Europe
The fourth unit of Wing 9 was formed at Air Force Base in the United Kingdom in March 1979. The unit had four reconnaissance officers, two SR-71s and two U-2Rs, the first commander being Colonel Mari, the last one being Colonel Hence. Force consisted of ten officers, 80 NCO and 50-80 civilians. Latter were subsequently replaced by only 14 Lockheed engineers and technicians. Although the “unit 4” remained part of the SAC, it was operationally subordinate to the command of the 3rd Air Force, which represented the U.S. Air Force in Western Europe. Flights in the airspace of Western Europe and near the western borders of the USSR were called “Senior Ruby”. The first SR landed in Britain on April 20, 1979, while British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher officially announced the presence in on a permanent basis of the U.S. Air Force's strategic intelligence unit only on April 5, 1984, and the first press reports appeared in 1982. At different times, was based on at least nine vehicles (simultaneously — only two): 64-17958, 962, 964, 971, 972, 974, 976, 979, 980.
Flights from were performed mainly on two routes, on the slang of the crews — to the “north” and “south”. More north-flying, the route was called the Viking North. Scouts flew along the Norwegian coast to the photographic survey of the Kola Peninsula. Photographic equipment made it possible to photograph the area at a distance of up to 150 km from the flight line, so the SR-71 controlled the entire coastal strip of the Soviet Arctic, without entering the airspace of the USSR. During the flight, the scout refueled three times in the air, the first time — immediately after takeoff, the second — over the water area of the Norwegian Sea and the third — there, but only after photographing the Kola Peninsula. On the way back the scout “wrapped” in the underbelly of Scandinavia. The plane crossed Denmark at an altitude of 80,000 feet (ca. 24 km) and a speed of M = 3.0, flew over the Baltic Sea along the Polish and Soviet coast. In the area of the northern tip of the island of Poland, the scout laid a bend of 110 km in radius and lay on the course of return. The pilot had to get into a narrow enough corridor between the islands of Poland and Eland, otherwise, he risked to “enter” Sweden. Swedish Air Force JA-37 “Wigged” fighters often used the next SR-71 as a training target for intercepting high-altitude aircraft, getting closer to a straight line distance on the counter-course
of visibility.
The usual flight on the northern route took four hours. The flight to the south lasted an hour longer because France did not give permission to fly U.S. Air Force combat aircraft over its territory. The first refueling of the SR-71 crew was done over the North Sea, then it flew over the Atlantic and Strait of Gibraltar on a cruise ship and entered the airspace of the Mediterranean. To the south of Sicily, there was a second refueling point from the KS-135 tanker. After replenishment of the fuel reserve, the scout took a course to the coast of Libya, passed along the whole coastline, turned to the north, crossed Turkey and was over the Black Sea. Returning — in reverse order, excluding the overflight of Libya.
In 1985 the pilots started working on flights over West Germany. However, too small a territory of Germany made the risk of flying into the GDR airspace too high, and it was foolish to hope that such a fortress would go unpunished: a group of Soviet troops in Germany is not the armed forces of the Dark. In addition, it became clear that flights over Europe were practically useless due to weather conditions — from a height of 24 km only clouds and shreds of fog got into the camera lenses.
Scouts from managed to take part in a real combat operation — a raid on Libya in April 1986. Both SR-71 units 4 were photographed on April 15, the results of air raids of the U.S. Air Force and Navy during Operation Colorado Canyon. It is noteworthy that during the mission scouts refueled not from the traditional KC-135Q but from the newest tankers KC-10.
