Lockheed U-2 and TR-1 Spy Planes: "Dragon Lady" ~ 1980 US Air Force Pilot Recruiting (Patreon)

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'US Air Force recruitment film for U-2 and TR-1 reconnaissance jet pilots.'

Originally a public domain film, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and one-pass brightness-contrast-color correction & mild video noise reduction applied.

The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_U-2

Wikipedia license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

The Lockheed U-2, nicknamed "Dragon Lady", is an American single-jet engine, ultra-high altitude reconnaissance aircraft operated by the United States Air Force (USAF) and previously flown by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). It provides day and night, high-altitude (70,000 feet; 21,000 m), all-weather intelligence gathering.

Lockheed Corporation originally proposed it in 1953, approval followed 1954, and the first test flight occurred in 1955. It was flown during the Cold War over the Soviet Union, China, Vietnam, and Cuba. In 1960, Gary Powers was shot down in a CIA U-2A over the Soviet Union by a surface-to-air missile (SAM). Major Rudolf Anderson Jr. was shot down in another U-2 during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962...

It was thought that an aircraft that could fly at 70,000 feet (21,300 m) would be beyond the reach of Soviet fighters, missiles, and radar... Officials at Lockheed Aircraft Corporation heard about the project and decided to submit an unsolicited proposal... The company asked Clarence "Kelly" Johnson to come up with such a design. Johnson was Lockheed's best aeronautical engineer... working in a separate division of the company, informally called the Skunk Works...

Johnson's design, named CL-282, was based on the Lockheed XF-104... It could reach an altitude of 73,000 feet (22,300 m) and had a 1,600 mi (1,400 nmi; 2,600 km) radius. The reconnaissance aircraft was essentially a jet-powered glider. In June 1954, the USAF rejected the design...

Civilian officials... were more positive about the CL-282 because of its higher potential altitude and smaller radar cross section, and recommended the design to the Central Intelligence Agency's Office of Scientific Intelligence... 

Edwin Land, the developer of instant photography, and another member of the panel proposed to Dulles through Dulles' aide, Richard M. Bissell Jr., that his agency should fund and operate this aircraft... The USAF's Seaberg helped persuade his own agency to support the CL-282, albeit with the higher-performance J57 engine, and final approval for a joint USAF-CIA project (the first time the CIA dealt with sophisticated technology) came in November 1954...

The design that gives the U-2 its remarkable performance also makes it a difficult aircraft to fly. Martin Knutson said that it "was the highest workload air plane I believe ever designed and built ... you're wrestling with the air plane and operating the camera systems at all times", leaving no time to "worry about whether you're over Russia or you're flying over southern California". The U-2 was designed and manufactured for minimum airframe weight, which results in an aircraft with little margin for error. Most aircraft were single-seat versions, with only five two-seat trainer versions known to exist...

High aspect ratio wings give the U-2 some glider-like characteristics, with an engine out glide ratio of about 23:1, comparable to gliders of the time. To maintain their operational ceiling of 70,000 feet (21,000 m), the early U-2A and U-2C models had to fly very near their never-exceed speed (VNE). The margin between that maximum speed and the stall speed at that altitude was only 10 knots (12 mph; 19 km/h). This narrow window is called the "coffin corner", because breaching either limit would likely cause airflow separation at the wings or tail. For most of the time on a typical mission the U-2 was flying less than five knots (6 mph; 9 km/h) above stall speed. A stall would cause a loss of altitude, possibly leading to detection and overstress of the airframe.

The U-2's flight controls are designed for high-altitude flight; the controls require light control inputs at operational altitude. However, at lower altitudes, the higher air density and lack of a power assisted control system makes the aircraft very difficult to fly. Control inputs must be extreme to achieve the desired response, and a great deal of physical strength is needed to operate the controls in this manner...