This hypersonic plane is shrouded in mystery. The SR-91 Aurora has kept both aviation enthusiasts and conspiracy theorists enthralled for several decades. Despite all the intrigue, conclusive evidence to prove that the aircraft exists still is not in the offing. Legends about the Aurora began in the 1980s as a possible successor to the SR-71 Blackbird and supposedly had capabilities to reach up to Mach 5 speeds.
The US administration has always denied the existence of such a plane, and the sightings of Aurora were never confirmed. Ben Rich, the former head of Lockheed Martin Skunk Works, explained that “Aurora” was only the codename for the funding of the B-2 bomber and not any secret hypersonic aircraft. Rich himself stated, “Aurora was the codename for the B-2 competition funding,” against the myth of a hypersonic top-secret project.
As the story goes, the U.S. military was rumored to have commissioned an ultrasecret next-generation reconnaissance plane project designed to take over from the now-aging SR-71 Blackbirds. Supposedly, an idea that was costing a rumored over two billion dollars at the tail end of the 1980s was then shelved; however, it remains unclear as to whether the plane ever existed even on the drawing board. Consistently, the government has denied that ever such an aircraft was built, and there’s no hard evidence that an SR-91 prototype ever took to the air.
Alleged sightings that began in the early 1990s-including reports of the Los Angeles area’s tremors and a famous 1989 sighting over the North Sea-have never been corroborated. These quakes could have been caused by military aircraft operating out of the Area 51 facility in Nevada, but there is nothing to suggest that the plane in question was an SR-91 prototype. It is possible that this was a B-2 Spirit that witnesses mistook for what they thought was an SR-91 since the Spirit somewhat matches the triangular shape described in eyewitness accounts.
The Aurora rumors were spurred less by concrete proof than by popular demand for stories confirming the SR-91’s existence. Most of what we know stems back to a 1990 Aviation Week & Space Technology article claiming that the term “Aurora” was referenced in federal budget documents. Rich explained that the name leaked out during congressional appropriations hearings, leading to the persistent rumor of a top-secret hypersonic plane.
Until more persuasive evidence can be produced, Rich’s version can stand as the last word on the subject. The Aurora story provides an excellent case history of how what might begin as a leak to the press can blossom into a complete urban legend.
Despite a lack of concrete proof, many are still convinced that there exists a hypersonic spy plane cloaked in secrecy. One British Ministry of Defence report, published in May 2006, does mention the USAF’s priority plans to produce a Mach 4-6 highly supersonic vehicle. No concrete evidence has so far been produced to indicate that such a project is underway. Another theory is that the Aurora project was canceled in favor of a move away from spy planes to hi-tech unmanned flying vehicles and reconnaissance satellites.
The best-known testimony to the existence of such a plane, however, comes from the sighting over the North Sea of a triangular aircraft in August 1989 by oil exploration engineer Chris Gibson. Additionally, the so-called “skyquakes” that have been heard over Los Angeles since the early 1990s, which have been identified as flying toward the secret Groom Lake/Area 51 installation in Nevada, add to the speculation.
The prime contractor for the SR-91 Aurora aircraft would most likely be Lockheed’s Skunk Works, now the Lockheed Advanced Development Company. Financial analysts were able to determine that Lockheed had been working on several large classified projects throughout the 1980s, although they couldn’t identify enough of them to account for the company’s income.
Aviation writer Bill Sweetman is one of the famous aviation writers, he said, “This evidence of 20 years of examining budget ‘holes,’ unexplained sonic booms, plus the Gibson sighting, helps establish the program’s initial existence.” Sweetman’s investigations continue to turn up evidence suggesting current activity, including a $9-billion black hole in the Air Force operations budget that seems a perfect fit for a project like Aurora.
The SR-91 Aurora remains that tantalizing mystery, a mix of fact and fiction, continuing to fire up speculation and debate in the aviation community. Whether it ever existed or not, the legend of Aurora survives as a testament to the magic of cutting-edge military technology and the power of a good yarn.