BLACK PROJECTS
turns out the airport behind her isn't just an airport.
Lockheed · Plant C-1 · Burbank
The Atlantic Aviation terminal address overlaps the former Lockheed Plant C-1 addresses on Sherman Way, Burbank (California Water Board record; Tetra Tech site map, 2012). This does not establish that every aircraft below was built on that parcel: it is the door into the wider history.
Skunk Works
“Be quick, be quiet, be on time.” The credo of Kelly Johnson, who founded Lockheed's Skunk Works (Ben Rich, National Academy of Sciences, 1995).
Lockheed Martin Advanced Development Programs. The design family includes the SR-71 Blackbird, the U-2 and A-12 OXCART reconnaissance aircraft, and Have Blue, the stealth demonstrator that led to the F-117 Nighthawk (Senior Trend).
Air · sea · space
- Sea Shadow: stealth ship, built and concealed inside the Hughes Mining Barge HMB-1.
- CORONA: satellite reconnaissance; film capsules recovered in mid-air.
- D-21: uncrewed reconnaissance drone.
Built to stay invisible
- WWII: the Burbank plant was camouflaged. “All the general said he could see was suburb after California suburb.” (Lockheed Martin)
- CIA: eighty-seven percent of the U-2 prototype was fabricated in one building in Burbank.
- A-12 / OXCART: too secret to fly out, moved by road in a 105 × 35 ft crate (CIA).
- CIA: U-2 and OXCART flights of the late 1950s–1960s accounted for “more than one-half of all UFO reports”.
Sources
- California Water Board · Plant C-1 record
- Lockheed Martin · Skunk Works
- National Academy of Sciences · Kelly Johnson memoir by Ben Rich (1995)
- Lockheed Martin · Operation Camouflage
- DARPA · Have Blue
- DARPA · Sea Shadow
- NRO · CORONA
- National Museum of the USAF · D-21B
- CIA · Archangel (A-12 crate, p.17)
- NASA · SR-71