Famed test pilot killed in small-plane crash

A brotherhood of rivals
The now 83-year-old Yeager, in his book “Yeager: An Autobiography,” described friction between the military pilots and the civilian NACA pilots. He groused that Crossfield “was a proficient pilot, but also among the most arrogant I’ve met. ... None of us blue suiters was thrilled to see a NACA guy bust Mach 2.”

The competition did not end at Mach 2. On Dec. 12, 1953, just a few days before the 50th anniversary of the Wright brothers’ first flight, Yeager bested Crossfield when he flew an X-1A to a record speed of more than Mach 2.4, or more than 1,600 mph.

The upcoming Wright anniversary had weighed on his mind, Yeager wrote: “The television networks had scheduled special programs about Crossfield and his Mach 2 flight. ... Our plan was to smash Scotty’s record on December 12.”

Nowadays, the best fighter jets can fly well over Mach 2.

Crossfield left NACA in 1955 to work for North American Aviation on the X-15 project, including its first flight, an unpowered glide, in 1959. Other early X-15 test flights were made by pilots Joe Walker and Robert White.

In one of his test flights, Crossfield reached about three times the speed of sound on Nov. 15, 1960, in an X-15 launched from a B-52 bomber. The plane reached an altitude of 81,000 feet.

A dangerous job
There were some close calls. During an X-15 flight in 1959, one of the engines exploded. The emergency landing broke the aircraft’s back just behind the cockpit, but Crossfield was not injured, according to the Edwards Air Force Base Web site.

Less than a year later, a malfunctioning valve caused a catastrophic explosion during a ground test while Crossfield was in the cockpit. He again escaped injury.

In later years, he was an executive for Eastern Airlines and Hawker Siddley Aviation and a technical consultant to the House Committee on Science and Technology.

“I am an aeronautical engineer, an aerodynamicist and a designer,” he told Aviation Week & Space Technology. “My flying was only primarily because I felt that it was essential to designing and building better airplanes for pilots to fly.”

More recently, Crossfield had a key role in preparations for the attempt to re-enact the Wright brothers’ flight on the 100th anniversary of their feat on the sand dunes near Kitty Hawk, N.C. Crossfield trained four pilots, and one of them, Kevin Kochersberger, was selected for the Dec. 17, 2003, attempt.

But in the end, unsuitable weather doomed the attempt to get the replica into the air. The plane plopped into wet sand as the crowd of 35,000 groaned.

Among his many honors, Crossfield was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 1983.

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