From: skunk-works-digest-owner@harbor.ecn.purdue.edu To: skunk-works-digest@harbor.ecn.purdue.edu Subject: Skunk Works Digest V3 #13 Reply-To: skunk-works-digest@harbor.ecn.purdue.edu Errors-To: skunk-works-digest-owner@harbor.ecn.purdue.edu Precedence: bulk Skunk Works Digest Tuesday, 17 August 1993 Volume 03 : Number 013 In this issue: About JAS-39 Gripen crash Re: What is Bicycle Lake used for? Airpower Re: What is Bicycle Lake used for? Re: Bicycle Lake Re: What is Bicycle Lake used for? See the end of the digest for information on subscribing to the skunk-works or skunk-works-digest mailing lists and on how to retrieve back issues. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: sp2stes1@berta.his.se (Stefan Skoglund) Date: Mon, 16 Aug 93 12:05:18 +0200 Subject: About JAS-39 Gripen crash The crash was pretty spectacular. Every year in Stockholm (capital of Sweden) it is a big Festival - Stockholm Water Festival. It is a pretty big festival centered around the water. One of the events was a big air show Sunday 8 of July with a bunch of Viggen, Hercules and a JAS-39 Gripen and I don't know what more. The air-room was severely restricted. The program was mostly a bunch of turns to stay inside the limits. This happened: 1. A 7-8 g turn to get back over the area. 2. A small ascent to bleed of some speed. 3. Something makes the A/C to stand on its tail. 4. The pilot understand that he has lost control and punches out. 5. The A/C goes down at a island straight down like a leaf ie level. 6. Hits the ground and start burning. The A/C doesn't explode and only a small fire starts. Personaly I wasn't in Stockholm. I was on a air-show at Skoevde airport. Saw one P-51D, one ex-swiss Vampire, one Pembroke ( english prop transport ), one Pitt aerobatic with two wingstanding-ladies, two Yak-52 aerobatic and one AJ-37 Viggen. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Stefan Skoglund I "Viggen | i tiden *)" sp2stes1@helga.his.se, I | University of Skoevde, Sweden I _____/0\_____ - --------------------------------I ____________O(.)O___________ I -+- O -+- I *) Viggen with two Rb04 ------------------------------ From: Bruce Henderson Date: Mon, 16 Aug 93 10:34:54 -0700 Subject: Re: What is Bicycle Lake used for? Actually, Bicycle lake is really not such a hot place for a black project. It is fairly close to a populated area. It is used extensively by the Marines to train infantry in desert survival. That, and the fact that it is plainly visible from the Pac Bell trans continental cable right of way make it pretty useless. It is a pretty cool area though. Oh yeah, there are significant archeological sites in that area. As far as I know, there is no airstrip on bicycle lake. Bruce [Fort Irwin survivor] ------------------------------ From: dnadams@nyx.cs.du.edu (Dean Adams) Date: Mon, 16 Aug 93 19:09:21 MDT Subject: Airpower Check out the latest issue of AIRPOWER magazine (9/93)! It is an ALL-Blackbird "Special Collector's Edition"... "A-12, YF-12, SR-71: The complete story in one issue" Cover-to-cover Blackbirds... i'd say its worth $3.25. - -dean ------------------------------ From: Jeffrey_Lo@ccm11.sc.intel.com Date: Mon, 16 Aug 93 19:36:33 PST Subject: Re: What is Bicycle Lake used for? >From: TRADER@cup.portal.com >Date: Sun, 15 Aug 93 23:22:01 PDT >Subject: What is Bicycle Lake used for? > >While studying the topographic maps in DeLorme Publishings "Southern >California Atlas & Gazetteer" I found a remote airstrip that would be >ideal for "black" aircraft programs. I wonder if anyone out there knows >what the Bicycle Lake facility is used for? If I read this scale correctly, >the runway looks like it is about 9000 feet (2740 meters) long. Bicycle >Lake is located on the property of Fort Irwin, California. It appears to >be almost 30 air miles (48 km) from Interstate 15, with Alvord and Tiefort >mountains between the airstrip and the highway. It is east of the highly >restricted Goldstone satellite complex (associated with the National >Reconaissance Office). Given this airstrip's size, remote desert location, >and being surrounded by Fort Irwin and the China Lake Naval Air station, >I believe it would make an ideal clandestine test facility - Groom Lake >in Nevada is too well known. > >Paul McGinnis / TRADER@cup.portal.com In looking at a Los Angeles sectional chart, it appears that Bicycle Lake airport is within 20 NM of I-15, and less than 10 NM fmr the edge of the restricted area, along what is probably a fairly often travelled route between Los Angeles and Las Vegas. Doesn't sound great for secrecy. The name is listed as "BICYCLE LAKE AAF NG", which leads me to believe it is used for Army National Guard aircraft. The airport symbol on the chart also indicates that the runway is "Military - Other than hard surfaced" which indicates to me that it is simply part of the dry lake bed with a runway marked out on it. It is probably listed on the chart as a 9500 foot runway because that is probably the usable length of the lake bed. I would think that they would probably build a concrete runway for any kind of fast, expensive, experimental aircraft to use, even though lake beds often work well (as evidenced by Rogers dry lake at Edwards AFB), it would probably make life difficult in bad weather with the runway getting muddy (can anyone at Edwards comment on this?). All in all, Groom may be well known, but the military still makes it difficult for anyone to get in really close for a good look and is probably a better site for black aircraft than Bicycle Lake. Jeff Lo jlo@gomez.intel.com ------------------------------ From: dnadams@nyx.cs.du.edu (Dean Adams) Date: Mon, 16 Aug 93 22:31:55 MDT Subject: Re: Bicycle Lake Jeffrey_Lo@ccm11.sc.intel.com writes... >I would think that they would probably build a concrete runway for any >kind of fast, expensive, experimental aircraft to use, even though lake >beds often work well (as evidenced by Rogers dry lake at Edwards AFB), >it would probably make life difficult in bad weather with the runway >getting muddy (can anyone at Edwards comment on this?). When there is a lot of rain, some/all of the lakebed runways are closed, until (of course) they dry out again... >All in all, Groom may be well known, but the military still makes >it difficult for anyone to get in really close for a good look and >is probably a better site for black aircraft than Bicycle Lake. Absolutely. Groom Lake may be "well known", but we still KNOW very little about the place! (much to our annoyance :) All we really have are some grainy photos, assorted old film clips, and reports from our favorite diggers like Goodall and Sweetman. I'd say they are keeping their secrets all too well at Groom... - -dean ------------------------------ From: TRADER@cup.portal.com Date: Mon, 16 Aug 93 22:31:43 PDT Subject: Re: What is Bicycle Lake used for? In an earlier message, Bruce Henderson writes: >Bicycle lake is really not such a hot place for a black project. It is fairly >close to a populated area. It is used extensively by the Marines to train >infantry in desert survival. That, and the fact that it is plainly visible >from the Pac Bell trans continental cable right of way make it pretty useless. >As far as I know, there is no airstrip on bicycle lake. >Bruce >[Fort Irwin survivor] As I mentioned before, I'm using DeLorme's topographics maps (quite accurate from experience) to make these comments about Bicycle Lake. The map (circa 1986) shows a long runway running from roughly SW to NE across Bicycle Lake (i.e. across the dry lake bed) and roughly parallel to Irwin Road (about 2 miles from Irwin Road actually). The only cable line that I see on this map is about 18 miles southeast at its closest point. I also mentioned Goldstone earlier - they have their own runway, which looks like it is about 4000 feet long. Paul McGinnis / TRADER@cup.portal.com ------------------------------ End of Skunk Works Digest V3 #13 ******************************** To subscribe to skunk-works-digest, send the command: subscribe skunk-works-digest in the body of a message to "listserv@harbor.ecn.purdue.edu". 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