/tags/testpilot/Recent content in Testpilot on Gromet's Plaza ArchiveHugoen-usWed, 19 Nov 2014 00:00:00 +0000/stories/2014/11/19/gloriana/Wed, 19 Nov 2014 00:00:00 +0000/stories/2014/11/19/gloriana/<p>A Pilot Joins a Very Special Twelve Mile High Club. What happens at 65,000 feet can’t stay at 65,000 feet. But will– or can– test pilot Colonel Harold Hammen ever tell what actually happened when he met Gloriana.</p> <p>= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =</p> <p>The XF-139 was a very special type of plane, but then Colonel Harold H. Hammen was a very special type of test pilot. The plane was an SRA, a “Slingshot Response Aircraft” capable of responding anywhere in the world in just minutes when carried aloft by a special UTV, an “Ultrasonic Transport Vehicle.” The docked pair could be kept anywhere in the world and respond instantly to anywhere in the world when a situation arose. Both the two-pilot transport and the single pilot response aircraft would need mid-air refueling and perhaps mid-air towing to return to base, but the incredibly short initial response time meant that there was nowhere in the world that US air power could not appear in the sky within minutes of an incident. Or, at least that was the design theory that Colonel “HH” Hammen was trying to prove out in this test flight.</p>