Cool U2 Footage.

[Tools R Us]

Breathtaking spy plane footage. [VIDEO]

 

[splitshot]

That gave me chicken skin, thanks for sharing. I remember as a kid watching them fly out of DMAFB.

 

[MaddBaggins]

All I can say is WOW!

 

[Short Bus 80]

You can’t talk about the U2 without mentioning Gary Powers. Here is the Cliff Notes version.

U2 Pilot shot down over Russia during the cold war

Sat in a Russian prison for 5 years for spying

CIA brought him back to the US only to charge him for treason because he was under orders to kill himself if captured

Sat in a US prison for a couple of years before the CIA got him out and gave him a job with Lockheed

Flew every kind of experimental aircraft for Lockheed while the CIA secretly paid his salary

Powers wrote a very nasty book about the CIA. At that point the CIA stopped paying his salary and Lockheed let him go

Got a job flying a helicopter in LA doing the morning traffic report

After years of flying the most advanced experimental aircraft he died when his traffic helicopter crashed

 

[MaddBaggins]

I seem to remember seeing some made for TV movie about him many moons ago. Early 80's I think.

 

[RHINO]

i like his comment,, "if everyone got a change to do this once it would change the face of global politics, religion, education,, everything."

 

[inkpot]

Howdy! Neat video, neat plane. I'd dearly love to get a ride in that second seat. But we have had a lot of other planes that will fly over 60,000 ft. John

 

[MaddBaggins]

Francis Gary Powers: The True Story of the U-2 Spy Incident (1976) (TV)

I think this is what I saw.

 

[msahr]

That's James May from Top Gear. Cool video. I think the TV special he did on this was "James May on The Moon", neat show, he's being all geeky about space travel and gets to try out the centrifuge before the U2 ride. Lucky guy I'd be just as geeky about all this too. Don't get me started on NASA stuff. And yes I've been to Kennedy Space Center.