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CIA/CSI/ History Staff Monograph, The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance: The U-2 and Oxcart Programs, 16 July 2002.

Central Intelligence Agency · 406 pages · text from the file's own layer

This is a CIA History Staff monograph by Gregory W. Pedlow and Donald E. Welzenbach, written in 1992 and approved for release in 2011. It covers the CIA's manned overhead reconnaissance program from 1954 to 1974 and its two aircraft, the U-2 and the A-12 OXCART. It follows their development, the overflights of the Soviet Union, the downing of Francis Gary Powers in 1960, and later operations. One section is titled "U-2s, UFOs, and Operation BLUE BOOK."

  • p. 24 …Advanced Development Projects Division, Burbank. California. ED 129581.131011>10<25Yrs IS1 UNCLASSIFIED
  • p. 58 …Pedlow, Burbank, California, 26 August 1988. Sbc.et UNCLASSIFIED
  • p. 85 …how to transfer Lockheed employees from Burbank to Iwithout arousing a great deal of curiosity. The…
  • p. 273 …SP-1362, "History of the OXCART Program," Lockheed Aircraft Corporation, Burbank, CA. 1 July 1968, p…
  • p. 287 …designed trailer truck that carried it from Burbank By 18 November 1959, the mockup was in…
  • p. 297 …Construction began in September 1960; a C-47 shuttle service ferried work crews from Burbank to…
  • p. 299 …The plane left Burbank on 26 February 1962 and arrived at two days later. After the…
  • p. 304 …into the engine nacelles during assembly at Burbank were sucked into the power plant during initial…
MC-2 partial-pressure suit (seen
on pilot Francis Gary Powers)
CO5653421 UNCLASSIFIED
""""Igeret-ALQ
Chapter 2
63
advanced gear for the U-2 pilots. David Clark expert Joseph Ruseckas
then developed a complex life-support system, which was the first
partially pressurized "spacesuit" for keeping humans alive for
lengthy periods at ultrahigh altitudes. The effort to provide a safe en-
vironment for pilots at high altitudes also involved the Firewel
Company of Buffalo, New York, which pressurized the U-2 cockpit to
create an interior environment equivalent to the air pressure at an alti-
tude of 28,000 feet. The system was designed so that, if the interior
cockpit pressure fell below the 28,000-feet level, the pilot's suit
would automatically inflate. In either case, he could obtain oxygen
only through his helmet.'4
" Ibid., chap. 5, p. 19 (TS Codeword).
UNCLASSIFIED

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FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 406 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.