[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 156 (Tuesday, October 16, 2007)]
[House]
[Pages H11614-H11616]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       HONORING THE 60TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE AERONAUTICS RESEARCH 
   ACCOMPLISHMENTS EMBODIED IN ``THE BREAKING OF THE SOUND BARRIER''

  Mr. LAMPSON. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to 
the resolution (H. Res. 736) honoring the 60th anniversary of the 
aeronautics research accomplishments embodied in ``the breaking of the 
sound barrier''.
  The Clerk read the title of the resolution.
  The text of the resolution is as follows:

                              H. Res. 736

       Whereas the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics 
     (NACA), and its successor agency, the National Aeronautics 
     and Space Administration (NASA), developed and sustained the 
     world's preeminent aeronautics research program after NACA's 
     formation in 1915;
       Whereas the speed of sound once presented a seemingly 
     impenetrable and dangerous barrier to piloted flight;
       Whereas NACA, the U.S. Air Force, and Bell Aircraft 
     undertook a joint project to develop and test the X-1 
     aircraft and achieve piloted supersonic flight;
       Whereas on the morning of October 14, 1947, an X-1 aircraft 
     piloted by Captain Charles ``Chuck'' Yeager was dropped from 
     a B-29 carrier aircraft and ``broke the sound barrier'' and 
     achieved supersonic flight for the first time in history;
       Whereas this flight provided proof of the feasibility of 
     piloted supersonic flight, and delivered the data required to 
     improve high speed performance and develop technologies for 
     advanced supersonic aircraft; and
       Whereas subsequent X-plane aeronautics research projects 
     have built on the historic accomplishments of the X-1 
     aircraft and achieved advances in a wide range of aeronautics 
     research areas: Now, therefore, be it
       Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
       (1) recognizes and honors the contributions of the 
     scientists and engineers of NACA and its partners who 
     pioneered the technologies to enable supersonic flight;
       (2) recognizes and honors the bravery of Charles Yeager, 
     and the bravery of the many other test pilots who, sometimes 
     at the cost of their lives, enabled the aeronautics 
     developments that made that first supersonic flight possible; 
     and
       (3) recognizes the importance of strong and robust 
     aeronautics research activities to the well being of America.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Lampson) and the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Feeney) each 
will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas.


                             General Leave

  Mr. LAMPSON. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members

[[Page H11615]]

may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and to 
include extraneous material on H. Res. 736, the resolution now under 
consideration.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Texas?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. LAMPSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I stand in strong support of this resolution honoring the 60th 
anniversary of the breaking of the sound barrier, and I want to 
compliment Mr. Rohrabacher for introducing it.
  Last Sunday marked the 60th anniversary of Captain Charles ``Chuck'' 
Yeager's historic achievement that led to the first piloted flight at 
supersonic speeds.
  As an airplane approaches the speed of sound, shock waves build up, 
creating increased drag, loss of lift and loss of control. Airplanes 
had previously broken up under these conditions, and brave pilots died.
  We now know that the passage from subsonic to supersonic speeds is 
accompanied by some unusual phenomena which lie in the realm of 
nonlinear mechanical events, events involving some degree of chaos.
  America's bright engineers and brave pilots were not deterred. They 
were drawn to the challenge of bursting through this obstacle to learn 
what lies on the other side, where no human had ever been.
  On October 14, 1947, Captain Yeager, sitting on four rocket engines, 
blasted through that invisible barrier. Folks on the ground heard the 
sonic boom, and they knew that he had made it. His successful test 
flight freed humankind to travel faster and faster by providing data 
that enabled the mapping of a path to a supersonic future.
  This success required all of the ingredients of successful 
innovation: technical competence, teamwork, a spirit of optimism and 
adventure that accepts risk taking.
  World War II fighter pilot Captain Chuck Yeager was recognized as the 
man for this job. The X-1 was a joint project of the National Advisory 
Committee for Aeronautics, NACA, the Air Force, and Bell Aircraft, with 
the turbo-pump-equipped rocket made by Reaction Motors, Incorporated. 
It has been described as a bullet with wings on it, just 31 feet long 
and a 28-foot wingspan.
  It's on display less than a mile from here over at the Air and Space 
Museum, surrounded by many other great achievements of NACA and its 
successor, NASA, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
  The X-1 and subsequent aerospace achievements have kept us where the 
action is and kept us technologically competitive. We want to stay in 
this game for the next 60 years, and so I will continue to work to keep 
America technologically competitive in aerospace and in all other areas 
of innovation.
  And with this resolution, I pay my respects to Chuck Yeager and to 
the many men and women of America's great aerospace tradition. I thus 
want to voice my support for this resolution, and I urge its adoption.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. FEENEY. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Mr. Lampson, and I yield the 
initial 7 minutes of my time to the prime sponsor of the resolution, my 
friend from California (Mr. Rohrabacher).
  Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I thank Mr. Lampson and Mr. Feeney for 
their hard work they have been doing here, not just on this legislation 
but overseeing America's space program. You certainly have my respect 
and my support, and I'm happy today for their support for this 
legislation.
  This bill takes note and honors America's historic aeronautic 
accomplishments on the 60th anniversary of one of our great aviation 
milestones, that of achieving mach 1, better known as breaking the 
sound barrier.
  It also honors those American scientists and technologists who 
conceived and designed the Bell XS-1, as well as the courage of the 
hero who flew the plane, General Chuck Yeager of West Virginia.
  The leadership of Larry Bell of Bell Aircraft and John Stack of NACA, 
which is the predecessor of NASA, are also recognized and applauded 
here today.
  The sound barrier was not called a barrier for nothing. As an 
aircraft approaches the sound barrier, many of the subsonic rules of 
aerodynamics change radically. Conventional airplanes that had flown 
close to mach 1 before that, and they had done this mainly when they 
were diving, were known to have shaken violently and quite often lost 
control. On that morning of October 14, 1947, the principles of 
supersonic flight were still not proven. It was unknown whether an 
airplane could surpass the speed of sound and survive.
  The XS-1 was pushing the envelope and it was dangerous. Behind the 
plane, it was really a rocket, as described, a rocket with wings, which 
is sort of like the plane I have here. Behind that lay the hard work 
and dedication of pioneering American scientists and engineers who were 
to write the book on supersonic design, beginning with the XS-1 
project.
  The XS-1, a bullet with wings, as they say, was the first high-speed 
aircraft built purely for aviation research purposes, and the XS-1 
project was destined to demonstrate that controlled, sustained flight 
was possible at supersonic speeds.
  In addition, this bill honors Chuck Yeager of West Virginia and all 
that he represents in America's experimental aeronautics programs. 
Besides not knowing whether the aircraft would break the sound barrier 
without breaking apart, no one knew whether the human body could 
survive the kinds of forces Yeager was about to undergo. He was one of 
the best and the bravest, and he was, as Tom Wolfe described him, an 
individual with the right stuff.
  Not only did he reach mach 1 on that October morning at Edwards Air 
Force Base, but he has repeated that on many occasions since, including 
October 1997 on the 50th anniversary of his flight. His life has been 
an inspiration to generations of young Americans and, yes, to young 
people throughout the world.
  And so on that October morning, American expertise in aeronautic 
science and technology, and its human skills and experience in flight, 
were put to the test and came together to tear down the sound barrier 
wall and lead the way to a new era of aviation and to the space age 
beyond.
  To continue that tradition and the tradition of these pioneers, I 
will be introducing an aeronautics and space prize scholarship bill 
this week. This legislation will create a National Endowment for Space 
and Aeronautical Technology Development, and it will include a 
scholarship program, but its primary mission is to provide prizes for 
those who break technology barriers and enable the further exploration 
and utilization of space. Certainly, Chuck Yeager would have won one of 
these prizes.
  So I would ask my colleges to join Bart Gordon, Ralph Hall, Bud 
Cramer and others who are in this in bipartisan support for creating 
the National Endowment for Space and Aeronautics Technology 
Development.
  I would also ask my colleagues to join me tonight in supporting H. 
Res. 736, honoring the 60th anniversary of this great milestone in 
aeronautics and space technology development.
  Mr. LAMPSON. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. FEENEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I'm proud to be a cosponsor of this resolution, along with Mr. 
Lampson, that Mr. Rohrabacher is the prime sponsor of, and it does a 
number of important things.
  It congratulates the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics and 
their test pilots. This was the successor agency to what we now know as 
NASA. It honors the bravery of Chuck Yeager and all of the many other 
test pilots that took on such risks, and it basically emphasizes a 
strong and robust aeronautics research program for America.
  As both Mr. Lampson and Mr. Rohrabacher have pointed out, Mr. 
Yeager's historic flight on October 14, 1947, breaking the sound 
barrier was a very dangerous and precarious experiment. At that time, 
pilots routinely risked losing control of their aircraft or, sadly, 
lost their lives due to extreme forces on the airplane.
  But it's not just that great flight that made Chuck Yeager such a 
great test pilot in America. Chuck Yeager was only 24 when he flew the 
Bell X-1 on the famous flight above the Muroc

[[Page H11616]]

Army Air Field in California. Two days prior to his record-breaking 
flight, Mr. Yeager broke two ribs after falling off a horse. Fearing 
that knowledge of this injury would disqualify him from the scheduled 
flight, he hid his injury from his superiors and, as a result, had to 
improvise a way to close the latch on his plane.
  Having successfully broken the sound barrier, others soon followed in 
Mr. Yeager's footsteps, flying newly designed aircraft at higher and 
higher speeds to help scientists and engineers gain critical knowledge 
about transonic and supersonic flight.
  Only 6 years later, Chuck Yeager flew another Bell-designed rocket 
plane at more than twice the speed of sound.
  A veteran of the Second World War, General Yeager flew P-51 Mustangs 
in the European theater. He ended the war credited with 61 missions and 
11.5 shootdowns of enemy aircraft, including five kills in just 1 day. 
He was himself shot down over France, and with the help of the French 
Resistance, was able to make his way back to England where he continued 
flying against the Axis powers.
  In the years following his historic flight, General Yeager continued 
an illustrious career in the Air Force. Among other accomplishments, he 
was the first commanding officer of the Air Force Aerospace Research 
Pilot School and a commander of fighter wings and squadrons in Germany 
and southeast Asia during the Vietnam War. He also continued to work 
for NASA as a consulting test pilot.
  On the 50th anniversary of his supersonic flight in 1997, General 
Yeager, then 74, piloted an Air Force F-15 Eagle past mach 1.
  General Yeager is a native of West Virginia and today resides in 
California. He's a gifted pilot who spent his career in service to his 
country, sometimes at extreme risk, defending our shores and advancing 
our understanding of aeronautics.
  Mr. Speaker, I'm proud to be a cosponsor and supporter of H. Res. 
736, commemorating the 60th anniversary of General Yeager's first 
flight exceeding the speed of sound. And with that, I would urge my 
colleagues to support this resolution.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. LAMPSON. Mr. Speaker, I have no more speakers. I'll just say that 
we commend Chuck Yeager for his bravery and for the work that he did to 
give us an opportunity to change the world, and we are quite excited 
about what transpired since that time and looking forward to what's 
going to happen in the future.
  With that, Mr. Speaker, I encourage all of our colleagues to 
enthusiastically support this resolution.
  Mr. UDALL of Colorado. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this 
resolution.
  I am an original cosponsor of H. Res. 736 because it is important to 
recognize one of the amazing achievements of the Nation's aeronautics 
R&D enterprise.
  I also think it important to honor Captain Yeager and the other brave 
test pilots who have helped push back the boundaries of flight--with 
results that have benefited our security, our economic well-being, and 
our quality of life.
  As Chairman of the Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee of the Science 
and Technology Committee, I am well aware that this amazing achievement 
was not an isolated event. It is just one thrilling chapter in the 
great story of American aviation and aerospace.
  I am pleased that our predecessors in Congress recognized the 
importance of aeronautics, and invested in it.
  Americans were drawn to the challenges of advancing the state of 
aeronautics, and they gave much of their discipline and intelligence to 
overcome seemingly insurmountable technical obstacles.
  At times, bravery was required, too, and the breaking of the sound 
barrier is a good example of that.
  Today we honor the 60th anniversary of Captain Chuck Yeager's 
breaking of the sound barrier, but we also take inspiration from it to 
renew our commitment to ensuring that America remains preeminent in 
aeronautics R&D.
  I urge my colleagues to support this resolution.
  Mr. LAMPSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Lampson) that the House suspend the rules and 
agree to the resolution, H. Res. 736.
  The question was taken; and (two-thirds being in the affirmative) the 
rules were suspended and the resolution was agreed to.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

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