Rockwell to Sell Part of El Segundo Facility
Rockwell International said Tuesday that it will sell 50 acres of its 100-acre aircraft manufacturing complex in El Segundo and transfer some of the machinery there to sites in Palmdale and Tulsa, Okla.
The announcement confirms what the company said in September, 1988, when it said it would close down most manufacturing activities at the site after the last B-1 bomber was produced.
Rockwell said 16 of 600 machines in El Segundo will be sent to Tulsa, where Rockwell produces aircraft components. But the firm said it will continue to locate any future aircraft assembly operations at its facilities in Palmdale.
The company said the plan to sell the facilities will affect 300 workers. Of those, 20 will be transferred to Tulsa, an undetermined number will be transferred to other Rockwell plants in Southern California, and the balance will be laid off.
Rockwell officials said they did not have a list of which facilities in the complex will be sold, but they plan to retain an engineering building and wind-tunnel facilities. Even after the sale, the company said it would retain 3,250 workers in El Segundo, including 2,000 engineers. In addition, some production workers will remain in El Segundo for advanced manufacturing work, the company said.
The company declined to say how much the property is worth, but real estate experts have estimated that the 50-acre site is worth $70 million, not including the value of the buildings on the site or the cost to demolish them.
The El Segundo complex has 2.7 million square feet of plant space, Tulsa 1.65 million and Palmdale 900,000.
Rockwell sold a major portion of the El Segundo complex to Northrop in 1978, which uses its site to produce rear fuselage sections for the F-18 jet fighter. That facility includes 1.9 million square feet of plant space on 75 acres.
