond movie, “Top Gun: Maverick” may open with an action sequence where “Maverick” is in the new secret hypersonic test plane and experiences the accident we have theorized about (one more time, this is just a theory). That leads to what we have seen in the photos leaked (or intentionally “leaked”) today.

One essential part of Hollywood filmmaking solidly in place since the 1930 production of the Howard Hughes film, “Hell’s Angels”, which could be considered the original “Top Gun”, is the generation of hype and speculation. Different from factual reporting on military aviation news, entertainment hype is all about speculation and sensation. In the words of writer and film critic Karina Longworth who recently wrote a book about the real-life Hollywood starlet mistresses of Howard Hughes titled, Sex, Lies and Stardom in Howard Hughes’s Hollywood, Howard Hughes was a master at hype before a film release. “[Hughes] told everyone he was the greatest through publicity, and they believed it,” Longworth told the Hollywood Reporter’s columnist Katie Kilkenny in a November 9, 2018 interview.

 

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It looks like Maverick is going to eject again! 😱 #Repost @top.gun.movie with @get_repost ・・・ @tomcruise On Set Of TOP GUN: MAVERICK Wearing a High Altitude Pressure Flight Suit (Approx. $60,000). These Suits are Mainly Used in SR-71 and U-2 Aircraft (Any Aviators please feel free to correct me in comments below). This appears to be a Post Crash Scene…We will leave your imagination to run wild with this Plot Twist! Photo via Hollywood Pipeline #topgun #topgun2 #topgunmaverick #topgunmovie #tomcruise #usnavy #fighterpilot #sr71

A post shared by David Cenciotti TheAviationist (@davidcenciotti) on Nov 13, 2018 at 11:52am PST

Just like the leaks and rumors propagated through Hollywood media in 1930 for “Hell’s Angels”, speculating about the plot for “Top Gun: Maverick” with its delayed release is both entertaining and helps the keep the anticipated sequel top-of-mind for aviation film enthusiasts. In Hollywood, it’s all about the hype. In a year and a half, we’ll know if any of our wild guesses were right.

Lockheed Advanced Development Program Subverted Normal Channels On The Way to Innovation.

The Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star, the F-104 Starfighter, the U-2 spy plane, the SR-71 Blackbird and the D-21 supersonic drone, the F-117 Stealth Jet, the still secretive SR-72. No one outside of its very opaque walls knows how many projects the secretive Lockheed “Skunk Works” have developed, and how many flops they’ve had. But everyone in defense and aerospace knows the Lockheed Skunk Works broke barriers in innovation and defense acquisition that changed the world and toppled superpowers. It likely continues to do so today, behind a thick veil of secrecy.

Founded in the mid 1940s at the height of WWII when defense acquisitions needed to be fast-tracked to remain ahead of Axis adversaries, especially Germany and their secret weapons program headquartered at Peenemunde, Lockheed’s Skunk Works was tasked with developing ground-breaking aerospace technology and weapons systems.

The Skunk Works’ initial projects vaulted the U.S. into the jet age with the first operational, production jet fighter, the Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star, first flown on January 8, 1944, too late to effectively influence WWII. Following the P-80 and WWII the U.S. defense industry entered an unprecedented period of innovation and breakthroughs as the Cold War with Russia escalated and China emerged as a growing part of the “Red Menace”.

The Skunk Works’ original founder of record is Kelly Johnson. Johnson, the round-faced, blunt-speaking character who seemed to have aerodynamic engineering in his genetic make-up, went on to make aviation history in more ways than can be able to accurately (and publicly) tabulated. Perhaps more so than the engineers of the early NASA space programs, Kelly Johnson made being an engineer cool. Johnson was awarded an unprecedented two Collier Trophies, an annual award presented by the U.S. National Aeronautic Association for the person who made the most significant contribution to aerospace. He was also awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Successor to the Skunk Works throne, colleague and later President Ben Rich, said in his book, “Skunk Works” that Kelly Johnson was, “The toughest boss west of the Mississippi, or east of it too, suffered fools for less than seven seconds, and accumulated as many detractors as admirers at the Pentagon and among Air Force commanders.”

While the Skunk Works is most famous for the “black projects” that went on to become famous technology breakthroughs like the U-2 spy plane, SR-71 Blackbird and the F-117 stealth fighter, what may have been the single largest innovation with the Skunk Works was their ability to, in some cases, subvert the normal convoluted and lethargic acquisition projects the Department of Defense is infamous for.

The Skunk Works developed the F-117 Nighthawk stealth fighter in complete secrecy for less money and in less time than it took Ford Motor Company to develop its Ford Taurus line of cars. Observers in the former Soviet Union and in the U.S. defense and intelligence community maintain the F-117 and the breakthrough in “stealth”, or low radar observability, was a significant factor in the demise of the Soviet Union since their massive defensive dependence on an integrated air defense system had been rendered largely ineffective by stealth.

Today the Skunk Works continues as a more recognized, less shadowy organization in brand identity but not in projects. Those remain highly classified.

While no one in the public domain knows what the Skunk Works is working on now, the one thing that is certain is they are working on something. A host of projects has been discussed by the U.S. Air Force and Lockheed that include hypersonic remotely piloted and manned strike and reconnaissance platforms.

In 2017 Aviation Week magazine wrote that, “One such technology demonstrator, believed to be an unmanned subscale aircraft, was observed flying into the U.S. Air Force’s Plant 42 at Palmdale, where Skunk Works is headquartered. The vehicle, which was noted landing in the early hours at an unspecified date in late July, was seen with two T-38 escorts. Lockheed Martin declined to comment directly on the sighting.”

In a rare and stunning reveal in late 2017 at the Society of Aerospace Engineers Exhibition, Lockheed’s Executive Vice President of Aeronautics, Orlando Carvalho, told media about a new “SR-72 program”: “Although I can’t go into specifics, let us just say the Skunk Works team in Palmdale, California, is doubling down on our commitment to speed.” Carvalho told Aviation Week, “Hypersonics is like stealth. It is a disruptive technology and will enable various platforms to operate at two to three times the speed of the Blackbird… Security classification guidance will only allow us to say the speed is greater than Mach 5.”

Based on their remarkable 75-year history two things we do know about the Skunk Works’ current projects are; they are certainly working on something, and, it will defy our imaginations.

The Media is Full of Speculation, But What Do We Know and What Can We Predict?

One of 2017’s biggest defense and aviation stories is the anonymous sighting by a “handful of witnesses” of the landing of a mysterious, unidentified new aircraft at U.S. Air Force Plant 42 Production Flight Test Facility in Palmdale California. What was it?

Aviation Week reporter Guy Norris scooped the story but was guarded in his reporting of sources. On September 27, 2017 Norris wrote:

“According to information provided to Aviation Week, one such technology demonstrator, believed to be an unmanned subscale aircraft, was observed flying into the U.S. Air Force’s Plant 42 at Palmdale, where Skunk Works is headquartered. The vehicle, which was noted landing in the early hours at an unspecified date in late July, was seen with two T-38 escorts. Lockheed Martin declined to comment directly on the sighting.”

Nearly every article quoting Norris’ story suggests that, what the unnamed witnesses saw is related to a new global intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance (ISR) gathering asset. Likely a new hypersonic remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) that could be a sub-scale developmental testbed for a planned manned version. While it is a significant leap to extrapolate this sighting to a full-scale manned platform, the silence from Lockheed Martin about the incident is deafening. Had the sighting been nothing, they would have said it was nothing.

It isn’t much of a leap to suggest that any proposed, new manned aircraft, colloquially referred to in most media as the “SR-72” would have global range, fly in excess of Mach 6, be low-observable and potentially have strike capability. This is one list of requirements for an SR-71 follow-on.

When analyzing the role of a possible new strategic reconnaissance/strike asset, manned and unmanned, a few assumptions can reasonably be made. The mission of a high-speed reconnaissance (and possibly even strike) platform likely includes four unique capabilities for the strategic ISR and global strike mission:

1. It is very low observable. The relevance and quality of any intelligence collected is degraded substantially if the adversary knows it has been collected. A stealthy, ultra-high-speed intelligence gathering and strike asset could obtain signals, atmospheric and image intelligence across several spectrums potentially without detection. This improves the actionable relevance of the intelligence since the adversary does not know their operational security has been compromised.

2. It is timely. An ultra-high speed (some reports suggest Mach 6+) asset could be over the reconnaissance target area quickly and provide either real-time intelligence via secure datalink or be back on the ground quickly for retrieval and analysis of intelligence gathered over the target and stored onboard the asset.

3. It is difficult to intercept if detected. One of the primary defensive capabilities of the Mach 3+ SR-71 was its speed and altitude performance. It could outrun and out-climb most missiles and interceptor aircraft. But advances in detection, tactics, aircraft, aircraft weapons and surface to air missiles and even soon-to-be fielded focused energy beam weapons (as from the Chinese) provide a requirement for a faster, higher flying and lower observable platform.

4. It provides on-board decision-making capability in the manned configuration. While a manned asset exposes a flight crew to the risks associated with overflight it also keeps the human decision-making capability inside the mission loop. While this may not be critical in the ISR role, it may be in the strategic strike role. Once strategic strike platforms such as ICBMs and cruise missiles are committed to the attack they can be difficult to re-task or abort, especially in a dynamic tactical environment. A manned strategic strike asset with ultra-high-speed and global range retains a human in the decision loop. This is attractive both empirically and morally.

Having identified these four potential unique capabilities to a presumptive “SR-72” type asset it is appropriate to examine the possible regions and roles the asset would be employed in. Given the current and near-future strategic situation these four global missions may be part of the SR-72s tasking:

1. North Korea. The crisis has reached a near flashpoint with Pyongyang’s repeated missile and nuclear proliferation and continued adversarial rhetoric. Accurate and timely monitoring of North Korea’s actual testing activity and developmental capabilities is critical to managing the U.S. response in the crisis. This includes preventing the crisis from becoming an armed conflict. A strategic reconnaissance asset that is stealthy, fast and field-able would bolster the U.S. position in intelligence gathering, especially in this dynamic environment. A similar low observable, hypersonic strike asset would also be critical in maintaining our first strike capability should the rapidly evolving situation warrant it.

2. Iran. With potential changes in the U.S. doctrine and Iran’s nuclear policy maintaining real-time intelligence on Iran’s nuclear program is critical. The political environment surrounding Iran, and its attendant diplomatic ramifications, dictate that the best intelligence on Iran’s nuclear program and any weapons development be gathered covertly and updated in a timely manner. While orbital reconnaissance assets can provide excellent imaging across the entire spectrum from visible to infra-red to electronic emissions a reconnaissance satellite cannot collect atmospheric samples that are key to detecting nuclear testing. Also, re-tasking spy satellites not already in position with orbits over key targets makes a more dynamic, high-speed, low-observable atmospheric reconnaissance platform desirable.

3. Syria. The tenuous relationship with Russia in the Syrian conflict has been well-managed to date, but the potential for serious incidents still exists. Intelligence gathered covertly in real or near real-time about both Syrian and Russian activities in the region can help manage each participants’ agendas while lowering the risk of fratricide and other accidental conflict. It can also provide exclusive intelligence to the United States unavailable to other participating nations, providing a strategic intelligence advantage in the conflict.

4. The emerging global theater. The United States enjoys a geographic separation from the major Asian, African and Middle Eastern conflict areas. The geographic separation from conflict zones afforded by the Atlantic and Pacific oceans has been a significant reason for the U.S. ability to maintain security and prevent a large-scale conflict on U.S. soil. But this geographical distance from conflict zones also means preemptively managing conflict globally. It requires long reach and high-speed for timely intelligence gathering. A new high-speed, low-observable ISR/strike platform is required to maintain that agenda. This is a persistent requirement within the U.S. arsenal and will remain indefinitely.

Any new strategic reconnaissance and strike asset in development now could still be years from operational fielding, or it may already be in service. Recall that the F-117 Nighthawk was flying in 1981 but not officially revealed until 1988, a span of seven years during which the program remained hidden. While media has changed since the 1980s and it is more difficult to keep a program secret today, the possibility still exists that the program is much farther advanced than publicly revealed.

As early as 1985 a line item appeared in the U.S. defense budget for $85 million USD attributed to a project called “Aurora”. By 1987 that allocation had bloated to over $2.3 billion for the same project. Some reports suggest the U.S. Air Force was working on an SR-71 replacement as early as 1988.

Subsequent reports in credible media like Jane’s Defense and Aviation Week & Space Technology have featured accounts of hearing and seeing unidentified aircraft in the region of the Nellis test ranges.

Another famous sighting happened over the North Sea in November 1991. Scottish petroleum engineer Chris Gibson, who was also serving in the British Royal Observer Corps according to reports, was working on the offshore oil rig Galveston Key. Gibson, an experienced and trained professional aircraft spotter, saw “The shape of a pure isosceles triangle” flying behind a KC-135 Stratotanker refueling aircraft in formation with two F-111s. The aircraft were sighted in the 6A air-to-air refueling zone according to reports. Gibson’s accounting was substantiated by another witness, lasted a significant amount of time, and has been repeatedly analyzed, but never explained.

Trying to organize the sightings and information we have of any possible new hypersonic low-observable reconnaissance/strike aircraft with the mission requirements and global strategic need for aerial intelligence still leaves massive gaps between what we know and what is possible according to accounts, but within this massive gap of the unknown exists plenty of room for a real project that, when we eventually do hear about it, will undoubtedly be one of the most sensational defense and aviation stories of this century.

Top image: Conceptual image of SR-72 with SR-71. Courtesy of Aviation Week & Space Technology

The SR-71 Blackbird was so fast it outran every missile shoot against it and every interceptor scrambled to intercept it.

The aviation “side” of the Web went abuzz following the rumor that an SR-72 prototype was spotted performing flight tests at the U.S. Air Force’s Plant 42 at Palmdale, California.

Back in 2013, Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works, the legendary division that designed airplanes which represented a giant leap for their times such as the F-104, the U-2, the Blackbird family or the F-117A stealth fighter jet, reveled the existence of a project for a Hypersonic strike aircraft dubbed SR-72.

The SR-72 is an unmanned hypersonic intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and strike platform designed for Mach 6.

Based on the concept images released by the U.S. Air Force (the first official one can be found above) is coherent with the most recent hypersonic designs and it is quite similar to at least one of the configurations studied since the early ’60s for an SR-71 Blackbird replacement.

Anyway, regardless to whether an SR-72 prototype has already started flight testing somewhere between California and Nevada, the hypersonic strike aircraft will be able to fly about twice as fast as its predecessor, the iconic Mach 3 SR-71 Blackbird, one of the fastest planes ever flown operationally.

The Blackbird was the first aircraft to feature stealth capabilities: a special paint that contained iron ferrites and absorbed radar energy instead of returning it to the sender was used for SR-71’s wings, tail and fuselage. The reduced RCS (Radar Cross Section) made any reaction to an SR-71 overflight almost useless: the aircraft was so fast that once the radar detected it, the SAM battery’s guidance system was not able to compute the right parameters for a successful kill. Moreover, the range and bearing of the SR-71 was also denied to the enemy by jamming the radars with the use of the sophisticated electronic countermeasures (ECM) that equipped by the Blackbird.

However, in spite of its radar-evading features, what made the SR-71 almost impossible to intercept, were its incredible flight characteristics: it was able to fly at more than 3.5 Mach at 88,000 feet. The aircraft could climb higher than that and according to some sources the Blackbird could reach 120,000 feet and above. At that altitude, Soviet SAMs would have been unable to maneuver to hit an SR-71: the air is so thin that any maneuvering capability of a missile is practically nonexistent, as explained by the former Blackbird pilot Col. Richard H. Graham in his book “SR-71 The Complete Illustrated History of THE BLACKBIRD The World’s Highest , Fastest Plane.”

In 2012 a DARPA statement stated that America was gradually losing the “strategic advantage” that its stealth warplanes had long provided, as other countries’ stealth and counter-stealth capabilities continued to improve. For this reason, “speed is the new stealth” is a slogan that accompanied the unveiling of the SR-72 in 2013. However, the SR-71’s story is a proof that speed has always been the key to stealth.

Indeed, throughout its career, that came to an end on Oct. 9, 1999, no SR-71 was reportedly lost nor damaged due to hostile actions.

Not only did SAMs fail to catch the Blackbird but even the fastest Soviet fighter jets, including the MiG-31 Foxhound, lacked the necessary speed to reach the SR-71.

Here below you can find an excerpt from “MiG Pilot,” a book for Soviet pilot Viktor Belenko, who defected to Japan in a MiG-25 on Dec. 6, 1976, that we have already posted in the past. Here’s what Belenko recounts :

“American reconnaissance planes, SR-71s, were prowling off the coast, staying outside Soviet airspace by photographing terrain hundreds of miles inland with side – angle cameras. They taunted and toyed with the MiG-25s sent up to intercept them, scooting up to altitudes the Soviet planes could not reach, and circling leisurely above them or dashing off at speeds the Russians could not match.”

“[The Soviets] had a master plan to intercept an SR-71 by positioning a MiG-25 in front of it and one below it, and when the SR-71 passed they would fire missiles. But it never occurred. Soviet computers were very primitive, and there is no way that mission can be accomplished.”

“First of all, the SR-71 flies too high and too fast. The MiG-25 cannot reach it or catch it. Secondly…the missiles are useless above 27,000 meters [88,000 feet], and as you know, the SR-71 cruises much higher. But even if we could reach it, our missiles lack the velocity to overtake the SR-71 if they are fired in a tail chase. And if they are fired head-on, the guidance systems cannot adjust quickly enough to the high closing speed”.

As the above footage shows, NASA flew the Blackbird as well.

Four SR-71 airplanes operated from NASA Dryden during the 1990s. According to the Agency, two were used for research and two to support Air Force reactivation of the SR-71 for reconnaissance missions. Although the Air Force retired the Blackbirds in 1990, Congress reinstated funding for additional flights several years later. SR-71A (61-7980/NASA 844) arrived at Dryden on Feb. 15, 1990. It was placed into storage until 1992 and served as a research platform until its final flight on Oct. 9, 1999. SR-71A (61-7971/NASA 832) arrived at Dryden on March 19, 1990, but was returned to Air Force inventory as the first aircraft was reactivated in 1995. Along with SR-71A (61-7967), it was flown by NASA crews in support of the Air Force program. SR-71B (61-7956/NASA 831) arrived at Dryden on July 25, 1991, and served as a research platform as well as for crew training and proficiency until October 1997.

Last week Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works acknowledged the existence of an SR-71 Blackbird, capable to fly at hypersonic speed with a dual ISR (Intelligence Surveillance Reconnaissance) and Strike capability, dubbed SR-72.

In accordance with the new slogan “speed is the new stealth”, Skunk Works is studying high Mach systems that would give platform equipped with these weapons the capability to strike heavily defended targets, quickly and undetected.

Among LM’s hypersonic programs focusing on both “expendable missiles” and “reusable aircraft”, the High Speed Strike Weapon (HSSW), “a hypersonic missile concept suitable for future bomber and fighter aircraft” was not a secret.

However, there was only one HSSW concept image available.

Until Lockheed Martin released the one you can see on this post that is a bit more detailed (if any detail can be gathered from a rendering) than any previous one.

Image credit: Lockheed Martin

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