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| Flying on the shoulders of a giant London, ON September 2020 This photo originally shared on Instagram |
Most folks remember him as the swaggering test pilot featured in the iconic book and film, The Right Stuff. If his story stopped and ended at being the first human to exceed the speed of sound, that would probably be enough.
But he was a war hero, too, who had battled German pilots over Europe - and had shot down 13 of them before he, too, was shot down over occupied France. He survived thanks to the help of French Resistance fighters on the ground, and went on to a storied military career.
Along the way, he built a test pilot school that proved instrumental in preparing pilots for spaceflight, and established the baselines for turning radical new designs, like the F-35A you see here, into capable, mature systems.
His legacy is baked into everything that flies today, as well as every pilot who flies them. His ability to instinctively fly into the unknown has made aviation safer for us all.
Because of him, what was once a leap into that unknown ultimately became routine. He risked his own life to turn the mysteries of high-speed, high-altitude, high-performance flight into known quantities that shape our lives to this day. We owe him our gratitude.
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Thank for this Caarmi. Chuck was a huge hero in West Virginia, where I am from.
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