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UFO UpDates Mailing List

From: Baron Northrop <baron@anim.dreamworks.com>
Date: Fri, 01 May 1998 23:13:59 -0700
Fwd Date: Sat, 02 May 1998 09:30:25 -0400
Subject: Re: Mach 50 Thunderdart

>From: "Tim Matthews" <matthews@zetnet.co.uk>
>To: <updates@globalserve.net>
>Subject: Mach 50 Thunderdart
>Date: Sat, 2 May 1998 09:27:18 +0100


<snip>

>The rumour that the US has a Mach 50 Thunderdart is complete
>nonsense. The Thunderdart was a Testors model kit. The whole idea
>makes no sense.

<snip>

To quote from:

http://www.fas.org/sgp/bulletin/sec29.html


Aurora for Fun and Profit

Could secrecy be the new engine of economic growth? Hardly. But
the classification of advanced surveillance aircraft is being
exploited as the major selling point for a new set of scale
models of "Aurora"-type spy planes for hobbyists.

Declaring that "the secret is out!" the Testor Corporation of
Rockford, Illinois announced last month that it is marketing what
it calls "the super secret SR-75 Penetrator" ("also known by the
code word Aurora") and "the XR-7 Thunder Dart reconnaissance
aircraft system."

The ad copy asserts that these craft "were designed to replace
the aging SR-71 Blackbirds and are now flying missions from
remote bases around the world." The Air Force denies this.

The models' designer, John Andrews of Testor, says they are based
on "available government information, some expert aviation and
aerospace contacts, his own engineering experience, and several
technological guesses."

The marketing of a toy model has become something of a milestone
in secret aircraft programs, suggesting that the time for
declassification of some secret aircraft may soon be ripe. The
Testor Corporation created an uproar when it released its model
of a stealth fighter (which it called the F-19) in 1985, just a
few years before the F-117A stealth fighter was finally unveiled.
At the time, one bewildered Congressman demanded to know "how a
secret aircraft that even Congressmen were not allowed to see
could be reproduced by a model company." (Airpower Journal, Fall
1991, p.24).

As it turned out, however, the Testor model bore little
resemblance to the actual F-117A. But more than one million F-19s
were sold, making it "the best selling model airplane of all
time."

Available at:

http://worldmall.com/hhaven/120595.txt

TES  567      1/72 XR-7 THUNDER DART                  8.95

Also available!

TES  576      1/48 LAZAR SPACECRAFT                  19.95

Please don't flame me for what may look like an advertisement...
I just wanted to show the kind of information that can be
located on the net with minimum effort...  This information is
the result of less than 5 minutes using  http://www.dogpile.com
with "Thunderdart" as a search term...