The U-2 is basically a F-104 with glider wings. The landing gear situation is something only crazy cold war people would approve of.

It's a testament to the engineering that what was by all rights a quick hack job has managed to stand the test of time.

Going to airshows with engineers who work in aerospace/defense industry is great. They point out all the cool stuff.

"just imagine the objections people would have raised to this feature, more parts, it looks funny"

"we wanted to throw a clambshell on it for shits and giggles but the powers that be decided that being able to back up a 2% grade was enough"

"both sets of wheels steer so it's one of the nicest planes to land in a near-hurricane cross wind because it can just crab sideways though the sky and keep the wheels lines up perfectly with the runway"

"The landing gear situation is something only crazy cold war people would approve of."

oh gee whiz. this is such a great comment. I almost spilled coffee laughing on my keyboard. A+.

The U-2 is so difficult to fly that it requires external sensors to land. AKA another pilot racing down the runway in a chase car radioing instructions to the pilot in the plane.

https://jalopnik.com/5537629/the-140-mph-chase-cars-of-the-u...

It has only two landing wheels--one in the front and one in the back (called bicycle landing gear). The chase car tells the pilot what to do to keep the plane balanced on two wheels as it goes down the runway. At the end, as it slows down, it reallly wants to tip over. Before it can, ground crews run up and put wingtip stanchions with wheels on them under the wingtips to complete the landing gear so it can taxi. Really amazing

"tough to replicate with computers"

I was under the impression that computers can fly planes which are impossible for humans to fly (e.g. the F-117, or any fighter with forward-swept wings). Since the U-2 is much closer to a "conventional" aircraft, and can be stick-flown by a human, wouldn't it be a walk in the park for a compute to fly it?

I'm not saying a computer can't fly the U2, but I do think it'd be more complex than a conventional aircraft. It has some pretty unique flight characteristics. From Wikipedia:

"...To maintain their operational ceiling of 70,000 feet (21,000 m), the early U-2A and U-2C models had to fly very near their never-exceed speed (VNE). The margin between that maximum speed and the stall speed at that altitude was only 10 knots (12 mph; 19 km/h). This narrow window is called the "coffin corner", because breaching either limit would likely cause airflow separation at the wings or tail. For most of the time on a typical mission the U-2 was flying less than five knots above stall speed. A stall would cause a loss of altitude, possibly leading to detection and overstress of the airframe."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_U-2

This actually sounds like the kind of challenge a computer can do VERY easily - much more so than a human.

This speed management is actually handled by an autopilot (i.e. computer) in U2s, using 'mach hold' mode.

Flappy wings, tough to land.

Computers don't fly the F-117, they help humans fly it. The difference between the two is significant.

Those were the 80s computers though. We've gone a long way since then.