‘Our dreams soared with Chuck’... sound-barrier pilot dies aged 97
LEGENDARY airman Chuck Yeager, the first person to fly faster than the speed of sound, has died at the age of 97.
The US test pilot – whose exploits were immortalised in the book and movie The Right Stuff – propelled himself into the history books in an experimental rocket plane in 1947.
Brig Gen Yeager died on Monday, his wife Victoria said. ‘An incredible life well lived, America’s greatest Pilot, & a legacy of strength, adventure, & patriotism will be remembered forever,’ she wrote on Twitter.
Nasa administrator Jim Bridenstine described his death as ‘a tremendous loss’ to the country.
‘Gen Yeager’s pioneering and innovative spirit advanced America’s abilities in the sky and set our nation’s dreams soaring into the jet age and the space age,’ he said.
On October 14, 1947, Gen Yeager, then a 24-year-old captain, pushed an orange, bullet-shaped Bell X-1 plane past 660mph to break the sound barrier over the Mojave Desert.
But he came within a whisker of missing out on the flight. Two nights before, in an ill-advised escapade, he fell from a horse and broke two ribs.
Refusing to tell anyone except his flight engineer, the West Virginian was in such pain that he couldn’t seal the plane’s hatch for himself –
Flying ace: Yeager, 24, and Bell X-1 he flew into the history books so he had a broom handle rigged up to use as a lever.
‘Sure, I was apprehensive,’ he said in 1968. ‘When you’re fooling around with something you don’t know much about, there has to be apprehension. But you don’t let that affect your job.’
The US air force base at Edwards, California, where he became a test pilot after earning his wings as a World War II fighter ace, unveiled a bronze statue of Gen Yeager in 2006.
Its historian Jim Young said at the time: ‘In an age of media-made heroes, he is the real deal.’
He was ‘the most righteous of all those with the right stuff,’ said Maj Gen Curtis Bedke, the test base’s commander, referring to Tom Wolfe’s book and the 1983 film it inspired.
Gen Yeager flew for more than 60 years, including piloting an X-15 to near 1,000mph at Edwards in 2002 aged 79. In 1999, he wrote: ‘If I auger in (crash) tomorrow, it won’t be with a frown on my face. I’ve had a ball.’