Aug
31
I have a question about breaking the sound barrier, can you help?
Filed Under Cars and Transportation
I have heard that an America aircraft manufacturer, one that built large passenger jets, broke the sound barrier with one of these planes, and did it almost 10 years before the Concorde. Is this true? What was the airplane? All wrong, heres the answer… http://www.dc8.org/library/supersonic/index.php koolbean>> If you have proof that a P-51, or any other propeller driven plane has broken the sound barrier, I would love to see it. Now, go back to singles and dating and play with the kiddys.
Answer:
True – it was a DC8 : “On 21 August 1961 a Douglas DC-8 broke the sound barrier at Mach 1.012 (660 mph/1,062 km/h) while in a controlled dive through 41,000 ft (12,497 m). The flight was to collect data on a new leading-edge design for the wing. The DC-8 became the first civilian jet to make a supersonic flight.[1] The aircraft was a DC-8-43 later delivered to Canadian Pacific Air Lines as CF-CPG” from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DC8#First_orders (bottom of the section) Also see: http://www.dc8.org/library/supersonic/index.php