U-2C “Dragon Lady”

This aircraft was designed and used for high-altitude communications intelligence and electronic intelligence. It was capable of day or night all-weather surveillance. The U-2 has been configured with an array of cameras, electronic intelligence equipment and radar-homing and warning systems, depending upon its mission. This aircraft played an instrumental role in detecting Soviet intermediate-range ballistic missiles during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962.  

The U-2 “Dragon Lady” gained notoriety when one – flown by Francis Gary Powers, a former SAC F-84 pilot – was shot down during an intelligence gathering mission over the Soviet Union on May 1, 1960. The U-2 is still considered to be one of the most technologically advanced aircraft ever built. Designed to fly for long periods at very high altitudes, it is essentially a powered glider with a sail-plane-like wing and lightweight structure.  

Nicknamed “The Saint” during its service with the Air Force thunderstorm research program, our U-2C (S/N 56-6701 also served with the Central Intelligence Agency and various reconnaissance wings. This aircraft has been converted from a U-2A to a U-2B, and finally to a U-2C model in 1968. It was dropped from the inventory and flown to the SAC Aerospace Museum in 1982.