Talk Around Town: Aviation Week Says NASA May Be Secretly Trying to Fly the SR-71A Blackbird Again

THE QUICK TAKE

Aviation Week reports, citing two named former NASA test engineers, that the agency quietly launched a project in summer 2026 to return SR-71A Tail No. 844 to flight after nearly 27 years on the ground.
NASA has not confirmed the program exists, telling Aviation Week only that it has no additional information to share about the aircraft at this time.
Former engineer Mike Relja, who says he was approached but declined the offer, told Aviation Week he doubts the project can succeed given the loss of fuel infrastructure, ground equipment, and specialized consumables.

What Folks Are Chattering About

Well, butter my biscuit and call it a Sunday — Aviation Week & Space Technology, a publication that's been sniffing out aerospace secrets longer than most of us have been alive, published a report on September 29, 2026 claiming NASA quietly kicked off a project in summer 2026 to put the last SR-71A Blackbird ever flown — Tail No. 844 — back in the dadgum sky, nearly 27 years after its final flight on October 9, 1999. That is the kind of rumor that makes a person spit sweet tea clean across the kitchen.

According to Aviation Week, the story don't rest on some anonymous tipster whispering behind a dumpster — reporter Steve Trimble named two specific former NASA test engineers, Mike Relja and Tim Conners, who each say they were personally approached over the summer with job offers to help make this thing happen. That's named sources, y'all, not campfire gossip. The person reportedly making those offers, according to Aviation Week, was David Ash, a former U.S. Navy and Joby Aviation test pilot who the outlet says was brought on in June 2026 as a NASA special projects director. Interesting company to keep for somebody supposedly just shuffling paperwork.

What We Actually Know for a Fact

Here's what has been nailed down tighter than a barn door in a tornado. Aviation Week confirmed, through Relja's own account, that Tail No. 844 had already vanished from its outdoor display at Armstrong Flight Research Center before May 17, 2026, and according to former engineer Mike Relja, as cited by Aviation Week, the bird was rolled into the former space shuttle hangar at Edwards for inspection. The War Zone separately noted the aircraft's disappearance from its display location. That physical move is documented.

Aviation Week further confirmed that both Relja and Conners, along with others, were approached with job offers over the summer, a claim Relja and Conners themselves provided directly to the publication. NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman, meanwhile, displayed a dark, unidentified aircraft silhouette on a slide described as being about rebuilding the agency's X-plane portfolio at the All-In Summit on September 12–14, 2026, per The Aviationist and BizPac Review. When asked point-blank whether it was a Blackbird, Isaacman reportedly replied, 'You sure that's a Blackbird?' — which is the kind of answer that tells you exactly nothing while making you think everything. A May 2026 Isaacman directive, confirmed by BizPac Review and Air Data News, instructed NASA officials to pursue additional X-planes centered on what Isaacman described as 'radical airframe and engine propulsion design.'

What Nobody Has Proved Yet

Lord have mercy, here's where the wheels wobble on the wagon. NASA itself has confirmed precisely zilch about any return-to-flight program. A NASA spokesperson told Aviation Week only that the agency has no additional details to share about the aircraft right now — which is the bureaucratic equivalent of a possum playing dead in your headlights. The central claim — that NASA has formally launched a secret program to fly Tail No. 844 — rests entirely on the personal accounts of Relja and Conners as reported by Aviation Week. Every secondary outlet covering this story, including The War Zone, Army Recognition, and The Aviationist, traces its sourcing right back to that same Aviation Week piece without adding independent confirmation.

On the structural side of things, former test pilot Forger Stucky posted on X that all SR-71s sent to museums had their main wing spars cut to render them unflyable — but Stucky's post also argued that Tail No. 844 was simply towed across the street at Dryden/Armstrong and never went through that demilitarization process, potentially leaving it structurally intact. That claim, which would be mighty significant if true, has not been independently verified. Army Recognition also noted that while cannibalizing parts from other museum Blackbirds is theoretically on the table, decades-old components from aircraft that have sat in the sun would themselves need serious life-assessment before anyone bolts them onto a plane they intend to leave the runway on.

The Formidable Engineering Mountain Ahead

Now, even if NASA is dead serious — and that ain't confirmed — the engineering challenges are enough to make a seasoned mechanic weep into his coveralls. Mike Relja, the very engineer Aviation Week says was approached for this job, told the publication he turned it down, expressing grave doubts the team could get it done. His concerns, as Aviation Week reported them, center on the loss of bespoke ground support equipment, the collapse of JP-7 fuel infrastructure, the disappearance of triethylborane ignition chemicals, and a whole barnyard full of other specialized consumables that simply no longer exist in the supply chain. That's like trying to bake grandma's recipe when half the ingredients went extinct.

According to Aviation Week, David Ash reportedly brushed past those concerns without going into detail — which either means he knows something Relja doesn't, or he's as optimistic as a rooster crowing before the sun decides to show up. The Isaacman directive cited by BizPac Review and Air Data News calls for radical new propulsion and airframe designs, which some analysts have suggested could point toward a new-build aircraft concept rather than rehabilitating a 1960s-era airframe that's been sitting outside soaking up California desert wind for decades.

Our Analysis: Intriguing Smoke, But No Confirmed Fire

This is analysis, not reporting: Aviation Week is not a publication that manufactures aerospace drama for clicks — it broke the original SR-72 story and has a long track record of getting these things right. Named sources, a named NASA official allegedly making job offers, a physically missing aircraft, and a NASA chief flashing mysterious silhouettes while talking about flying 'high and fast again' — taken together, that's a genuine constellation of circumstantial indicators that something is afoot at Armstrong. But 'something is afoot' and 'NASA is definitely flying a 27-year-grounded spy plane' are two very different conclusions, and the gap between them is wide enough to park a Blackbird sideways.

The fact that Relja — a man who was allegedly offered the job — publicly doubts the project can succeed is the kind of detail that deserves serious weight. It suggests that even if the intent is real, the gap between wanting to fly this thing and actually flying it may be a canyon rather than a ditch. Until NASA speaks up, or a second independent source surfaces who can corroborate the program from outside those two personal accounts, this one belongs firmly in the 'fascinating if true' category — like a catfish story from your uncle that gets bigger every telling but might just be missing a few facts.

Who is doing the hollering

These links show where the chatter came from. A link is attribution, not our endorsement or independent confirmation.

Revision record

Last checked Sep 30, 2026, 1:07 PM EDT. Talk Around Town: NASA has not confirmed this program exists. All central claims about a return-to-flight project rest on accounts from two named retirees who say they were personally approached. Engineering feasibility is seriously disputed by those same individuals, and multiple specialized support systems, fuel infrastructure, and tooling no longer exist.