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Testing Limits – Pushing Frontiers

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Meilensteine in der Geschichte des DFRC:

1961-1970

  • Feb. 12, 1962 - Flight tests begin with the Paraglider Research Vehicle (Paresev). Developed to study ways of returning Gemini and Apollo spacecraft to Earth using a hang glider-type wing. Pilot was Milt Thompson

  • Apr. 5, 1963 - M2-F1 lightweight lifting body was towed into the air over Rogers Dry Lake for the first time by a Pontiac convertible tow vehicle with Milt Thompson the pilot. Set the stage for research with several lifting body designs to study atmospheric flight of a vehicle somewhat like a space shuttle

  • Aug. 22, 1963 - Joe Walker flew the X-15 to unofficial world altitude record of 354,200 feet

  • Oct. 30, 1964 - Joe Walker was the pilot on the first flight of the Lunar Landing Research Vehicle (LLRV), known as the "Flying Bedstead." The LLRV was used to simulate techniques of landing a spacecraft on the moon's surface

  • Apr. 25, 1967 - First NASA flight of the XB-70A with Air Force Col. Joe Cotton and NASA research pilot Fitz Fulton at the controls. The XB-70 flights investigated the stability and handling qualities of large, delta-wing aircraft flying at high rates of speed

  • Oct. 3, 1967 - The X-15 set world speed record for winged aircraft, 4520 mph, with Air Force Maj. William Knight the pilot

  • Oct. 24, 1968 - Last X-15 flight, 199th mission, piloted by NASA's Bill Dana. The world's first hypersonic aircraft was the most successful research aircraft to date

  • Dec. 17, 1968 - Last research flight of XB-70 flown by Fitz Fulton and Air Force Lt. Col. Ted Sturmthal, reaching Mach 2.53. Program produced data on sonic booms, flight dynamics and handling qualities associated with large supersonic aircraft. Flight was on the 65th anniversary of the Wright Brothers' flight at Kitty Hawk

  • May 9, 1969 - HL-10 became the first lifting body to fly supersonically. John Manke, later to become Dryden site manager, was the pilot

  • March 5, 1970 - First NASA checkout flight of YF-12A, Fitz Fulton pilot

  • June 2, 1970 - Bill Dana conducted the first flight of the M2-F3 lifting body

  • Oct. 14, 1970 - NASA Research pilots Tom McMurtry and Hugh Jackson reached a Dryden single-day record of six missions flown, in an F-104B while deployed to obtain data for the "Big Boom" experiments that sought to focus the energy from a sonic boom over a limited area


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