XB-70 Valkyrie

When I saw a picture of this plane at a little museum near Edwards Air Force Base, I thought I was looking at a Concorde. What is that thing?

It's an XB-70 Valkyrie. Two of these prototypes were made. They were supposed to be hypersonic (Mach 3+) bombers. The planes needed to be fast not only to escape from Soviet interceptor jets, but needed to escape the nuclear blast once they released their deadly cargo.

The folding wing tips and cannards made this plane truly strange looking.

Advancing Soviet surface-to-air missile technology changed the game. High flying bombers like the Valkyrie were no longer effective. Low-flying planes were favored instead. That, the high expense, and other technical issues (fires, pieces of wing falling off) meant the Valkyrie would not go into service for the USAF.

The story gets sadder. In 1966, an XB-70 and four other jets were on a photo shoot for GE, which made the engines for all five aircraft. At the end of the shoot, an F-104 drifted into the XB-70. The F-104 pilot and XB-70's co-pilot died. The XB-70's pilot sustained serious injuries.