He retired from the Air Force in 1975 after logging more than 10,000 hours of flight time in roughly 360 different military aircraft models. An Air Force captain at the time, he zoomed off in the plane, a Bell Aircraft X-1, at an altitude of 23,000 feet, and when he reached about 43,000 feet above the desert, historys first sonic boom reverberated across the floor of the dry lake beds. Yeager married 45-year-old Victoria Scott DAngelo in 2003. He retired in 1976 as a brigadier-general his wife thought he should have made a full general. Yeager was born February 13, 1923, in Myra, West Virginia, to farming parents Albert Hal Yeager (1896-1963) and Susie Mae Yeager (ne Sizemore; 1898-1987). Chuck Yeager, a former U.S. Air Force officer who became the first pilot to break the speed of sound, died Monday. [75] Yeager was incensed over the incident and demanded U.S. Ive flown 341 types of military planes in every country in the world and logged about 18,000 hours, he said in an interview in the January 2009 issue of Mens Journal. An incredible life well lived, Americas greatest Pilot, & a legacy of strength, adventure, & patriotism will be remembered forever.. Chuck Yeager (@GenChuckYeager) December 8, 2020 In 1947, Yeager flew the Bell X-1 rocket 700 mph at 43,000 feet, becoming the first person to break the sound barrier in level flight. On later visits, he often buzzed the town. "He got himself shot down and he escaped," van der Linden says. I was just a lucky kid who caught the right ride, he said. Glennis Dickhouse was pilot Chuck Yeager's wife of 45 years. [65][76], On March 1, 1975, following assignments in West Germany and Pakistan, Yeager retired from the Air Force at Norton Air Force Base, California. rules against Chuck Yeager's daughter in dispute with stepmother", "Chuck Yeager, who made history for breaking the sound barrier, dies at 97", "Chuck Yeager, pilot who broke the sound barrier, dies at 97", Biography in the National Aviation Hall of Fame, General Chuck Yeager, USAF, Biography and Interview, "Chuck Yeager & the Sound Barrier" in Aerospaceweb.org, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Chuck_Yeager&oldid=1142035779, United States Air Force personnel of the Vietnam War, People from Lincoln County, West Virginia, Recipients of the Air Force Distinguished Service Medal, Recipients of the Distinguished Flying Cross (United States), Recipients of the Distinguished Service Medal (US Army), Survivors of aviation accidents or incidents, United States Army Air Forces pilots of World War II, Pages using cite court with unknown parameters, Short description is different from Wikidata, All Wikipedia articles written in American English, Official website different in Wikidata and Wikipedia, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Yeager, Chuck, Bob Cardenas, Bob Hoover, Jack Russell and James Young, This page was last edited on 28 February 2023, at 04:40. What really strikes me looking over all those years is how lucky I was, how lucky, for example, to have been born in 1923 and not 1963 so that I came of age just as aviation itself was entering the modern era, Yeager said in a December 1985 speech at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. Norm Healey was visiting from Canada and reading about Yeager's accomplishments. Legendary airman Chuck Yeager the first pilot in history confirmed to break the sound barrier died Monday, his wife announced. NASAs administrator, Jim Bridenstine, described General Yeagers death in a statement as a tremendous loss to our nation. The astronaut Scott Kelly, writing on Twitter, called him a true legend.. He even lobbied to change one of the plane's control surfaces so that it could safely exceed Mach 1. Mike Ives and Neil Vigdor contributed reporting. [86] Later that month, he was the recipient of the Tony Jannus Award for his achievements. [63], Yeager made a cameo appearance in the movie The Right Stuff (1983). Video, 'Trump or bust' - grassroots Republicans are still loyal, "It is w/ profound sorrow, I must tell you that my life love General Chuck Yeager passed just before 9pm ET. In this Tuesday, Oct. 14, 1997, file photo, Chuck Yeager explains it was simply his duty to fly the plane, during a news conference at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., after flying in an F-15 jet . It might sound funny, but Ive never owned an airplane in my life. Yeager died Monday, his wife, Victoria Yeager, said on his Twitter account: "It is w/ profound sorrow, I must tell you that my life love General Chuck Yeager passed just before 9 pm ET. Yeagers feat was kept top secret for about a year when the world thought the British had broken the sound barrier first. ", Yeager strikes a pose with Sam Shepard, who played him in the movie version of The Right Stuff. [52] For this feat, Yeager was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal (DSM) in 1954. He was also one of the first American pilots to fly a Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15, after its pilot, No Kum-sok, defected to South Korea. Yeager had been cheap, sneered some, and thus expendable. US Air Force officer and test pilot Chuck Yeager, known as "the fastest man alive," has died at the age of 97. Yeager was not present in the aircraft. Contact Us. He also flew directly under the Kanawha Bridge and West Virginia named it the Chuck E. Yeager Bridge. BY STEVEN MAYER smayer@bakersfield.com. The airport that serves Charleston, West Virginia, is named after Chuck Yeager. In addition to his flying skills, Yeager also had "better than perfect" vision: 20/10. Air & Space/Smithsonian magazine ranked him the fifth greatest pilot of all time in 2003. Yeager shot down 13 German planes on 64 missions during World War II, including five on a single mission. With the aircraft simultaneously rolling, pitching, and yawing out of control, Yeager dropped 51,000ft (16,000m) in less than a minute before regaining control at around 29,000ft (8,800m). Aviation Remembers Chuck Yeager. It was a feat of considerable courage, as nobody was certain at the time whether an aircraft could survive the shockwaves of a sonic boom. Famed U.S. Air Force test pilot Chuck Yeager visits with students . One day I climbed up on my roof with my 8 mm camera when he flew overhead. As for the X-1, its rocket engine was conceived in pre-war Greenwich Village, but the plane itself strongly resembled the British Miles M-52 jet, whose plans were shown to Bell in 1944. ", "Pilot Chuck Yeager's resolve to break the sound barrier was made of the right stuff", "This day in history: Yeager breaks the sound barrier", "Harmon Prizes go for 2 Air "Firsts"; Vertical-Flight Test Pilot and Airship Endurance Captain Are 1955 Winners", "BRIGADIER GENERAL CHARLES E. "CHUCK" YEAGER", "Yeager (n.d.). He was 97. "He cleared me for combat after D Day, because all the free Frenchmen Maquis and people like that had surfaced". Chuck Yeager, a military test pilot who became the first pilot to break the sound barrier. Gen. Charles E. "Chuck" Yeager died Dec. 7. [8], His cousin, Steve Yeager, was a professional baseball catcher. Copyright 2023 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. Read about our approach to external linking. This version corrects that Yeager flew an F-15, not an X-15, when he was 79. Yeager's wife,. In November, he shot down another four planes in one day. [78] Also in popular culture, Yeager has been referenced several times as being part of the shared Star Trek universe, including having a fictional type of starship named after him and appearing in archival footage within the opening title sequence for the series Star Trek: Enterprise (20012005). It might sound funny, but Ive never owned an airplane in my life. She is the namesake of his sound-barrier breaking Bell X-1 aircraft, "Glamorous Glennis". He later regretted that his lack of a college education prevented him from becoming an astronaut. Can Nigeria's election result be overturned? In 2016, when General Yeager was asked on Twitter what made him want to become a pilot, the reply was infused with cheeky levity: I was in maintenance, saw pilots had beautiful girls on their arms, didnt have dirty hands, so I applied.. [11], At the time of his flight training acceptance, he was a crew chief on an AT-11. An incredible life well lived, Americas greatest Pilot, & a legacy of strength, adventure, & patriotism will be remembered forever.. His last supersonic flight, in 2012 commemorated the 65th anniversary of his breaking of the sound barrier. 1953, when he flew an X-1A to a record of more than 1,600 mph. You don't do it to get your damn picture on the front page of the newspaper. When Armstrong did touch down, the wheels became stuck in the mud, bringing the plane to a sudden stop and provoking Yeager to fits of laughter. On Oct. 14, 1947, Yeager, then a 24-year-old captain, pushed an orange, bullet-shaped Bell X-1 rocket plane past 660 mph to break the sound barrier, at the time a daunting aviation milestone. They had to wait for rescue. General Yeager came out of the West Virginia hills with only a high school education and with a drawl that left many a fellow pilot bewildered. Cancelled in 1946, the M-52 would have been supersonic. Chuck Yeager, a World War II fighter pilot, the first person to break the sound barrier and one of the subjects of Philip Kaufman 's The Right Stuff has died. Yeager died Monday, his wife, Victoria Yeager, said on his Twitter account. Yeagers pioneering and innovative spirit advanced Americas abilities in the sky and set our nations dreams soaring into the jet age and the space age. He also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1985. Yeager started from humble beginnings in Myra, W.Va., and many people didn't really learn about him until decades after he broke the sound barrier all because of a book and popular 1983 movie called The Right Stuff. One day he took a ride with a maintenance officer flight-testing a plane he had serviced and promptly threw up over the back seat. When youre fooling around with something you dont know much about, there has to be apprehension. In 2005 President George W Bush promoted him to major-general. Chuck Yeager, a World War II fighter pilot, the first person to break the sound barrier and one of the subjects of Philip Kaufman 's The Right Stuff has died. The documentary was screened at film festivals, aired on public television in the United States, and won an Emmy Award. When he was asked to repeat the feat for photographers, Yeager replied: You should never strafe the same place twice cause the gunners will be waiting for you.. With the U.S. Air Force's 75th Birthday approaching next year, we look back at the legacy of the first person to break the sound barrier at a time when the Air Force was not even a month old. This was Yeager's last attempt at setting test-flying records. "Over Tehachapi. Retired Air Force Brig. But he became a fighter ace in World War II, shooting down five German planes in a single day and 13 over all. For that same series, executive producer Rick Berman said that he envisaged the lead character, Captain Jonathan Archer, as being "halfway between Chuck Yeager and Han Solo. You do it because its duty. That year, he flew a chase aircraft for the civilian pilot Jackie Cochran as she became the first woman to fly faster than sound. He was 97. After the war, Yeager became a test pilot and flew many types of aircraft, including experimental rocket-powered aircraft for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). Brigadier General Charles Elwood Yeager (/jer/ YAY-gr, February 13, 1923 December 7, 2020) was a United States Air Force officer, flying ace, and record-setting test pilot who in October 1947 became the first pilot in history confirmed to have exceeded the speed of sound in level flight. "I was at the right place at the right time. After World War II, he became a test pilot beginning at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio. His flight helmet even cracked the canopy, and a scratchy archive recording from the day preserves Yeager's voice as he wrestles back control of the aircraft: "Oh! Key points: Yeager broke the sound barrier when he was just 24 years old in 1947 Ive had a ball.. But the guy who broke the sound barrier was the kid who swam the Mud River with a swiped watermelon or shot the head off a squirrel before going to school.. Gen. Chuck Yeager, along with his remains, to his funeral in West . Summary: Retired Air Force Brig. US Air Force / The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images file. [17] He escaped to Spain on March 30, 1944, with the help of the Maquis (French Resistance) and returned to England on May 15, 1944. I thought he was going to take me off the roof. [64], From 1971 to 1973, at the behest of Ambassador Joseph Farland, Yeager was assigned as the Air Attache in Pakistan to advise the Pakistan Air Force which was led by Abdur Rahim Khan (the first Pakistani to break the sound barrier). 1 of 2. IE 11 is not supported. "An incredible life well lived, America's greatest Pilot, & a legacy of strength, adventure, & patriotism will be remembered forever," his wife wrote on Monday. The actor Sam Shepard, left, and General Yeager on the set of the 1983 film The Right Stuff, in which Mr. Shepard played General Yeager. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser. My accomplishments as a test pilot tell more about luck, happenstance and a persons destiny. He was once shot down over German-held France but escaped with the help of French partisans. Chuck Yeager, Test Pilot Who Broke the Sound Barrier, Is Dead at 97 A World War II fighter ace and Air Force general, he was, according to Tom Wolfe, "the most righteous of all the possessors of. [47] The X-1 he flew that day was later put on permanent display at the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum. Vice President Mike Pence said he will escort Victoria Yeager, the widow of retired Air Force Brig. [49], Yeager went on to break many other speed and altitude records. I'm down to 25,000," he says calmly if a little breathlessly. -. He was depicted breaking the sound barrier in the opening scene. . Litigation ensued, in which his children accused D'Angelo of "undue influence" on Yeager, and Yeager accused his children of diverting millions of dollars from his assets. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. In 1962, he became commander of the school at Edwards that trained prospective astronauts. The Interstate 64/Interstate 77 bridge over the Kanawha River in Charleston is named in his honor. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nations highest civilian award, from President Ronald Reagan in 1985. Early life and education. The Ughknown was a poke through Jell-O. [27][28] Yeager said, "I'm certainly not proud of that particular strafing mission against civilians. Ive flown 341 types of military planes in every country in the world and logged about 18,000 hours, he said in an interview in the January 2009 issue of Mens Journal. As popularized in The Right Stuff, Yeager broke the sound barrier on Oct. 14, 1947, at Edwards Air Force Base in California. When Yeager left Hamlin, he was already known as a daredevil. During the ejection, the seat straps released normally, but the seat base slammed into Yeager, with the still-hot rocket motor breaking his helmet's plastic faceplate and causing his emergency oxygen supply to catch fire. Chuck Yeager was America's most decorated pilot, Chuck Yeager - who was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 1973 - kept flying in his later years, 'Trump or bust' - grassroots Republicans are still loyal. My accomplishments as a test pilot tell more about luck, happenstance and a persons destiny. He accomplished the feat in a Bell X-1, a wild, high-flying rocket-propelled orange airplane that he nicknamed "Glamorous Glennis," after his first wife who died in 1990. Sixty-five years later to the minute, on Oct. 14, 2012, Yeager commemorated the feat, flying in the back seat of an F-15 Eagle as it broke the sound barrier at more than 30,000 feet (9,144 meters . In his memoir, General Yeager said he was annoyed when people asked him if he had the right stuff, since he felt it implied a talent he was born with. The Luftwaffe pilot Hans Guido Mutke, with rivets bursting from his Me 262 jets wings, may have accidentally broken the sound barrier over Austria in April 1945. "Yeager epitomized the pioneering spirit that has and always will propel the Test community Toward the UnexploredAd Inexplorata! Yeager shot down 13 German planes on 64 missions during World War II, including five on a single mission. 2023 NYP Holdings, Inc. 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