Chuck Yeager, USAF Officer and Test Pilot
Captain Charles E. Yeager, standing in front of the Air Force's Bell X-1. The world's first supersonic aircraft, the Bell X-1, flew faster than the speed of sound on October 14th, 1947. The X-1 was carried into the air under a converted B-29 bomber, and released at an altitude of 6800 meters over Muroc, California. The X-1 was powered by a four-chamber XLR-11 rocket engine that generated kilonewtons of thrust. This pushed the aircraft to a speed of 1078 km/h at an altitude of 12,800 meters - equivalent to times the speed of sound. Yeager unofficially named to aircraft "Glamorous Glennis," after his wife. It is now displayed at the Smithsonian. Charles Elwood "Chuck" Yeager (born February 13, 1923) is a retired brigadier general in the United States Air Force and record-setting test pilot. In 2012, on the 65th anniversary of breaking the sound barrier, Yeager did it again at the age of 89, riding in a McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle piloted by Captain David Vincent out of Nellis Air Force Base.
Size: 4200px × 3257px
Photo credit: © Photo Researchers / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
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