Aurora or SR-91 Aurora is a hypothesised reconnaissance aircraft of the United States which is believed can attain a speed over Mach 5 (five times the speed of sound). SR-71 Blackbird is another plane in reality which can fly at a speed about Mach 3.
The Aurora was developed in 1990 s as a replacement for Blackbird. It is believed that the Aurora project was soon called back because there was a shift from spyplanes to high tech unmanned aerial vehicles and spy satellites which can do the same job at a lower risk and expense.The sonic booms heard by the Southern Californians in mid to late 1991 makes the story of Aurora a little more mysterious. The sonic booms were quite un-natural at that time and a series sonic booms were recorded by the U.S Geological Survey sensors across Southern California. Later, the NASA sonic boom expert Dom Maglieri studied the 15 year old sonic boom data from the California Institute of Technology and came to the conclusion that the data showed something at 90,000 feet and at a speed of Mach 4 to Mach 5. He also said that the boom signature pattern recorded in the data and that of another aircraft which had traveled through the atmosphere many miles away at LAX is wildly different.
The high cost of manufacture and maintenance is another reason for the decline of this high velocity mysterious aircraft.
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