Rodent Regatta

DON’T YOU JUST LOVE TALES LIKE THIS ONE
I hope there’s something to it!

Tech Blog’s Ben Sullivan sent this story on the mysterious flying black triangles. (My wife and I spotted one of these weirdo things while driving up to Tahoe for New Year’s 2001. They’ve been seen all over the world, and are often seen flying over our chunk of the California desert near Edwards AFB. It is a damned dramatic thing to see with your own eyes.)
Anyway, the Space.com article is based on a National Institute for Discovery Science hypothesis. Based on 150+ reports (including one from me), NIDS says the triangles might be ”lighter-than-air, blimp-style craft of the U.S. military’s making.” NIDS makes the case that Big Black Deltas, or BBDs, are U.S. Defense Department airships. They are so large they can carry massive payloads at low altitudes, cruising at speeds three to five times as fast as surface ships. Among a range of NIDS observations, the group believes the BBDs are powered by electrokinetic/field drives, or airborne nuclear power units. These craft also fly at extreme altitudes, high above conventional aircraft and the pulsing of ground-based traffic control radar. Elecrokinetic propulsion means that no propellers or jets are used. A hybrid lighter-than-air craft would rely on aerostatic, lift gas, like a balloon. No helicopter-like downwash would be produced. Except for a slight humming from high-voltage control equipment—and in older BBD versions an occasional coronal discharge—a Big Black Delta makes no noise. Given a slew of BBD capabilities—from silent running, diminished drag, elimination of sonic shockwaves, to operation from ground level to full vacuum—NIDS calls for pushing this black world technology out into daylight for commercial benefit.
Who knows? Black projects manage to stay secret for decades, with whatever little leaks quickly stomped by DoD and DoE’s well-oiled counter-propaganda machine.If these things are giant transports, we may soon see them in Iraq. The Afghanistan campaign saw several test planes—spy drones—thrown into quick service. These triangles have been flying around the United States for a dozen years or more. Imagine one of these giant blimp-deltas leaving Edwards with 50 tanks or choppers and 200 troops inside … and landing in Kurdish Iraq half a day later. (If these are truly airships, they wouldn’t even need runways to land. The GoodYear blimp lands in a small field off the 405.)
Then imagine Southwest Airlines getting a fleet of these buddies. $99 fares to Greece—and your car flies free! Meanwhile, Janes.com is reporting that Boeing’s Phantom Works is working hard on ”experimental anti-gravity projects that could overturn a century of conventional aerospace propulsion technology.” But they’re having trouble with the cranky Russian, Dr. Evgeny Podkletnov, who claims to have made some big advances. And Russia is tired of seeing its government-funded technology turn up in U.S. high-tech operations. [Ken Layne]