Whistling Past the Runway
Chapter 1 - Prince Galitzine and the German Daedalus
Chapter 2 - The Need, the Need For Speed
Milburn "Mel" Apt and the quest to exceed Mach 3
Since the last article I wrote involved a quest for altitude, it's appropriate that this article should involve a quest for speed.
Sixty five years ago today (today being 27 September 2021), for the first time in history a human being exceeded the speed of Mach 3 in atmospheric flight.
Even now, almost two thirds of a century later, this is not a commonplace achievement. There are only two or three production aircraft models in the world that could hit that speed (the Lockheed SR-71/YF-12 reconnaissance planes, the Mig-25, and possibly the Mig-31). Of those planes, there were only about 20 of the Lockheed planes produced and they were supposedly retired in the 1990s, and the Mig-25, though still in service, can only achieve Mach 3 for short periods of time by burning out its engines. So my guess would be less than a couple of hundred people have reached that speed in those two or three planes.
As of this writing, somewhere between 550 and 600 astronauts and cosmonauts have either reached earth orbit or made a suborbital flight that would have exceeded the equivalent speed of Mach 3. In addition, test aircraft such as the X-2 (one of the subjects of this article) and the X-15 have exceeded that speed (the X-15 reached speeds over Mach 6.5 during tests in the 1960s).
The bottom line: In 65 years less than a thousand people have gone that fast, and Mel Apt was the first one.
Sources:
Chapter 3
To Be Determined
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