The end of an era began April 21, 2008, at Holloman AFB in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Following a morning ceremony at the base, the final four operational Lockheed F-117A Nighthawks taxied out, took off, flew over their home base one last time, and then flew west, towards Palmdale, California’s famous Lockheed Skunk Works facility, for one last ceremony before they are officially ‘put to bed’ at their ‘ancestral’ home at the Tonopah Test Range in Nevada, near the mysterious Groom Lake airfield, aka Area 51. I use the term ‘ancestral’ as opposed to ‘birthplace’ because the true birthplace is Burbank, California, where the Skunk Works was originally at. At the Tonopah base, their wings will be removed and they will go into storage. Due to their sensitive nature, they will not be coming to the ‘Boneyard’ in Tucson, Arizona. One aircraft will remain in use with the 410^th FLTS at Plant 42, and it will be retired in the fall of this year. The Air Force was originally going to retire the plane in 2011, however they later decided to accelerate the process, in order to free up funds for the F-22 Raptor and F-35 Lightning II programs.

For the final flight ceremonies, the four-ship formation arrived over Palmdale’s USAF Plant 42 at 11am on Monday, April 21^st. Reaching the center of the base, each Nighthawk broke off from the formation for their base leg to final, banked again just past the Northrop Grumman plant, and then lined up on final approach to runway 25. Aircraft serial numbers included #80-0843 which wore the American flag on its belly and was the final F-117 delivered to the Air Force; #84-0809,wearing the 9^th FS ‘Iron Knights’ colors; #82-0800 sporting the 8^th FS ‘Black Sheep’ colors; and #84-0824, which wore the 49^th OG colors. All four aircraft have seen combat, with aircraft #843 and #809 being Desert Storm veterans. Nighthawk #843 is also known by its maintainers as ‘Affectionately Christine’, after the Stephen King movie depicting a Plymouth Fury that had a life of its own. On Tuesday, April 22^nd, there was one last ceremony near the Skunk Works, before the aircraft headed for Tonopah. With crowds of spectators and photojournalists watching from various areas off and on-base, the four Nighthawks taxied out about 2pm PST, and after a short wait, took to the Palmdale skies. They formed up north of the base, line up on runway 22, and did one last flyover, in fingertip formation, southeast over the Skunk Works, before they turned back to the northeast and headed into the history books.

The F-117, which was known as the ‘Have Blue’ project early in its development, after first being conceived as ‘Hopeless Diamond’. The ‘Have Blue’ aircraft first flew in late 1977. It appeared somewhat different than the Nighthawk we know today. Its tail fins were smaller and leaned in towards one another. When it became “Senior Trend”, that first flight was in spring of 1981. During the early eighties, rumors abounded regarding a ‘stealthy’ airplane flying around Area 51, and when two aircraft crashed in separate incidents near Bakersfield, California, tragically killing their pilots, the secret was nearly out. The rumor mill was fed even more when the Testors company, known for making plastic model kits, came out with a kit named the ‘F-119’. The mysterious aircraft was finally revealed to the public in 1988 with a grainy photo, shot from an angle that made it look distorted, to hide certain details. The Nighthawk’s first combat missions were over Panama in 1989, and is famous for being involved in the initial aerial assault on Baghdad during ‘Operation Desert Storm’. It saw action over Kosovo during ‘Operation Allied Force’ in 1999, where one plane was shot down. Its remains have been displayed in a Belgrade museum. The aircraft has been deployed to South Korea, has participated in frustrating enemy ‘red forces’ during several Red Flag exercises at Nellis AFB, and of course has been used most recently in ‘Operation Iraqi Freedom’. Despite its radically faceted and super-secret stealth design, it is a fly-by-wire aircraft, and many off the shelf parts were used in its construction.

Because of its “F” designation, airshow fans throughout the world know the aircraft as the “stealth fighter”, and indeed it does look like a fighter jet - however the airplane is actually a bomber / attack aircraft, carrying only two precision guided bombs. A popular remark about the F-117 is that it is invisible to radar. Not quite. In truth, it simply has a tiny radar signature, approximately the size of a small bird - thanks to its faceted design and radar absorbent material, or RAM. Part of its stealthiness is due also to the way the exhaust area was created. It is not only very narrow, but is partially hidden from the ground by what you might call a protruding ‘lower lip’. Many airshow photographers have tried to get detailed photos of this section of the aircraft. Most have failed. Display aircraft are usually roped off so that you cannot get photos of the rear, OR the exhaust area itself is completely sealed off. And those are the recent display birds. After its public unveiling at Nellis AFB, for several years spectators could not get close to the aircraft at all, and the F-117s were always guarded by locked and loaded security forces. Keep in mind that’s just a fraction of the security it took to keep this airplane a secret as long as it was. It was operational a full five years before the public knew about it. The general public, that is.

Fiction. Not all of the F-117s were black. In fact, there were one or two white ones, a camouflaged ‘Have Blue’ aircraft, two known ‘gray dragons’, and I’ve been lucky enough to not only photograph two silver birds, but a green one as well. The latter three were probably undergoing major maintenance and were spotted without their normal paint.

Over the years, there were several special paint schemes used on F-117As. In 1986, aircraft #782 had a large scorpion painted on the bottom. The same aircraft again received a special scheme in 1983, when it was painted up with the American flag for the first time. That was the first of three times a Nighthawk would wear the colors of the flag. In 1990, #831 wore the Lockheed Skunk Works ‘Skunk’ logo underneath. Later that year, several aircraft wore shark mouths when they were stationed in Louisiana. At the October 2005 Edwards AFB airshow, #782 again was privileged to get the American flag treatment and the pilot treated the crowd to some wonderful views of the painters’ workmanship. During the April 21-22 final flight events, #843 was the proud flagship.

Out of the fifty-nine aircraft built by the Skunk works, there are currently four Nighthawks on permanent static display - one at Nellis AFB (YF-117A #79-10780), one at Wright-Patterson’s Air Force Museum (YF-117A #79-10781), one at Palmdale’s Joe Davies Heritage Airpark (YF-117A #79-10783 - one of several to have been painted gray for daylight testing), and the most recent, #85-0816, is now on display at Holloman’s Heritage Park. The last was rumored to be among the very first into downtown Baghdad. Besides the famous name of ‘Nighthawk’, the F-117A was also known as ‘Wobbly Goblin’, ‘Stinkbug’, and ‘Cockroach’.

F-117 Nighthawk ‘Final Four’, participate in retirement ceremonies.