Lockheed Martin has created a webpage dedicated to the story behind the creation of the Top Gun: Maverick Darkstar hypersonic aircraft. The company had previously disclosed that its legendary Skunk Works advanced projects division had been directly involved in creating this fictitious design, but had declined to provide more specific details about its relation to the production.
Lockheed Martin Skunk Works thrives on tackling seemingly impossible work, developing technologies for tomorrow’s challenges before the need is even identified.
From creating radar evading stealth capabilities to X-planes that redefine the sonic boom to many revolutionary technologies in between, Skunk Works has a long tradition of quickly developing enduring innovation for when it’s needed most.
When the Top Gun: Maverick team was looking to push the envelope and stand true to Maverick’s Need for Speed, Skunk Works was their first call. With the Skunk Works expertise in developing the fastest known aircraft combined with a passion and energy for defining the future of aerospace, Darkstar’s capabilities could be more than mere fiction. They could be reality…
Lockheed Martin conceptual designers, engineers and aircraft model developers work each day to bring aircraft concepts for today and tomorrow to life. These aircraft support critical global security missions and advance the future of aviation and technology.
We partnered with the Top Gun: Maverick film’s creative team to collaborate on bringing our expertise in hypersonic capabilities and aircraft design to the big screen.
Most of the stuff I work on, I can’t talk about,” Jim, described as an “artist… with some technical boundaries applied” who helps “conceptualize the future” at Skunk Works, says in his video featurette. “The first thing you draw may not be the right answer. The 10th thing you’ve drawn may not be the right answer. And so you have to be willing to start over.”
“What excites me around here is the ability to see the future,” Jason, a radio frequency engineer at Skunk Works says in his video interview, where he speaks alongside Lucio, a laboratory mechanic.
“When we aren’t changing cinematic history by building Darkstar, we’re changing the future of aviation by building the next generation aircraft,” Lucio adds in the clip, which includes footage from Skunk Works’ Helendale Radar Signature Test Range.
In my role, my responsibility is to design and fabricate different types of full-scale pole models,” mechanical engineer Becky explains in her video interview, referring to the kinds of models that Skunk Works creates to mount on poles at facilities like Helendale to test a design’s radar signature. “On Darkstar, I was the lead mechanical design engineer. That was my first model that I ever did and it was so rad.”
The captions to the features also confirm that Skunk Works built a physical mockup of some kind that included “a forebody model with a functional cockpit for an iconic actor [Tom Cruise]” and that required attention from Becky during the production to keep it “structurally sound and worthy of its pilot.” The company describes what was built as “a functional piece of art.”
Darkstar may not be real, but its capabilities are. Hypersonic technology, or the ability to travel at 60 miles per minute or faster, is a capability our team continues to advance today by leveraging more than 30 years of hypersonic investments and development and testing experience. The mission is to defend and protect our nation and allies with the discriminator of speed.
Sources: The Drive; Company website