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Twelve pilots flew the X-15 over the course of its career. Scott Crossfield and William Dana flew the X-15 on its first and last free flights, respectively. Joseph Walker set the program's top two altitude records on its 90th and 91st free flights (347,800 and 354,200 feet, respectively), becoming the only pilot to fly past the Kármán line, the 100 kilometer, FAI-recognized boundary of outer ...
Brigadier General Charles Elwood Yeager (/ ˈ j eɪ ɡ ər / YAY-gər, February 13, 1923 – December 7, 2020) was a United States Air Force officer, flying ace, and record-setting test pilot who in October 1947 became the first pilot in history confirmed to have exceeded the speed of sound in level flight.
Like many X-series aircraft, the X-15 was designed to be carried aloft and drop launched from under the wing of a B-52 mother ship. Air Force NB-52A, "The High and Mighty One" (serial 52-0003), and NB-52B, "The Challenger" (serial 52-0008, also known as Balls 8 ) served as carrier planes for all X-15 flights.
On October 14, 1947 the first individual flies faster than sound
The X-1 aircraft #46-062, nicknamed Glamorous Glennis and flown by Chuck Yeager, was the first piloted airplane to exceed the speed of sound in level flight and was the first of the X-planes, a series of American experimental rocket planes (and non-rocket planes) designed for testing new technologies.
He flew in three versions of the Bell X-1: the X-1#2 (two flights, first on August 27, 1951), X-1A (one flight), X-1E (21 flights). When Walker attempted a second flight in the X-1A on August 8, 1955, the rocket aircraft was damaged in an explosion just before being launched from the JTB-29A mothership .
In 1947, Chuck Yeager became the first human to break the sound barrier when he pushed the Bell X-1 past Mach 1 during a flight over the Mojave Desert. Boom Supersonic XB-1 breaks sound barrier ...
The third NF-104A (USAF 56-0762) was delivered to the USAF on 1 November 1963, and was destroyed in a crash while being piloted by Chuck Yeager on 10 December 1963. This accident was depicted in the book Yeager: An Autobiography, and the book and film adaptation of The Right Stuff. The aircraft used for filming was a standard F-104G flying with ...