A serious question thus arose regarding the future status of Oxcart. On the one hand, it vindicated the decision to develop a U-2 replacement; but it also opened up a debate as to whether the United States should continue violating Soviet airspace with its manned strategic reconnaissance program.
In late May, Eisenhower told his military aide Brig Gen Andrew Goodpaster that he believed the project should go forward on low priority, for Air Force use in time of war. In a subsequent memo for the record, Goodpaster noted that Eisenhower “Did not think the project should be pushed at top priority. In fact, they might come to the conclusion that it would be best to get out of it if we could.” But with Corona still struggling, there was no viable option to Oxcart available in the short-to-mid-term, so the program survived.
Whilst production work on the A-12 got underway at the Skunk Works plant in Burbank, California, so too did construction on a 12,000ft runway extension, workshops, hangars, and a raft of other support facilities out at Area 51. The operational unit for Oxcart was designated the 1129th Special Activities Squadron (SAS), and the selection process for its pilots was evolved in 1961 by Brig Gen Flickinger, Col Houser Wilson at the Pentagon, and the Director of the Agency’s Office of Special Activities (OSA), Brig Gen Jack Ledford (later succeeded by Brig Gen Paul Baclais), who together defined the required physical and experience criteria. Pilots were required to be qualified in the latest high-performance aircraft, highly proficient in air refueling, emotionally stable, married, and especially well motivated. In addition, candidates had to be between 25 and 40 years of age, weigh less than 175lb, and be under 6ft tall. There followed a week of psychological assessments in various hotel rooms in Washington, DC and then an extensive medical examination at the Lovelace Clinic at Albuquerque, New Mexico. Once the process was completed, the 11 successful candidates began taking trips to the David Clark Company in Worcester, Massachusetts, to be outfitted with their personal S-901 full pressure suits.
Following further production delays in Burbank, the May 1961 planned delivery of aircraft number one to the Area 51 test site proved overly optimistic and slipped to late summer. Problems in procuring and working with titanium, combined with difficulties experienced by Pratt & Whitney, prompted Johnson to write to CIA officials explaining that schedules could slip from between three to four months. The response from Bissell was predictably curt, his memo finishing with, “I trust that this is the last of such disappointments short of a severe earthquake in Burbank.”
Despite the production problems, Oxcart preparations continued in various parts of the world, with high-capacity fuel tank farms constructed at Air Force bases in California, Alaska, Greenland, Okinawa, and Turkey, to provide worldwide storage of the A-12’s special fuel in readiness for the jet’s operational sorties. Additional fuel storage facilities were also prepared at bases in Arkansas and Florida to support transcontinental training flights. The 903rd Air Refueling Squadron based at Beale AFB, California, was designated to support Oxcart air refueling operations and was equipped with special KC-135Q tankers, which possessed separate “clean” tankage and plumbing to isolate the A-12’s fuel from the tanker’s own JP-4. These tankers were also equipped with special ARC-50 distance-ranging radios to facilitate discrete, precision, long-distance, highspeed join-ups.
During January and February 1962, final checks were at last successfully conducted on aircraft number one (Article Number 121; USAF serial number 60-6924). The airframe was then dismantled, loaded onto a custom-built trailer and on February 26, 1962, transported to Area 51. Following reassembly at its new desert home and whilst being prepared for the first flight, yet another delay occurred when the aircraft began leaking fuel profusely from its “wet” tanks. An investigation revealed that the specially designed sealant had failed to adhere to surfaces between the fuel tanks and the metal skin of the aircraft. The defective sealant was removed and the tanks relined — but tank sealant issues on all variants of the aircraft remained an issue throughout its life.
Having successfully completed a series of low- and medium-speed taxi tests, Lockheed Chief Project pilot, Lou Schalk, was scheduled to take Article 121 on a high-speed test on April 24, 1962. The test-card called for the evaluation to culminate in a momentary lift-off and landing roll-out onto the dry salty lakebed. For this first “hop” the A-12’s stability augmentation system (SAS) was left uncoupled — it was planned to test this properly in flight. However, as Lou Schalk recalls, immediately after lift-off everything went badly wrong:
I really didn’t think I was going to be able to put the aircraft back on the ground safely because of lateral, directional and longitudinal oscillations. The aircraft was very difficult to handle but I finally caught up with everything that was happening, got control back enough to set it back down, and chop engine power. Touchdown was on the lakebed instead of the runway, creating a tremendous cloud of dust into which I disappeared entirely. The tower controllers were calling me to find out what was happening and I was answering, but the UHF antenna was located on the underside of the aircraft [for best transmission in flight] and no one could hear me. Finally, when I slowed down and started my turn on the lake-bed and re-emerged from the dust cloud, everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
Two days later, Schalk successfully completed a trouble-free first real test flight lasting 35 minutes — for which the SAS dampers remained switched on!
Over the next few months Article 121 was joined by more of its stablemates. Article 122 (60-6925) arrived on June 26, but was destined to spend three months conducting ground radar tests before taking to the air. Aircraft number three (Article 123; 60-6926) arrived in August and flew in October. In November the two-seat pilot trainer (Article 124; 60-6927) was delivered, which was planned to help smooth transition training. The aircraft was to have been powered by J58 engines, but as engine production problems persisted, it was decided to equip the two-seater with J75 engines and let the checked-out pilots go on to high-Mach flight on their own. Therefore the AT-12 trainer aircraft, nicknamed the “Titanium Goose,” undertook its maiden flight in January 1963 fitted with the less-powerful engines. Aircraft number five (Article 125; 60-6928) was delivered to the site on December 19, 1962.