Highlights
F-117 Stealth Fighter
Flight Test, Production, War, & Retirement
The plane bounced in the turbulence and startled me from a sound sleep. I had been riding on this chartered flight for twenty hours a week for the last two years. I was getting pretty good at sleeping on an airplane. I noticed that we must have some first timers because the flight crew was making the rounds and closing all the window shades as we approached the Restricted AreaTest Site. I yawned, checked my seat belt, and started thinking about what I had to do when I arrived at our destination.
Things at the Test Site, where we supported the flight test activities of the best kept secret ever… the Top Secret F-117 Stealth Fighter, were winding down. I worked with a couple other photographers there and our responsibilities were the high-speed motion picture film cameras that were installed in orange pods on four of the flight test aircraft. One test had nine cameras on it all sighted on the weapons release area so the flight test engineers could analyze the films and master the release of the weapons. These films assisted in giving the F-117 the accuracy that it later became so noted for. The aircraft could release a weapon and drop it into your choice of windows on the target so collateral damage could be kept to a minimum. I really valued being a part of such incredible project.
In 1990 my buddy Eric Schulzinger and I followed the production birds to their Home
Base and enjoyed being involved in their day-to-day activity. We tried to capture the look and feel of the place. One day after the Gulf War, we were quietly setting up to shoot in the training room and overheard the pilots reviewing actual war missions and Eric turned to me with a big grin on his face… “Do you realize where we are and what we are getting to see?” We felt like two of the luckiest photographers in the world as we witnessed aviation history in the making!
Eric and I obviously became very attached to the airplane and the supremacy role it was playing in defending the United States! When the announcement came that they were going to retire the F-117, it was a very sad day indeed. I wondered how they could retire the airplane when it played such a crucial part in saving lives. Time after time the 
F-117s had flown in and destroyed enemy targets to make it safe for our other warriors entering the battle. Every time the F-117s were on the news, I felt a deep sense of pride and honor to be a part of the Skunk Works who developed, tested and built this fantastic airplane!
The final retirement event took place in Palmdale California on April 22, 2008. Eric and I had pretty much started our careers with this program and now as we both approached our own retirement, it was very fitting that we attended the last hurrah! We got to see a lot of familiar faces from our past and said our last good bys as we signed the weapon bay doors and watched the four aircraft as they taxied out and took off for their next destination where they are to be stored. It was truly the end of an era!
Written by Denny Lombard, Promotional Photography
Lockheed Martin Skunk Works; Palmdale, CA
Approved for Public Domain on October 30, 2008