My dad was a Flight Service Specialist in the FAA, stationed at William J. Fox airport in Lancaster, very near Edwards AFB. One day Yeager was flying an ultralight in the area and made a forced landing. Dad drove out and gave him a ride back to the airport. (He must have been off-duty.)
Yeager went Mach 1 in an F-15 for the 50th anniversary of his famous flight, at the airshow at Edwards. I was walking along, and there he was; just feet away from me. Before I could stop myself, I was like ‘General Yeager!’ He looked at me and smiled and waited for whatever I had to say. I had nothing. My exclamation came out before I could stop it.
I was an extra on The Right Stuff (though I didn’t make it on-screen). I didn’t meet Yeager then, as his scenes were elsewhere at a different time.
Yeager used to give a talk at the National Air and Space Museum every October. I went to the one in 1997, just a few days removed from that 50th anniversary. Earlier that day, the museum staff had raised him up on a lift so he could climb in the cockpit of the X-1 again (it’s hanging from the ceiling of the museum). During the talk he played a recording from his flight in the X-1A where it started tumbling and fell 50,000 feet before he regained control.
I saw the F-20 when I worked at Eddie’s Air Patch. I’ve always liked the T-38s and F-5s, and so I liked the Tigershark. It should have been successful.
Agreed. Always sad when someone dies, of course, but what more could anyone ask than nearly a century of gloriously cheating death and spitting in its face.