Capt. Charles "Chuck" Yeager stands in front of the Bell X-1 for a publicity shot in 1947. Yeager was the first man to break the legendary sonic barrier when he took the X-1 to Mach 1.06 Oct. 14, 1947. (Courtesy photo)
Posted on 10/14/2004 5:47:40 AM PDT by Mike Fieschko
U.S. Air Force Captain Chuck Yeager becomes the first person to fly faster than the speed of sound.Yeager, born in Myra, West Virginia, in 1923, was a combat fighter during World War II and flew 64 missions over Europe. He shot down 13 German planes and was himself shot down over France, but he escaped capture with the assistance of the French Underground. After the war, he was among several volunteers chosen to test-fly the experimental X-1 rocket plane, built by the Bell Aircraft Company to explore the possibility of supersonic flight.
For years, many aviators believed that man was not meant to fly faster than the speed of sound, theorizing that transonic drag rise would tear any aircraft apart. All that changed on October 14, 1947, when Yeager flew the X-1 over Rogers Dry Lake in Southern California. The X-1 was lifted to an altitude of 25,000 feet by a B-29 aircraft and then released through the bomb bay, rocketing to 40,000 feet and exceeding 662 miles per hour (the sound barrier at that altitude). The rocket plane, nicknamed "Glamorous Glennis," was designed with thin, unswept wings and a streamlined fuselage modeled after a .50-caliber bullet.
Because of the secrecy of the project, Bell and Yeager's achievement was not announced until June 1948. Yeager continued to serve as a test pilot, and in 1953 he flew 1,650 miles per hour in an X-1A rocket plane. He retired from the U.S. Air Force in 1975 with the rank of brigadier general.
Chuck Yeager: The best there ever wuz...
Amazing achievement and didn't he do it with a broken rib?
What's interesting was that if it weren't for the stupidity of the British government the British-built Miles M 52 would have gotten there first. What we know now is that because of the design of the horizontal tail surfaces on the M 52 (the same concept was used on the XS-1), the plane would have safely exceeded the speed of sound.
Some scientists thought you would die if you went that fast....
In every article about supersonic flight, there is the obligatory mention of "critics" who said "it couldn't be done". It's pro forma; I think it's even in the _Chicago Manual of Style_. Anyone writing on supersonic flight has to mention anonymous critics who said it was impossible.
Of course, no informed person thought it was impossible to fly faster than sound, I'm sure. Bullets and shells traveled faster than sound. Supersonic rockets had already been built and flown by 1947. V2 rockets had even been guidable at supersonic speeds, so everyone must have known that it was possible to employ some flight controls at speed.
Don't get me wrong. Piloted supersonic flight was a great acheivement. It wasn't great because infomred people said it was impossible, is all I saying...
Did the M 52 have the same airfoil section for its wing and horizontal tail?
My 1880's variety Mauser rifle fires a supersonic round.
As a kid in the early sixties I remember planes over Long Island breaking the sound barrier. It's a very distinctive sound. But it scared people and provoked complaints (I was 5 and I thought it was cool!).
I think a bit of PC may have crept into the reproduction of the story some where along the line. Back in the day the likliest use was "first MAN to..." this story uses "person". Back then people werent concious of any political/social implications and used 'person' and 'man' interchangably buy I was a big reader of History and high accomplishment and that 'first person' glares out at me. Though I will admit that I may be hypersensitive living in the PC age (Call it reverse PC sensitivity!)
Didn't Yeager get pushed out of the Moon program, starting with Merc or Gemini because he didn't have the academic backround ( he wasn't an engineer)that the John Glenns had? If so it shows you how hard the pre PC meritocracy pushed. Somehow I doubt he would have been a drag on the program. I mean Chuck Yeager epitomizes American 'can-do!"
We ran a class through of roughly 11 pilots per year; 38 of the guys that graduated from the school while I was commandant went to NASA as astronauts: Dick Truly, who is now a colonel, was one of my students; Bob Crippen, Frank Borman, Tom Stafford, the whole bunch. They are a good bunch of guys and we had an excellent facility there, but it was wiped out.
Yeager, a good old boy from West Virginia, barely scraped through the formal training he needed to do his job. He said in his biography that his "best-kept secret" was Jack Ridley, his good friend and engineer on the X-1 project. Ridley, a brilliant theoretical and practical engineer, helped Yeager with the bookwork and training he needed to qualify to fly the X-1.
The cool thing about Welsh was that he was a P-40 pilot at Pearl Harbor assigned to a tiny sattelite airstrip who always stayed up all night playing poker...as a result he and a buddy were awake when the first Jap planes flew over. As a result, he and a wingman were able to get in the air early, allowing him to shoot down several planes that day. His story was one of several featured in the movie Tora, Tora, Tora.
Welch was performing a demonstration flying the new F-100A. His flight card called for a symmetrical pull-up at 1.55 Mach. The maneuver would generate more than 7 Gs. As he began the maneuver, the airflow over the wing suddenly burbled, completely blanking the newly redesigned and smaller vertical stabilizer. The fighter yawed slightly and then suddenly turned partially sideways to the direction of travel. The nose folded up at the windscreen and crushed Welch in his ejection seat. Miraculously, the seat fired and carried Welch clear of the plane as it disintegrated. Ejecting at supersonic speeds is not only hard on the human body, it’s hard on parachutes as well. Welch’s chute was nearly shredded by the violent blast of air. With many panels blown out, the rate of descent was much too fast to avoid serious injury, or even death. When rescuers arrived at Welch’s side, he was barely alive. He died before he could be transported to a hospital. Ironically, Yeager had complained that the F-100A, with its smaller vertical stabilizer, was dangerously unstable. Welch elected to fly it anyway.
Indeed, he lead an exciting life - in addition to being the first guy to break the speed of sound in 1947 (F86 in a dive), he was also the first guy to break the sound barrier in a jet in level flight (F100)
Indeed, he lead an exciting life - in addition to being the first guy to break the speed of sound in 1947 (F86 in a dive), he was also the first guy to break the sound barrier in a jet in level flight (F100)
Yeager must have thought a lot of Ridley as he mentions in his book that Ridley was the only pilot to ever "wax" him in a mock dogfight.
I really do need to get my copy of his book ("My Life") autographed. I hope Yeager will be at Oshkosh in May of '05, because I'm going.
Yeah...he had to hide it or he would have been scrubbed. Another guy had to help him get settled in correctly.
Chuck Yeager...one of ours...
a proud West Virginian.
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