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The X-15 was built by two manufacturers: North American Aviation was contracted for the airframe in November 1955, and Reaction Motors was contracted for building the engines in 1956. Like many X-series aircraft, the X-15 was designed to be carried aloft and drop launched from under the wing of a B-52 mother ship .
Twelve pilots flew the X-15 over the course of its career. Scott Crossfield and William Dana flew the X-15 on its first and last free flights, respectively. Joseph Walker set the program's top two altitude records on its 90th and 91st free flights (347,800 and 354,200 feet, respectively), becoming the only pilot to fly past the Kármán line, the 100 kilometer, FAI-recognized boundary of outer ...
Flight 90 of the North American X-15 was a research flight conducted by NASA and the US Air Force on July 19, 1963. It was the first of two X-15 missions that passed the 100-km high Kármán line, the FAI definition of space, along with Flight 91 the next month. The X-15 was flown by Joseph A. Walker, who flew both X-15 spaceflights over the ...
The North American X-15's Flight 188 on October 3, 1967, was a record-setting flight. William J. Knight took the X-15A-2 hypersonic rocket-powered aircraft to 102,100 feet (31,100 meters) over Mud Lake, Nevada when Flight 188 reached a record-setting top speed of 4,520 mph (7,270 km/h), Mach 6.70.
North American X-10 – Unmanned missile technology demonstrator; Convair X-11 – Single engine missile testbed for Atlas; Convair X-12 – Three engine missile testbed for Atlas; Ryan X-13 Vertijet – Tail sitter VTOL jet; Bell X-14 – Thrust vectoring VTOL jet; North American X-15 – Hypersonic rocket-powered research aircraft (Mach 6)
Flight 35 of the North American X-15 was a test flight conducted by NASA and the US Air Force on March 30, 1961. [1] The X-15 was piloted by Joseph A. Walker to an altitude of 169,600 feet (51.7 km; 32.12 mi) surpassing the stratopause. [2] Thus Walker became the first human to reach the mesosphere. [3]
X-15: North American USAF, NASA 1959 Hypersonic, high-altitude flight First crewed hypersonic aircraft; capable of suborbital spaceflight. [25] X-15A-2: North American USAF, NASA 1964 Hypersonic, high-altitude flight Major Pete Knight flew the X-15A-2 to a Mach 6.70, making it the fastest piloted flight of the X-plane program. X-16: Bell USAF 1954
X-15 Flight 91 was an August 22, 1963 American crewed sub-orbital spaceflight, and the second and final flight in the program to fly above the Kármán line, which was previously achieved during Flight 90 a month earlier by the same pilot, Joseph A. Walker. It was the highest flight of the X-15 program.