X-Plane Files: THE LIFE OF X-1 ZERO SIX THREE
X-Plane Files: THE LIFE OF X-1 ZERO SIX THREE
XS-1 on the ramp with the B-29 mothership in 1949. This is the second XS-1 built; it later was converted into the X-1E. Unlike the XS-1-1, which was flown by the Air Force, the XS-1-2 was flown mostly by Bell and NACA pilots. It gathered much more research data than the more famous XS-1-1, known as Glamorous Glennis. Photo by NASA
A little while back, we began a series of articles looking at the air-test work which NASA and its forebear, the N.A.C.A., conducted at their facility in the Mojave Desert, located within the massive military test complex now known as Edwards Air Force Base. The civilian-run organization has often conducted its aerospace tests with active-duty military aircraft on bailment, with data shared back and forth to either help the U.S. aerospace industry, or the military itself.
By Sig Christenson | Dec. 27, 2020 ).insertAfter( .deck )
There was no warning when Chuck Yeager indulged in a moment of sentimentality after we landed one day in 2000 at San Antonio’s Stinson Municipal Airport.
As we taxied back in a P-51 Mustang, he spoke of his late wife, Glennis, saying he didn’t think he’d ever find anyone like her again.
In the couple of years I’d known the retired brigadier general a living American legend Yeager had never said anything so personal.
Getting personal wasn’t his way. Charles Elwood Yeager, who died on Dec. 7 at 97, had a crusty exterior.