Here is the pilot telling the story. I think it's the same pilot as top story as back seater is Walter.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8AyHH9G9et0

Thanks. Here's a text version: https://theaviationist.com/2018/11/29/that-time-a-crippled-s...

The JA37 Viggen is probably one of the few planes that managed to get a missile lock on the SR-71. This was mainly to try to push the northern flight path (over Norway, then onwards over Russia) to pass north of Sweden, instead of crossing Sweden. Take a route of JA37, ascending on full afterburner at about 45 degrees, coordinating with fighter control (military ATC, also trained to assist fighters during air-to-air combat), so as to enable the missile targeting systems when the SR-71 would be in an optimal position in the cone.

Most probably, the SR-71 would've been safe even if the missiles had been fired, but the goal was never to take it down, just to make them shift the overflight pattern to no longer be in Swedish airspace.

The dude on Reddit says:

> They could hear ATC but not other aircraft, because civilian aircraft are on VHF frequencies, military on UHF, and anybody above 60,000 feet (like the SR-71's) were on a separate, center-wide UHF frequency so they wouldn't have to switch frequencies constantly. So the SR-71 and F-18 pilots couldn't have heard those other aircraft requesting groundspeed, or heard each other for that matter.

The SR-71 had at least 5 radios, according to the flight manual [1].

• COMNAV-50 UHF. It had two of these, one in the front cockpit and one in the aft cockpit.

• AN/ARC-186(V). This one covers the civilian aircraft frequencies (and a bit more such as the 2 meter ham band).

• 618-T HF. This covered AM and SSB on 2-30 MHz in 1 KHz increments.

• AN/ARC-190(V). Another HF radio, covering 2-30 MHz in 100 Hz increments.

It was a spy plane. Listening in on other aircraft and ATC would help it carry out its mission, so of course it is going to have plenty of radios.

[1] https://www.sr-71.org/blackbird/manual/

If you read the comment thread, lots of people throw doubt on the doubter's story especially around the VHF band.

What's sort of weird is the ATC says they were a controller in the 90's. Could things have changed between the when the story happened and this person was an ATC Controller?

"Speed Classified" might have been different in the early days of the 71's program. Same with the flight ceilings.

To me, the only thing that hasn't been refuted yet is the speed measurement. Specifically the part where it's a multiple of 1842 (or 1942 as was told in the story).