It was once said if the legend is greater than the actual story, print the legend..In the case of test pilot Chuck Yeager, it's the real story that's become legendary..If you haven't seen The Right Stuff, the 1983 film that documented America's best fighter pilots who would go on to become the first astronauts, it goes like this..The day before Yeager is set to make another attempt at breaking the speed of sound in the Bell X-1, he fell off his horse and broke several ribs after a night of drinking and carousing at the infamous Pancho Barnes' Happy Bottom Riding Club in the Mojave.. Pancho Barnes serves up a cold onePancho Barnes serves up a cold one .In fact, Yeager slept poorly because of his ribs, but he resolved to only scrap the test if he couldn’t manage the contortions required to get into the X-1 from the B-29 that would lift it into the sky..Thanks to his buddy, aeronautical engineer Jack Ridley, he managed to use a piece of broomstick handle to help close the X-1’s hatch..And the rest, as they say, is history — 75 years ago, today..“I was scared,” he wrote in a memoir, “knowing that many of my colleagues thought I was doomed to be blasted to pieces by an invisible brick wall in the sky."."But I noticed that the faster I got, the smoother the ride. Suddenly, the Mach needle began to fluctuate, then tipped right off the scale,” the Los Angeles Times reported in his December 2020 obituary..For 18 seconds on Oct. 14, 1947, Yeager was supersonic — a feeling he later likened to “a poke through Jell-O.”.The achievement at Muroc Dry Lake made Yeager an aeronautic legend — “the foremost in the Olympus,” according to author Tom Wolfe, “the most righteous of all the possessors of the right stuff.”. Major Chuck Yeager in front of the XB-51.Major Chuck Yeager in front of the XB-51. .When Second World War fighter planes approached supersonic speed during dives, pilots often lost control because of “compressibility” — a phenomenon that buffeted their craft with shock waves and rendered their controls terrifyingly useless..With his experimental Bell X-1 — the bright-orange, bullet-shaped “Glamorous Glennis” — Yeager helped solve those problems, paving the way for faster airplanes and supersonic military flights that have become routine, the Los Angeles Times reported..Famously unflappable, Yeager braved danger first in combat and then on the fringes of space, surviving a horrendous 1963 crash..As his NF-104A Starfighter plunged out of control over the Mojave, Yeager was “spinning down like a record on a turntable,” dropping from an altitude of 20 miles to five miles in just minutes..Caught in a deadly flat spin, when he finally ejected his seat became entangled in his parachute lines and smashed his face plate..Red-hot debris ignited the oxygen flowing into his helmet and engulfed his head in flames. Severely burned, Yeager slammed onto the desert floor with his scorched parachute and was helped by a man in a pickup truck.. Yeager died Dec. 7, 2020, at age 97Yeager died Dec. 7, 2020, at age 97 .He “looked at me, then looked away,” Yeager recalled. “My face was charred meat. I asked if I could borrow his penknife. I used the knife to cut away the glove. Part of two burned fingers came with it.”.Yeager lost two fingertips and was hospitalized with other injuries for nearly a month, an ordeal he later described as “getting away cheap.”.Just one adventure out of many he would experience in his extraordinary life..Shot down in a P-51 Mustang over Bordeaux, occupied France, during the Second World War, Yeager would escape to Spain and eventually back to England, after being aided by the Maquis, a French Resistance Group..Because of the possibility they might be shot down again and tortured into revealing secrets about the Resistance, pilots who escaped from France were not supposed to return to combat..But Yeager wanted back in and pleaded his case to every officer he could find, including the Supreme Allied Commander, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower..Eisenhower, impressed with someone who turned down a chance to go home, gave Yeager his wish. By VE Day, he had taken part in downing 13 enemy planes — on one day alone he was responsible for knocking five German Messerschmitt-109 fighters out of the skies.."I was always afraid of dying. Always," Yeager said of his war exploits.."It was my fear that made me learn everything I could about my airplane and my emergency equipment, and kept me flying respectful of my machine and always alert in the cockpit.".As for which nation had the best pilots, Yeager was forthright.."I have flown in just about everything, with all kinds of pilots in all parts of the world — British, French, Pakistani, Iranian, Japanese, Chinese — and there wasn’t a dime’s worth of difference between any of them except for one unchanging, certain fact: the best, most skillful pilot has the most experience.".I never got to meet Chuck Yeager — I missed my one and only chance..I turned down a special invite to a Dryden Flight Research Center dinner where he was speaking because I had a family and bills to pay and couldn't afford it at the time, something I deeply regret to this day..But, I did see him do a fly-by in an F-15 at the annual Edwards AFB Airshow a few years later..On two occasions I also attended the yearly festivities at the former site of Pancho Barnes' ranch, which involved a wonderful tri-tip barbecue and Budweiser beer, a band, historical guides and a few tents selling Yeager T-shirts, hats and other items..I'm told that the event has now been moved to the site of the new Air Force Flight Test Museum outside the base at West Gate, which is probably a good thing..Pancho's is a historic site and what's left of it should be preserved..One of my good friends did get to meet Yeager, however. My lady friend Joyce, in Antwerp..She took part as an extra in some of the filming of The Right Stuff, and was lucky enough to sit down at a dinner table, right next to the great man..She said he was charming and down to earth, no big ego to speak of. He also flirted with her a bit, even though she was much, much younger!."I really don't remember much, except that we talked for several hours and that he invited me for drinks in the evening, which I declined," Joyce said, in an email.."He was very charming, talkative and had clear opinions on just about everything. A really nice man. A bit too flirty though!".Once a fighter pilot, always a fighter pilot, I guess..Since that historic day in 1947, the boundaries of aviation have rapidly expanded..The F-104 Starfighter was the first production aircraft to achieve sustained Mach 2 flight, while the iconic SR-71 Blackbird still holds the world record for Mach 3+ sustained flight..Aerospace giants continue to advance stealth and hypersonic technology, electrical flight and the potential for quiet, sustainable supersonic travel..Now, yet another era dawns — unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Robotic loyal wingmen that will help fight future air battles..A far cry from what happened in 1947 on that lonely dry lake bed north of Lancaster, Calif., when men like Chuck Yeager dared to rule the skies..As Tom Wolfe wrote in The Right Stuff, “Yeager didn’t go to Pancho’s and knock back a few because the big test was coming up.”.“No, he knocked back a few because, in keeping with the military tradition of flying and drinking, that was what you did if you were a pilot at Muroc and the sun went down.”. The parties never stopped at Pancho Barnes' Happy Bottom Riding Club.The parties never stopped at Pancho Barnes' Happy Bottom Riding Club.
