Pulled this off my feed saying it demonstrated the SR-71 leaking fuel just before an evening flight. First time seeing a video of that, if true. And before BillyBob complains that "iTs Ai" you should know I ran it through a denoise/ sharpener to try and resurrect pixels.😎

Folks, lol, with these responses. I was calling into question the validity of the video and title being true, not if the SR-71 leaks. Poor comm skills on my part, so I'll take the beat down.

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They all leaked fuel until the panels warmed up and expanded to make a seal.

That's what I've always heard just never seen it.

Oh that's cool. I know in avionics school we were trained (not sure why) to not write up fuel leaks or hydraulic leaks over a certain per minute mark. Maybe it was because we worked on the fuel sending units inside the tanks or something, I can't remember.

I've seen them more than once leaking fuel like rain in the hangar after a flight. I've never seen them before, but I have seen them loiter for quite a while to seal before taking off like something out of Star Wars.

that's crazy. Yeah, that's why I wasn't sure about this vid. Looks like it just came out of the carwash or something. 👀

It's absolutely true. They leaked like hell until they got up to altitude.

Understand that everything about that plane was designed to be loose to accommodate the extreme temperatures caused by the friction of the high speed. When it warmed up it was tight.

I’ve got a similar video from when I flew it. They told us it stopped leaking in flight but for all we knew that’s just what they wanted us to think.