The United States Airforce developed an aircraft in the 1960s that was capable of flight more than three times faster than the sound coming from its engines. This aircraft was the SR-71 Blackbird.
Its amazing speed allowed it to better gather intelligence; something it could complete in a matter of seconds. All of this happened while zooming through the skies at a speed of Mach 3+ while traveling at 80,000 feet.
If on the off-chance, an enemy tried firing a missile upon it, the SR-71 simply had to outrun it with its amazing speed of flight. It could outrun any missile as it was faster than all of them.
This aircraft was utilized by the United States Air Force from the year 1964 through to 1998, which is a lot of years of service. There were 32 of these produced in total. Twelve of these were lost in accidents; however, none were lost due to enemy action.
However, this does not mean the enemy did not try to destroy these aircraft; during the course of many missions (all reconnaissance) within the Vietnam War, 800 SAMs (approx) were fired upon SR-71s, but none managed to strike a hit.
But North Vietnam wasn’t the only country to try and shoot down a blackbird, there were four other countries who tried, too. Check out the video to find out more!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOjEeGY4QCM