New Skunk Works Plant to Build Advanced Fighters, Other Projectshttps://www.airforcemag.com/new-skunk-works-plant-to-build-advanced-fighters-other-projects/PALMDALE, Calif.—Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works advanced development division opened a new 215,000-square-foot production facility Aug. 10, allowing reporters and visitors a glimpse inside the state-of-the-art factory before it begins production of classified systems and is likely permanently closed to non-cleared personnel.
What will be built here first is a secret, but Skunk Works Vice President and General Manager Jeff Babione said he anticipates the facility—at the Air Force’s sprawling Plant 42 complex—will build fighters; intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance aircraft; hypersonic missiles; and other advanced projects, with possibly more than one project in series production at a time. He declined to say specifically whether Lockheed Martin will build Next-Generation Air Dominance fighters at the plant.
I winder if this might foreshadow closing the old Lockheed facility in Mountain View. Much of it is so old it's a maintenance nightmare. With Silicon Valley housing so expensive and Edwards AFB being ~30 miles' drive from central Palmdale (some Lockheed products' contracts require delivery by military transport), it could make recruiting young talent from college less difficult.
When I came to Silicon Valley during Carter's
MalAdministration, Lockheed and HP were Silicon Valley's biggest employers.
