On 14 October 1947, over the Mojave Desert in California, US Air Force Captain Charles 'Chuck' Yeager flew the rocket-powered Bell X-1, nicknamed Glamorous Glennis, dropped from the bomb bay of a B-29, and reached Mach 1.06, faster than the speed of sound, at an altitude of 13,000 metres. Yeager had two broken ribs from a horse-riding fall two days earlier and told no one. The flight, which was kept secret for months, proved that supersonic flight was possible and the 'sound barrier' was not a wall.
Before and after
- 21 September 1947Birth of Stephen King
- 28 September 1947Birth of Sheikh Hasina
- 4 October 1947Construction of H&M
- 4 October 1947Death of Max Planck
- 14 October 1947Chuck Yeager breaks the sound barrier
- 22 October 1947Kashmir conflict
- 22 October 1947Indo-Pakistani wars and conflicts
- from 22 October 1947 to 1 January 1949Indo-Pakistani War of 1947–1948
- 29 October 1947Founding of Şalom
More in Science & technology
- 1949Discovery of berkelium
- 1955Discovery of mendelevium
- 14 February 1961Discovery of lawrencium
- 8 December 1994Discovery of roentgenium
- 1996Discovery of copernicium
- 2006Discovery of nihonium
The era
This moment belongs to the Contemporary world (1945 CE to today), the world since 1945. You can also browse everything in the 20th century.