F-117 is leaving the same way it arrived -- stealthily
Employees and retirees who worked on the F-117 program attend the plane's retirement ceremony at Lockheed's Skunk Works plant in Palmdale Tuesday morning.

本周二上午，曾为F-117项目工作过的在职、退休人员在洛克希德公司位于棕榈谷的臭鼬工厂为该型机秘密举行隐退典礼。



The Air Force and Lockheed Martin are giving a secret retirement send-off to the world's first radar-evading fighter.

空军与洛克希德·马丁公司为世界上首架雷达隐身战斗机举行了秘密的告别仪式

By Peter Pae, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

作者：彼得·佩，《洛杉矶时报》记者

April 22, 2008

2008年4月22日


They were born shrouded in mystery in a windowless building in Burbank. They flew combat missions over Serbia and Iraq virtually invisible to enemy radar. And today, the black, bat-like F-117A Night Hawks will fly quietly into the night as stealthily as they came.

它们在伯班克的一栋没有窗户的建筑里一问世，就被蒙上了神秘的外衣。它们在塞尔维亚和伊拉克的上空飞翔（译注：作者忘记了巴拿马？还是不把巴拿马当一回事？再怎么说也是首战啊），就在敌军雷达的眼皮底下执行作战任务。今天，蝙蝠一样的F-117A“夜鹰”战斗机将像它们问世时那样，悄无声息地隐入夜空之中。

The last four of the world's first stealth fighters will make their final flights from Palmdale to a secret desert base in Nevada, where they will be locked up indefinitely in a secure concrete hangar.

世界上第一种隐身战机中的最后四架将在棕榈谷进行它们的最后一次飞行，它们将从那里飞往内华达州一个秘密的沙漠基地，在那里它们将被无限期地封存在一个安全的混凝土机库之中。

But unlike the passing of other notable planes, there will be no public fanfare or farewell for these mysterious aircraft that revolutionized aerial warfare. The F-117 is still so cloaked in secrecy that only employees and retirees who worked on the program can attend its retirement ceremony at Lockheed Martin Corp.'s Skunk Works plant in Palmdale. A few aerospace reporters have been invited, but they had to be U.S. citizens.

但与以往其它著名飞机不同的是，这种为空战带来了革命性变化的神秘飞机并没有享受到在公众面前接受赞扬或进行告别的待遇。由于F-117当前仍然被严格保密，因此只有曾经为它的诞生而工作过的在职、离退人员才能够参加在洛克希德·马丁公司位于棕榈谷的臭鼬工厂为其举行的隐退典礼。有为数不多的航空记者获得了邀请，但他们无一例外地都是美国公民。

"Some aspects of the plane are still classified," said Dianne Knippel, spokeswoman for Lockheed, whose legendary Skunk Works design house, formerly in Burbank and now in Palmdale, developed and built the aircraft.

“这架飞机在某些方面仍然是保密的，”洛克希德公司的女发言人戴安妮·莱伯尔说，洛克希德公司的“臭鼬工程”研制了这架飞机，其设计地点原来位于伯班克，后来迁到了棕榈谷。

The hushed send-off is no surprise to aviation buffs and historians who have followed one of the nation's most secretive aircraft programs since the Pentagon covertly launched it more than 30 years ago.

这种平静的送别对于空军官兵和从30多年前五角大楼悄悄启动该项目起就一直关注这一国家绝密机型项目的历史学家来说，并没有什么值得奇怪的。

"It reflects a hyper-security culture that has accompanied this thing since the beginning," said John Pike, a defense policy analyst with . "It's the nation's first stealth technology, and as a result you might imagine all the caution with security."

“这反应出了一种从该型飞机开始研制起就一直不离其左右的宣传保密文化，”防务政策研究专家约翰·派克说道。“它是国家最早掌握的隐身技术，因此理所当然地，你可以想象得到在安全方面的所有谨慎。”

The single-seat F-117 was the first plane that could evade radar detection; it was designed to fly into heavily defended areas to knock out radar installations and anti-aircraft missile batteries, clearing the way for other fighters and bombers. It was also used to destroy military command and communication centers.

单座的F-117是第一架能够躲避雷达探测的飞机；它被设计用来飞往严密防守的地区摧毁雷达站和防空导弹阵地，为其它战斗机和轰炸机扫清道路。它也被用来摧毁军事指挥及通讯中心。

The planes cost $45 million each, and 59 were built. The F-117 first flew in combat during the 1989 Panama invasion that led to the capture of dictator Manuel Noriega. F-117s were also among the first aircraft to strike targets in the Persian Gulf War in 1991 and in the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

每架F-117花费掉了4,500万美元，一共制造了59架。F-117的首次战斗飞行发生在1989年为了抓捕独裁者曼纽尔·诺内加的进攻巴拿马行动当中。F-117也差不多是1991年波斯湾战争和2003年进攻伊拉克行动当中最早对目标实施打击的飞机。

In 2006, with the introduction of the F-22, a fighter that features the latest stealth technology, the Pentagon decided to retire all 59 of the F-117s, leading to today's final flights.

到了2006年，随着F-22这样一架融合了最新隐身技术的战机的问世，五角大楼决定让所有的59架F-117退出现役，于是就有了今天的告别飞行。

The retirement also serves as a reminder of the decline of the aerospace industry in Southern California. The plane was built in the 1980s when Lockheed's Burbank plant employed more than 17,000 workers. The Burbank plant closed in 1994 and Lockheed now employs about 4,000 engineers in Palmdale.

此次的退役也在提醒着人们南加利福尼亚州航空工业的衰退。这架飞机研制时的上世纪80年代洛克希德公司的伯克班工厂有超过17,000名的工人。伯克班工厂于1994年关闭，洛克希德公司现在在棕榈谷的工程人员大约是4,000人。

Although a number of companies in the region still make aircraft parts and develop advanced weapon systems, large-scale manufacturing has mostly disappeared. The C-17 military cargo plane plant in Long Beach and the F-18 fuselage factory in El Segundo are about all that remain.

尽管该地区一定数量的公司仍然还在制造飞机零部件并研制先进的武器系统，但是大规模的制造场面已经消失的差不多了。位于长滩的C-17军用运输机工厂和位于艾尔·斯贡杜的F-18机身工厂已经是仅存的硕果。

"It does show how dramatically the industry has changed in Southern California," said Jack Kyser, chief economist with the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp.

“这确实显示出了这项工业在南加利福尼亚州引人注目的变化，”杰克·克瑟这样说，他是洛杉矶经济发展公司的首席经济学家。

The F-117 retirement ceremony is likely to be a somber event mostly attended by retirees who can finally talk about the aircraft -- if only to a certain extent.

F-117的隐退典礼因为出席者大都是对这架飞机最有发言权的离退人员——哪怕只是某个领域——而成为一件平淡无奇的事情。

"I would rather not get into it. I'm not sure if that is still classified," said Sherman N. Mullin, the former president of Lockheed's Skunk Works who led the F-117 program in the 1980s, when asked how the plane was transported from Burbank to its test flights in Nevada.

“我不想多说什么。我不能肯定要说的东西是否还是保密的，”谢尔曼·N·马林在被问及F-117是如何从伯班克运往内华达州进行试飞时这样回答道，他曾担任过洛克希德公司臭鼬工程的主任，在上世纪80年代主持了F-117项目。

He declined to confirm news reports at the time that massive C-5 Galaxy military cargo planes were used to "deliver or pick up secret cargo" -- the stealth -- in the dead of night. The speculation arose after residents complained about aircraft noise from Burbank airport late at night, according to a 1984 Times article. The plane was assembled in a hangar next to the airport.

他拒绝证实当时新闻报道中有关C-5“银河”巨型军用运输机在黎明之前被用来“运送机密货物”——也就是隐型飞机——的说法。根据1984年《时代》上的一篇文章的说法，这一推论来自当地居民对伯班克机场深夜巨大的飞机噪音的投诉。飞机在机场附近的机库里装卸货物。

During its development, the F-117 flew only at night to avoid prying eyes and Soviet spy satellites, thus its name Night Hawk.

在研制期间，F-117只在夜里飞行以避免被好奇的人员和苏联间谍卫星发现，这也是其呢称“夜鹰”的来由。

The project was so secretive that Mullin couldn't even tell his wife what he did.

这个项目是如此的绝密，以至于马林甚至都不能和他的妻子说他在做什么。

"She didn't know for 10 years," Mullin said, adding that every Friday, the entire complex was locked up for the weekend and no one was allowed to take work off-site. "I don't think she minded. She liked that I didn't bring home any work on the weekends."

“10年时间里她对此一无所知，”马林说，他还补充说甚至到了周五，整个项目都要因为周末而被封存起来，没有人可以把工作带出工作地点。“我想她并不会觉察到什么。她很高兴我没有把一丁点的工作带到周末里来。”

Monday's telephone interview from his home in Oxnard was the first time Mullin had talked to a reporter about the F-117, more than a quarter-century after he led its development efforts.

在他的研制成果已经问世超过四分之一个世纪之后，通过周一的电话采访，家住欧克斯纳德的马林第一次向一名记者说起了F-117。

Mullin said his fondest memory was a Friday afternoon in 1983 when the Air Force declared that the plane was ready for combat. But it would be four years before the government acknowledged its existence.

马林说他最为珍惜的记忆是1983年的一个星期五的下午，那个时候空军宣布F-117具备了作战能力。而这一时刻是在政府承认这架飞机存在的四年之前。

"It was an afternoon of great emotional satisfaction for me," Mullin said. "But we didn't celebrate. We didn't do a damn thing. We just locked up the place and went home."

“对我来说那是精神上极为畅快的一个下午，”马林说。“但是我们没有庆祝。我们没有做任何事情。我们只是锁上单位的门然后回家。”