James May at The Edge of Space

[Ayahuasca]

Eric Mc said:

But the U2 was chugging along merilly.

The U2 was designed specifically to fly at extreme altitudes. That is why it has such long thin wings. There are definite issues flying at such heights and the aircraft has to be handled VERY carefully - but that is what it takes to make it work.

Yep. I read somewhere that the difference between the 'do not exceed' speed and stalling speed is about 10 knots which is a tiny fraction of the aircraft's airspeed. if the pilot sneezes it might fall out of the sky (slight exaggeration). That is why the pilots sound so calm and relaxed... they are in a deep Zen zone.

[Tango13]

Ayahuasca said:

Yep. I read somewhere that the difference between the 'do not exceed' speed and stalling speed is about 10 knots which is a tiny fraction of the aircraft's airspeed. if the pilot sneezes it might fall out of the sky (slight exaggeration). That is why the pilots sound so calm and relaxed... they are in a deep Zen zone.

Known as 'Coffin Corner'

The pilots had to be very careful when turning as it's possible to have part of the wing on the inside of the turn stalling whilst the outside wing is suffering from a Mach buffet.

[Ayahuasca]

Tango13 said:

Ayahuasca said:

Yep. I read somewhere that the difference between the 'do not exceed' speed and stalling speed is about 10 knots which is a tiny fraction of the aircraft's airspeed. if the pilot sneezes it might fall out of the sky (slight exaggeration). That is why the pilots sound so calm and relaxed... they are in a deep Zen zone.

Known as 'Coffin Corner'

The pilots had to be very careful when turning as it's possible to have part of the wing on the inside of the turn stalling whilst the outside wing is suffering from a Mach buffet.

Makes jinking to avoid a SAM a bit tricky...

[Ginetta G15 Girl]

It's worse than that.

Slow down you stall, increase speed you go into a compressibility stall.

It rather makes getting downstairs somewhat "interesting".

Edited by Ginetta G15 Girl on Wednesday 22 February 20:39

[Pilotguy]

Watching again tonight on BBC Four, I don’t think May had dual controls in the rear compartment so he almost certainly didn’t fly the landing so it must have been “Cabi”, the TU2-S pilot displaying how not to land the Dragon Lady!
https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/a-spotters-guide...
Looking at Beale AFB where the programme was shot, came across this satellite image on Google Maps, shows perfectly a comparison between the size of the U2 and a successor, the Global Hawk https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/why-the-usafs-ma...

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@39.1413836,-121.432...

https://goo.gl/Qzj48k For screenshots