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Beginning in the mid-1980s, the U.S. Air Force
and NASA have supported a number of studies of aircraft that are
consistent with accounts of the ¡§Aurora¡¨ reconnaissance aircraft project,
the proposed successor to the SR-71 Blackbird which would retired in 1999.
While various sources disclosed that Lockheed¡¦s secret Skunk Works was
developing a SR-75 Penetrator for the U.S. Air Force, Aviation Week and
Space Technology magazine first reported the news that the term "Aurora"
was inadvertently released in the 1985 US budget, as an allocation of $455
Million for aircraft construction in fiscal year 1987. As the role of the
SR-71 Blackbird, it was believed that the SR-75 was designed as a
reconnaissance drone mother-ship. In 1995, U.S. congress approved $100
million to bring the SR-71's back into service. One argument is that the
SR-75 Penatrator project was abandoned, either due to expense or technical
difficulties, and that the SR-71 had to be brought back to resume its
mobile surveillance role.
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