Comments on: A Sound-Breaking Work of Staggering Genius: How Chuck Yeager Reached Supersonic Speed

By: Jonny

Jonny — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 15:14:30 +0000

I saw The Right Stuff on Turner Classic Movies last week as part of the moonlanding anniversary.

Buzz Aldrin was a guest host and he said that as far as the space program went, Yeager played a very small role in that, yet he was a technical advisor on TRS, so his character was seen as having a larger role in the movie than he did in real life (again, as far as the space program went).

By: That Jeff

That Jeff — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 17:50:32 +0000

Chuck Yeager never went into space? So, does that mean the X-15 flight he took doesn’t count? :)

By: Melissa C

Melissa C — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 12:23:23 +0000

I was at the Air & Space Museum in DC yesterday afternoon, admiring the Glamorous Glennis – and not for the first time, either. And while we were there, my dad asked me if I knew that Chuck Yeager had a cameo in The Right Stuff. It’s fun to find other floss-ers who are as intrigued by this stuff as I am.

By: Anne

Anne — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 11:02:00 +0000

The real Chuck Yeager actually had a cameo in The Right Stuff as a crazy old man hanging around Pancho’s. In the scene where Harry Shearer & Jeff Goldblum arrive at the bar, he’s the guy asking if they’d like a drink of whisky.
Another interesting note about Yeager – Army policy during WW2 was that if a pilot returned from being shot down, he wasn’t allowed to return to combat since he would have too much information about the French resistance that helped him escape. Yeager thought he was too good a pilot for this rule, so he literally marched into Eisenhower’s office and demanded they let him return – and they did.

By: Whitney

Whitney — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 03:30:10 +0000

How funny… i just saw and read this article today and last night i watched the first episode of Quantam Leap. Which just happens to be the one where he jumps into Chuck Yeager’s body and has to fly his plane.

His story is amazing.

By: Brian

Brian — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 01:48:16 +0000

“In 1947, Yeager volunteered to be the test pilot for a top-secret, rocket-powered plane dubbed X-S-1….

Why would the swaggering stud from Hamlin, W. Va., risk his neck to achieve supersonic speed? Simply stated, America had to do so if it was going to compete with the Germans and the Japanese, and Yeager knew it.”

Surely Mr. Fischetti meant to write “the Russians”? In 1947 the Germans and the Japanese weren’t competing with anyone other than the Four Horsemen of Their Recent Apocalypse. Right?

By: Isaac

Isaac — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 17:27:35 +0000

They did all that stuff out where I live. We still get a lot of sonic booms out here when they test planes.

By: PT

PT — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 16:02:00 +0000

“The Right Stuff” actually depicts the feat of breaking the sound barrier rather dramatically…

By: Morris

Morris — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 14:27:00 +0000

Although, Yeager didn’t go to space, he was the first person to break the sound barrier. No one can take that away from him.

He has lived an incredible life.

By: Pete

Pete — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:01:00 +0000

Chuck Yeager was one of my boyhood heroes after reading his book “Yeager” (which I highly recommend). Besides being the first to break the sound barrier, he was also a WW2 hero.

After reading his book, I wrote him a letter expressing my admiration for him. He responded with a personalized, autographed picture, which I still have framed. It’s one of my most treasured possessions.