David Clark Company
American’s David Clark Company (DCC) is a manufacturer and designer of a broad range of industrial and aerospace protective equipment such as headsets, anti-G suits, pressure-space suit systems, and many medical and safety items. Starting with the design and development of the first standard anti-G suits and valves used by allied fighter pilots during World War II, DCC has been involved in the design and manufacture of air-space personnel protection equipment since 1941.
A new generation of pressure suits, the S1031C, was introduced in the early 1980s as a result of DCC’s ongoing research and development activities since 1946. These efforts were primarily sponsored by the Department of Defense to support USAF high-altitude aircraft programs (Lockheed U-2 and SR-71).
NASA borrows U-2/SR-71 “yellow” Pressure Suits
‘NASA had to borrow some space suits from the U-2 program for the first shuttle mission,’ says Damien Leimbach, former Avionics Technician at the U.S. Air Force (2001–2007), on Quora.
‘The David Clark company builds space suits for NASA, but they also build the iconic yellow pressure suits that the U-2 and SR-71 program uses.
‘The program calls them “pressure suits” since they don’t actually fly to space, but they are essentially the same suits that the David Clark company made for NASA.
‘Prior to the first shuttle mission (STS-1), the launch of Columbia, there was a defect detected in the batch of suits NASA was making for the pilots to use. Since the maiden flight of the shuttle mission was also its first real test flight, there were only two crew members, a pair of pilots, for that mission.
Why NASA borrowed U-2/SR-71 pressure suits
‘However, the suits were not going to be fixed in time, so NASA called up Beale AFB and said, “Hey, we need to borrow a pair of space suits.”
‘And that’s why the crew pictures from the first shuttle mission show the pilots wearing yellow suits (high visibility to easily see downed pilots) instead of the iconic NASA white.
‘I mean, without the NASA patches, you wouldn’t know these guys weren’t SR-71 or U-2 pilots.’
Leimbach concludes;
You can even see the green velcro patches on the thighs where U-2 pilots put their note pads and map boards.’
In 1996, the David Clark Company Model S1034 Pilots Protective Assembly (PPA) started replacing the S1031 predecessor in the U-2R. This model is still in use today. Additionally, it has been adopted into the NASA ER-2 and WB-57F platforms.
Photo by NASA and U.S. Air Force