What was u 2

The flights continued intermittently over the next four years. It was later revealed that the Soviets did pick up the flights on radar, and the United States lost a plane over the Soviet Union in , but as long as there was no definitive proof connecting the flights to the United States there was no advantage for the Soviets to raise the issue publicly lest it draw attention to the Soviet inability to shoot down the offending flights.

On May 1, , the situation changed. Near the city of Sverdlovsk Oblast in the Ural Mountains, Powers' plane was shot down by a Soviet surface-to-air missile. Powers ejected and parachuted safely to the ground, where he was captured by the KGB , and held for interrogation. The plane crashed, but parts of it were recovered and placed on public display in Moscow as evidence of American deceit. Although the capture of Powers provided the Soviets the concrete proof that the United States had been conducting the flights, it was not immediately clear what the impact would be for the Paris Summit.

At first, and before they had confirmation that Powers had survived, U. On May 7, however, Khrushchev revealed that Powers was alive and uninjured, and clearly had not blacked out from oxygen deprivation. Moreover, the Soviets recovered the plane mostly intact, including the aerial camera system. As Powers flew over Sverdlovsk present-day Yekaterinburg, Russia , a Soviet surface-to-air missile exploded near his plane, causing it to drop to a lower altitude.

A second missile scored a direct hit, and Powers and his aircraft began to plummet from the sky. The pilot managed to bail out, but when his parachute floated to earth, he was surrounded by Soviet forces.

Powers landed in the center of a major diplomatic crisis. On May 5, Khrushchev announced that the Soviet military had brought down an American spy plane, but he made no mention of capturing Powers.

The Soviet leader quickly disproved that story, however, by producing a photograph of the imprisoned pilot as well as evidence recovered from the wreckage that conclusively showed it was a surveillance aircraft. The U-2 spy plane incident occurred at a crucial juncture in U. Eisenhower and Khrushchev were scheduled to join the leaders of France and Great Britain at a summit in Paris on May The American president had hoped the Paris summit would yield new agreements on nuclear arms production and testing, but he recognized that the embarrassing U-2 crisis posed a potential obstacle to that goal.

Before the world leaders opened their Paris meeting, the Eisenhower administration took responsibility for the spy flights and admitted that the weather plane explanation was false.

The U-2 incident had convinced Khrushchev that he could no longer cooperate with Eisenhower, and the Soviet leader walked out of the Paris meeting just hours after it began.

Soviet negotiators also abandoned talks on nuclear disarmament the following month. Kennedy While world leaders squabbled about the spy flights, Powers remained in a Soviet prison.

The U-2 spy plane, known as the Dragon Lady, can loiter at 70,ft 21,m over the area of operations for several hours and is often described as a glider due to its flight characteristics.

The design has remained essentially unchanged over decades of operational deployment but the reconnaissance systems are constantly upgraded with state-of-the-art and classified systems. The aircraft was used in Operations Desert Storm and Desert Shield during the Gulf Crisis during and , over Bosnia and Kosovo in support of Nato forces during the s, in Afghanistan in , and in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom in Completed in February , the sensor upgrades provide the aircraft with enhanced optical performance and accurate long-range tracking to enable improved detection of threats.

The U-2 spy plane will be equipped with a modernised avionics suite, an upgraded cockpit, and an OMS standard-compliant mission computer. Removable outrigger gear located away from the fuselage centreline is used to lighten the weight of the airborne aircraft. The outrigger gear, or pogos, are attached with pins, which are removed when the aircraft is on the runway and preparing for take-off.

The pogos drop onto the runway as the aircraft lifts and the ground maintenance crew retrieve them immediately after take-off. Unique to the U-2 aircraft is that the main wing planks are milled from large single billets of metal, rather than built up of riveted sheet metal, I-beams and U-channels.

The wings are fitted with titanium skidplates so that when the aircraft lands and is brought to a halt, the wing can gently touch the ground. Shortly thereafter the U-2 was ready for service, allowing CIA pilots to begin flying missions only CIA civilian pilots flew U-2 missions over hostile territory.

Through-out the four year overflight period, U-2 aircraft were launched from Germany, Japan, Pakistan, Turkey and Alaska. As the number of missions increased, U-2 pilots observed numerous attempted Russian fighter intercepts and it became apparent that the Russian ability to radar track the U-2 was improving. However, the approximately 30 completed flights provided the US with the greatest intelligence breakthrough of the 20th century.

From to the present the U-2 has experienced over a dozen design upgrades: the wing span has been increased from 80 feet to feet; the weight has nearly doubled; modern cockpit instruments have been added; and a state-of-the-art turbofan engine has been installed.

The range and altitude have been increased to 7, miles and 74, feet, respectively. Expanded payloads in the current version the extended nose and wing pods shown in the following photo now provide advanced sensor capability including signal intelligence gathering and synthetic aperture radar imaging.