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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 Martin was developing a Mach 6 plane 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.
However, no
conclusive evidence had emerged to confirm the existence of such a
project. It was believed by some that the Aurora project was canceled due
to a shift from spy-planes to high-tech unmanned aerial vehicles and
reconnaissance satellites which can do the same job as a spyplane, but
with less risk of casualties.
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