6 November 1958: NASA Research Test Pilot John B. (Jack) McKay made the final flight of the X-1 rocketplane program, which had begun twelve years earlier.
Bell X-1E 46-063 made its 26th and final flight after being dropped from a Boeing B-29 Superfortress over Edwards Air Force Base on a flight to test a new rocket fuel.
John B. McKay, NACA/NASA Research Test Pilot. (NASA)
When the aircraft was inspected after the flight, a crack was found in a structural bulkhead. A decision was made to retire the X-1E and the flight test program was ended.
The X-1E had been modified from the third XS-1, 46-063. It used a thinner wing and had an improved fuel system. The most obvious visible difference is the cockpit, which was changed to provide for an ejection seat. Hundreds of sensors were built into the aircraft’s surfaces to measure air pressure and temperature.
The Bell X-1E was 31 feet (9.449 meters) long, with a wingspan of 22 feet, 10 inches (6.960 meters). The rocketplane’s empty weight was 6,850 pounds (3,107 kilograms) and fully loaded, it weighed 14,750 pounds (6,690 kilograms). The rocketplane was powered by a Reaction Motors XLR11-RM-5 rocket engine which produced 6,000 pounds of thrust (26.689 kilonewtons). The engine burned ethyl alcohol and liquid oxygen. The X-1E carried enough propellants for 4 minutes, 45 seconds burn.
The Bell X-1E rocketplane being loaded into NACA 800, a Boeing B-29-96-BW Superfortress mothership, 45-21800, for another test flight. (NASA)
The early aircraft, the XS-1 (later redesignated X-1), which U.S. Air Force test pilot Charles E. (“Chuck”) Yeager flew faster than sound on 14 October 1947, were intended to explore flight in the high subsonic and low supersonic range. There were three X-1 rocketplanes. Yeager’s Glamorous Glennis was 46-062. The X-1D (which was destroyed in an accidental explosion after a single glide flight) and the X-1E were built to investigate the effects of frictional aerodynamic heating in the higher supersonic ranges from Mach 1 to Mach 2.
Bell X-1E 46-063 loaded aboard NACA 800, a Boeing B-29-96-BW Superfortress, 45-21800, circa 1955. (NASA)
The X-1E reached its fastest speed with NASA test pilot Joseph Albert Walker, at Mach 2.24 (1,450 miles per hour/2,334 kilometers per hour), 8 October 1957. Walker also flew it to its peak altitude, 70,046 feet (21,350 meters) on 14 May 1958.
NACA test pilot Joseph Albert Walker made 21 of the X-1E’s 26 flights. In this photograph, Joe Walker is wearing a David Clark Co. T-1 capstan-type partial-pressure suit with a K-1 helmet for protection at high altitudes. (NASA)
There were a total of 236 flights made by the X-1, X-1A, X-1B, X-1D and X-1E. The X-1 program was sponsored by the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics, NACA, which became the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, NASA, on 29 June 1958.
Albert Scott Crossfield, Jr., Aeronautical Engineer and Test Pilot, 1921–2006. (Jet Pilot Overseas)
Albert Scott Crossfield, Jr., was born at Berkeley, California, 2 October 1921, the second of three children of Albert Scott Crossfield and Lucia Dwyer Scott Crossfield. (“Scott Crossfield” is the family name, going back for many generations.) His father was a chemist who was the superintendent of the Union Oil Refinery in Wilmington, California. At the age of 5 years, the younger Scott Crossfield contracted pneumonia. He was comatose for a time and not expected to survive. When he finally began to recover, he was confined to bed for many months. The effects of this illness lasted throughout his childhood.
It was during this time that he developed his interest in aviation. He learned to draw, studied airplanes, and built scale models. Charles F. (“Carl”) Lienesch, who was a pilot for the Union Oil Company, gave Scotty his first ride aboard an airplane at age 6. As a teenager, he took flight lessons in an Inland Sportster at the Wilmington Airport.
Inland R400 Sportster NC267N, circa 1939. (William T. Larkins)
After his family bought a farm in Oregon, Scott Crossfield continued flight lessons and soloed a Curtis Robin at the age of 15. He earned his private pilot certificate at 18. After graduating from high school, “Scotty” helped his father with the family farm before attending the University of Washington as a student of aeronautical engineering. He took a job at Boeing to pay his tuition and support.
Ensign A. S. Crossfield, Jr.
After America’s entry into World War II, Scott Crossfield enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Corps as an aviation cadet, but because of expected delays in training, quickly transferred to the U.S. Navy. He enlisted as a Seaman 2/c in the Navy’s V-5 Program at the Naval Reserve Aviation Base, Seattle, Washington, on 21 February 1942. He began Primary Flight Training there, 7 May 1942. Scotty completed military flight training and was commissioned an Ensign, United States Navy, in December 1942.
On 21 April 1943, Ensign Albert Scott Crossfield, U.S. Navy, married Miss Alice Virginia Knoph at Corpus Christi, Texas.
Promoted to lieutenant (junior grade) with date of precedence 21 March 1944.
During World War II, Scott Crossfield served as a fighter pilot, flight and gunnery instructor, flying the Chance Vought F4U Corsair and Grumman F6F Hellcat. Though he was assigned to Fighting Squadron FIFTY-ONE (VF-51) aboard the Independence-class light aircraft carrier USS Langley (CVL-27), he did not serve in combat. He was promoted to the rank of lieutenant 1 August 1945. Scotty was released from active duty 31 December 1945. After the war he joined a Naval Reserve squadron and flew the Goodyear Aircraft Co. FG-1D Corsair at NAS Sand Point, Washington.
A Goodyear FG-1D Corsair, Bu. No. 92150, unfolding its wings at NAS Sand Point, circa late 1940s. The orange band around the fuselage shows that this airplane is assigned to a Naval Reserve squadron. (U.S. Navy)
During this time he resumed his education at the University of Washington and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in aeronautical engineering in 1949, and a master’s degree in 1950. As a graduate student he was the operator of the university’s Kirsten Aeronautical Laboratory wind tunnel.
The NACA High Speed Flight Station, 24 August 1954. The Boeing P2B-1S Superfortress is parked at the northeast corner of the ramp. (NASA)
In 1950 Scott Crossfield joined the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA, the predecessor of NASA) as an Aeronautical Research Pilot at the NACA High Speed Flight Station, Edwards Air Force Base, California. He flew many high-performance jet aircraft like the North American Aviation F-100 Super Sabre, and experimental airplanes such as the Convair XF-92, Douglas X-3, Bell X-4 and X-5. He also flew the research rocket planes, making 10 rocket flights in the Bell X-1 and 77 in the Douglas D-558-II Skyrocket.
Douglas D-558-2 Skyrocket, Bu. No. 37974, is dropped from Boeing P2B-S1 Superfortress, Bu. No. 84029, 1 January 1956. (NASA)
On 20 November 1953, Scott Crossfield became the first pilot to fly faster than twice the speed of sound (Mach 2). The D-558-II was carried aloft by a Boeing P2B-1S Superfortress drop ship (a four-engine B-29 long range heavy bomber which had been transferred from the U.S. Air Force to the Navy, then heavily modified by Douglas) to 32,000 feet (9,754 meters) and then released. Scotty fired the LR8 rocket engine and climbed to 72,000 feet (21,945 meters). He put the Skyrocket into a shallow dive and, still accelerating, passed Mach 2 at 62,000 feet (18,898 meters). After the rocket engine’s fuel was expended, he flew the rocketplane to a glide landing on Rogers Dry Lake.
In 1955 Crossfield left NACA and joined North American Aviation, Inc., as Chief Engineering Test Pilot. He planned and participated in the design and operation of the X-15 hypersonic research rocketplane for the Air Force and NASA. He also worked closely with the David Clark Co., in the development of the project’s full-pressure suits.
Scott Crossfield testing an experimental David Clark Co. XMC-2 full-pressure suit in a thermal chamber at Wright Field. (Ralph Morse, LIFE Magazine/National Archives College Park Collection)
Milton O. Thompson, another X-15 test pilot, wrote in At the Edge of Space,
“. . . he was intimately involved in the design of the aircraft and contributed immensely to the success of the design, as a result of his extensive rocket airplane experience. . . Scott was responsible for a number of other excellent operational and safety features built into the aircraft. Thus, one might give Scott credit for much of the success of the flight program. . . .”
—At the Edge of Space, by Milton O. Thompson, Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington and New York, 1992, at Page 3
Scott Crossfield, NAA Chief Engineering Test Pilot; Edmond Ross Cokeley, NAA Director of Flight Test; and Charles H. Feltz, NAA Chief Engineer, with an X-15 hypersonic research rocketplane. (North American Aviation via Jet Pilot Overseas)
In 1959–1960, Scott Crossfield flew all of the contractor’s demonstration phase flights for the X-15, including 16 captive carry flights under the wing of the NB-52A Stratofortress while systems were tested and evaluated, one glide flight, and thirteen powered flights. He reached a a maximum altitude of 88,116 feet (26,858 meters) on Flight 6, and a maximum speed of Mach 2.97 (1,960 miles per hour/3,154 kilometers per hour) on Flight 26. The X-15 was then turned over to NASA and the Air Force. The X-15 Program involved a total of 199 flights from 1959 until 1968.
A. Scott Crossfield, wearing a David Clark Co. XMC-2 full-pressure suit, which he helped to design and test, with the first of three North American X-15s, 56-6670. (North American Aviation, Inc.)
After leaving the X-15 Program, Scott Crossfield continued as a Systems Director with North American Aviation, Inc., working on the Apollo Command and Service Module and the S-IVB second stage of the Saturn V rocket. He left North American in the late ’60s and served as an executive with Eastern Air Lines and Hawker Siddeley. He also continued as a aeronautical engineering consultant to private industry and government.
Among many other awards, Scott Crossfield was received the Harmon Trophy, the Collier Trophy, and the Iven C. Kincheloe Award of the Society of Experimental Test Pilots..
Scott Crossfield’s Cessna 210A Centurion, N6579X, photographed at Santa Monica Airport, California, 26 September 1999. (AirNikon Collection, Pima Air & Space Museum, Tucson, Arizona via airliners.net, used with permission)
In 1980 Crossfield resumed flying when he purchased a 1960 Cessna 210A Centurion, N6579X, serial number 21057579. This was a single-engine, four-place light airplane, powered by an air-cooled Continental six-cylinder engine. He had flown more than 2,000 hours in this airplane when it crashed during a severe thunderstorm, 19 April 2006, while on a flight from Prattville, Alabama, to Manassas, Virginia.
Albert Scott Crossfield, Jr., was killed. His remains are interred at the Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia.
Albert Scott Crossfield, Jr., Test Pilot. (LIFE Magazine via Jet Pilot Overseas)
Highly recommended: Always Another Dawn: The Story Of A Rocket Test Pilot, by Albert Scott Crossfield and Clay Blair, Jr., The World Publishing Company, Cleveland and New York, 1960.
Vanguard 3 is launched aboard Vanguard SLV-7 from Launch Complex 18A at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, 12:20:07 a.m., EST, 18 September 1959. (NASA Marshall Space Flight Center MSFC-9139356)
18 September 1959: At 12:20:07 a.m., Eastern Standard Time (05:20:07 UTC), a three-stage Vanguard Satellite Launch Vehicle lifted off from Launch Complex 18A at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on the eastern coast of Florida. The rocket placed a 50 pound (22.7 kilogram) scientific satellite, Vanguard 3 (also known as Vanguard III) into Earth orbit. Orbital injection occurred at 05:29:49, 9 minutes, 35 seconds after launch, at 27,195 feet per second (98,239 meters per second). The orbit was inclined 33.350°. The satellite’s perigee, the closest point in its orbit to Earth, was 512.00 kilometers (318.142 statute miles), and its apogee, 3,750.00 kilometers (2,330.142 statute miles). The orbital period was 2 hours, 10 minutes, 9 seconds.
Vanguard III flight backup. (NASA)Vanguard 3 being installed on the Vanguard SLV-7 launch vehicle by NASA engineer R.J. Andryshak (left) and D.R. Corbin. (NASA)
Contained inside the satellite’s 1 foot, 8.0 inch (50.8 centimeter) diameter magnesium spherical outer shell were sensors and transmitters. The satellite collected data on the Earth’s magnetic field, the Van Allen Radiation Belt, micrometeorite impacts on the satellite, and measured drag acting to slow the satellite in its orbit. The 2 foot, 2 inch (0.66 meter) cone-shaped structure at the top of the satellite contains a magnetometer.
Vanguard 3 transmitted data for 84 days before its batteries failed. It is estimated that it will remain in orbit around the Earth for 300 years.
The Vanguard Satellite Launch Vehicle was a three-stage rocket, using liquid fuel for the first and second stages, while the third stage used a solid fuel rocket motor. It was built by the Glenn L. Martin Company at Baltimore, Maryland. The rocket had a total length of 71 feet, 6.721 inches (21.8115 meters), including the payload fairing. SLV-7 (also known as TV-4BU) was an unused test article. The all-up vehicle weighed 23,143 pounds (10,497.488 kilograms) at the time of the firing signal.
A Vanguard rocket (TV-2) at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Launch Complex 18A. (Dan Beaumont Space Museum)
The Vanguard first stage was powered by a General Electric Hermes X-405 (LR50-GE-1) engine, fueled by liquid oxygen and Shell Oil Company Jet B (a naptha-kerosene fuel used for turbojet engines in cold weather conditions). The propellant system was pressurized with helium. Hydrogen peroxide was used to drive the engine’s turbopump. The X-405 weighed 425 pounds (192.8 kilograms) and produced 27,835 pounds of thrust (123.816 kilonewtons) at Sea Level. The first stage was 39 feet, 7.243 inches (12.0712 meters) long and 3 feet, 9 inches (1,143 meters) in diameter. Its empty weight was 1,599 pounds (725.29 kilograms). The stage had a burn time of 2 minutes, 30 seconds.
AJ10-37
The second stage was 18 feet, 7.54 inches (5.6779 meters) long and 2 feet, 8 inches (0.8128 meters) diameter, and had an empty weight 1,013 pounds (459.49 kilograms). It was powered by an Aerojet General AJ10-37 engine, fueled by a hypergolic mixture of white inhibited fuming nitric acid (WIFNA) and unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine (UDMH). The engine weighed 386 pounds (175.09 kilograms). It produced 7,500 pounds (33.362 kilonewtons) thrust in vacuum. It had a burn time of 2 minutes.
The Vanguard SLV-7 third stage was 5 feet, 10.29 inches (1.7854 meters) long and 2 feet, 8 inches (0.8128 meters) in diameter. It weighed 50.9 pounds (23.09 kilograms) burn time 37 seconds. The engine was a solid fuel Allegany Ballistic Laboratory ¹ JATO X-248 A2, originally designed for rocket assisted takeoff for fixed wing aircraft. The engine was 4 feet, 10.2 inches (1.478 meters) long, 1 foot, 6.0 inches (0.457 meters) in diameter, and weighed 203 pounds (92.1 kilograms). It produced 3,070 pounds (13.656 kilonewtons) of thrust and had a burn time of 37 seconds.
Vanguard third stage X-248 A2 solid rocket motor (NASM A19680576000).
The satellite was enclosed in a conical phenolic plastic fairing, which had a titanium tip.. The fairing was 12 feet, 6.72 inches (3.8283 meters) long. The cone angled 20° from its axis.
Third stage was left attached to the satellite. The total mass placed in orbit was 94.6 pounds (42.91 kilograms).
¹ Allegany Ballistics Laboratory was a Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) facility, operated by the Hercules Powder Company.
Enterprise rollout at Palmdale, California, 17 September 1976. (Roger Ressmeyer/CORBIS)
17 September 1976. Enterprise (OV-101), the prototype Space Shuttle Orbital Vehicle, was rolled out at the Rockwell International plant at Palmdale, California.
President John F. Kennedy at Rice University Stadium, Houston, Texas, 12 September 1962. (Cecil Stoughton, White House/John F. Kennedy Library)
“We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard. . . .”
— John Fitzgerald Kennedy, Thirty-Fifth President of the United States of America, in a speech at Rice University, Houston, Texas, 12 September 1962.
And so, 2,500 days later. . .
Apollo 11/Saturn V launches from Pad 39A, Kennedy Space Center, Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 13:32:00.06 UTC, 16 July 1969. Destination: Mare Tranquillitatis, The Moon. (NASA)
