Last of Lockheed’s Burbank Buildings Get Wrecking Ball

Nearly a decade after Lockheed Martin pulled out of Burbank, crews are demolishing the last vestiges of the sprawling defense facilities that churned out combat aircraft and spy planes for World War II and the Cold War.

The wrecking ball is being put to structures on 32 acres next to the Burbank Airport parking garage, once home to an aircraft factory and Lockheed corporate offices, said Burbank Redevelopment Director Robert M. Tague.

Zelman Cos. of Los Angeles plans a 580,000-square-foot industrial park on the site, Tague said.

The facility being demolished was where subassembly work was done for the P-3 Orion anti-submarine aircraft. It also housed manufacturing for the L-1011 commercial jet built from the 1960s through the early 1980s, said Lockheed Martin spokeswoman Gail Rymer.

Demolition work began three months ago and is to be completed by December, Tague said. The project, erasing the last remnants of Lockheed’s presence in Burbank, brings to about 350 the number of acres cleared to make way for new developments in the last decade.