Why Neil Armstrong's X-15 Test Flight 'Bounced' Off The Atmosphere
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- Опубліковано 6 вер 2024
- The movie 'First Man' opens with Neil Armstrong's test flight of an X-15 which almost ends in disaster after he flies way past his landing area and over the edges of LA. While the movie chooses to portray this as a consequence of his distracted state of mind over the health of his daughter, there's a series of technical decisions that lead to this.
If you want to go deeper into the stories behind the movie I recommend the book from which is was adapted:
First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong by James R. Hansen
amzn.to/2RpArY7
My favorite Neil Armstrong story was the one my dad's friend Tom, who had a small airstrip near Solvang, CA told me. He got to take Neil up in one of his gliders. He offered him the controls, but he declined. He just wanted to be a regular tourist and spend some time enjoying the scenery. Can you imagine, get to fly an American hero around in an unpowered glider who just wanted a nice, quiet ride in the sky.
One of my favorite Armstrong stories is when he ejected out of the lunar lander trainer (after it developed a thruster problem and crashed) and was in the office that afternoon working like nothing even happened. Even his boss was like, "Are you alright? You can take the afternoon off if you want." He was just like, "No, I'm good. We got work to do here." Just another day at the office.
@@Skank_and_Gutterboy lol, yeah, and I think his wife found out from someone else as well
@@Skank_and_Gutterboy He was a cool customer. Probably why he was selected for the first moon landing.
@@VenturiLife
Exactly, like when/how he dealt with a thruster malfunction on a Gemini flight that spun the capsule faster with every passing second and was literally life-threatening. I'll bet a million dollars that was a huge contributor on why he was selected.
Did he seam kinda weird? Like something was off ? just wanna know because of own experience.
“Neil, you missed the runway”
“10-4, im just gonna circle the globe one time”
"Neil you idiot, the earth is flat. Everyone knows that!"
@@mokka1115 Don't worry he would have one under it and up back.
@@mokka1115 your mom's flat
Knowing how much of an engineer that Neil Armstrong was, I have no doubt in my mind that the guy wasn't "winging it" when he overshot his holding pattern in the X-15, but just calmly and collectively started immediately calculating his descend rate, speed and altitude to figure out if he could make it. And he probably all did it in his head. To give you an idea, back in 2000 he said this about himself in a speech: _"I am, and forever will be, a white-socks, pocket-protector, nerdy engineer, born under the second law of thermodynamics, steeped in steam tables, in love with free-body diagrams, transformed by Laplace, and propelled by compressible flow . . . [Arthur C. Clarke’s] third law seems particularly apt today: Any sufficiently developed technology is indistinguishable from magic. Truly, it has been a magical century.”_
The man was a legend and it was a sad day for space exploration, engineers, and the aerospace industry when he passed on. The man should be the patron saint of engineers everywhere.
One of the few who not only had the "theoric knowledge" but also the "empiric understanding" of it.
Add to that his ability to be one with the machine.
He wasn't selected to be the first Sapiens on the Moon by accident.
@@Dr_Do-Little Actually, he kinda was selected by accident; the accident in question being the one that killed Gus Grissom and his crew. Had that not happened the flight schedule would've been different and someone else likely would've been the first, probably Gus himself.
Matchesburn. Oh, Neil is without question one of my patron saints. Those guys inspired me into an aerospace engineering career. How I wish I could have met him.
that's a beautiful quote from an amazing man.
Just check out on his last minute corrections on Apollo 11
An aero engineering instructor at one point, Armstrong was asked what procedure existed, if any, for landing the X-15 should the lower horizontal stabilizer fail to jettison, necessary for deployment of the landing skids. "Well," said Armstrong, in his southern drawl, "what you have then is a situation in which you are about to be the driver of the world's fastest plow."
Southern drawl? He's from Cincinnati lol
@@michaelwoods9005 Ohioans have a drawl.
"Southern". He was from Ohio. I guess that's "Southern". Relative to Canada! 😉
No, he is from Wapakoneta Ohio.
My god how people have changed over the decades. I remember reading a quote from Frank Whittle when he was asked about the Gloster E.28/39 going really fast with his jet engine it. He just turned around and said “well, that is what it was bloody well supposed to do” haha.
You mentioned that Adams’ X-15 broke up on its last flight, but failed to note that Michael Adams lost his life in that flight. This made him the first fatality in the American Space program. He was only 37.
X-15 #3 was destroyed in November 1967, but the Apollo 1 fire was January 1967.
@@jmcdonne Yes, Grissom, Chaffee and White were the first fatalities in the American space program, but they never left the launch pad. Adams was the first American to die IN SPACE (according to the American definition of where space begins).
@@Cydonia2020 You didn’t specify that they needed to die in space.
1.Astronauts Freeman, See, and Basset were all American astronauts in training, and died well before those that you had mentioned...and both Grisson and White had certainly "left the launchpad" before their fire on Apollo 1.
2. Adams perished during his aircraft's breakup during REENTRY, and not above the Karmann Line, aka IN SPACE...
"During X-15 Flight 191, Adams' seventh flight, the plane had an electrical problem followed by control problems at the apogee of its flight. The pilot may also have become disoriented. During reentry from a 266,000 ft (50.4 mile, 81.1 km) apogee, the X-15 yawed and went into a spin at Mach 5. The pilot recovered, but went into a Mach 4.7 inverted dive. Excessive loading led to structural breakup at about 65,000 feet (19.8 km).[14] Adams was posthumously awarded astronaut wings, as his flight had passed an altitude of 50 miles (80.5 km)."
Scott, having been in flight test for the government (attached to the Air Force Systems Command (AFSC), I wish to congratulate you on your excellent synopsis of the magnificent X-15 and the equally magnificent expertise of Neil Armstrong. Mr. Armstrong was a consummate test pilot (and member of the Society of Experimental Test Pilots (SETP)). Folks think that test pilots are a wild bunch of 'Smil'n Jacks - they are not (Not even Chuck Yeager) they are skilled and disciplined professionals, who follow an exact flight test plan, for a particular mission/flight. Armstrong did what any good test pilot (or any pilot regardless of what you are flying) - must do - trust your instruments. The downlink telemetry data can be skewed and particularly back in those days it was still pretty much Frequency Modulated (FM) telemetry, before pulse coded modulation (PCM) evolved. Everyone who flew the X-15, including Scott Crossfield said it was a handful to fly and totally unforgiving. In my career I have seen test pilots make incredible saves - but NEVER outside the test plan envelope or the aircraft's capabilities. Yes, I have seen death in flight test, it is part of the game, but never never because of "hot dogging" or some such silliness. Its unfortunate but it happens. Keep up the excellent work on this channel, inform the public and continue to de-mystify what they are seeing, you are doing great work. Thank you.
Respect!
Back in the Gemini and Mercury days.....those pilots were made of hardened steel. Doing what no one before them had done, in vehicles never built before, in an environment humans had never experienced. Badass level over 9000
As Scott says, Armstrong was one of the "*primary engineers* and test pilots" for the avionics system. Yeah, the bravery of test pilots gets a lot of mention, but the job is *testing* the technical systems, which means the big difference between a pilot and test pilot is that a test pilot has to at the very least fully understand the inner workings of (and often has a hand in devising, designing, and building) bleeding-edge systems.
Never forget that the first Space Shuttle flight was also a super risky test flight. An untested, never flown rocket powered spaceplane, and you stick two guys in it, launch it to orbit, and then fly them home at mach 25 to an unpowered landing. Young and Crippen were an amazing crew.
@G.Gorrell I believe its Tail Number 3, - I was stationed at WPAFB, and went over to the museum quite a bit (that was a great assignment by the way!) If you get to the museum there are two aircraft their that I thought I would never see again after leaving a previous duty assignment - F-117 tail number 780 (it was the first of our test birds) and the other is the ugliest aircraft ever to take wing, (Northrop Tacit Blue). Apologies to the Northrop guys and gals ;-)
“Experimental aircraft explodes. Pilot wets pants” Good to see some things never change.
Could you imagine the shit he got because of that? LOL
I was thinking the same thing.
@@sirraident Great minds think alike LOL
#fakenews 😝😆
Nah today it would be: *Experimental aircraft explodes. You won't believe what happened next* (don't click on it btw, it's not a link)
Made me literally burst out laughing with your shuttle cough! 😂
Dream Chaser and the other lifting bodies have a glide ratio worse than Shuttle.
@@ljfinger A glide ration WORSE then the shuttle? Why that's preposterous!
same here hahaha
@@VolcanicSpacePizza both are still better than a wing suit.. the only thing wth a worse glide ratio than a wing suit is a brick
@@ljfinger "Lifting" bodies 😉
The X-15 actually came with *three* sets of controls. The main stick was for aerodynamic control in normal flight regimes. The left side stick was for the reaction thrusters. The right side stick was for aerodynamic control but in the more marginal parts of the envelope. It basically had higher resistance to prevent pilots getting into pilot induced oscillations. It became a macho badge of honour to not use the centre stick, and at leats one pilot admitted to not touching the centre stick even though he really, really wanted to.
Doing research on the X-15, could you send me a source for this by any chance?
7:55 - My favorite factoid about the Space Shuttle is that to train pilots to land it, they put them in a business jet modified to have the same cockpit layout as the Space Shuttle.
Then dove toward the ground.
With all the flaps/speed brakes deployed for maximum drag.
Then turned on the thrust reversers.
...when you're in orbit at Mach 25, the ground is a long way away.
Jet that you are talking about was the Sabreliner, which not having a parachute for braking, would have to use reversers to slow down.
Anonymous Freak __
I flew an approach a couple of years ago into SLC during a severe TS. It was the first time in decades of flying I ever saw it raining up! We were in a Fokker F100 full of folks in the back. By the time we had established a somewhat stable approach, about two miles off the end of the runway, we were in full landing mode. Approach angle correct, Gear down, Flaps 45, Engines to flight idle and we were climbing like a bat out of hell! Needless to say we aborted and get the hell out of Dodge. News reports later that evening told of a rare tornado touchdown in the Bountiful area. Closest I ever want to be to the edge. Neal was one of a kind and a national treasure.
But unlike the real shuttle, the training aircraft didn't break apart and throw its crew onto the ground. Twice.
Michael J. Adams died when the x-15 broke up in mid air for those wondering.
Thank you. He did just glide over that part
I was.
I was.
Thanks for the clarification as I just assumed the pilot survived because he he didn't mention it, that was a rather disregarding oversight.
It was glanced over but to be fair to Scott it has to be assumed the conditions in which the aircraft broke up that survival would be minimum at best. R.I.P Mr Adams.
"LA center, X-ray 1 5, got a ground speed readout for me?"
"X-ray 1 5, we're showing you at 3,989 knots across the ground."
"Center, I'm showing a little closer to 4 thousand."
(credit to Maj Brian Shul and Walter, LA Speed Check.)
I had to laugh so hard reading this 😂
lol When he heard Walter open his mic to say that was pretty funny. "Walter and I became a crew at that moment".
".....and the Navy had been slain". Good stuff.
@@KSparks80 Walter, what a poet.
Had he overshot a bit more: "LA center, X-ray 1 5, mayday mayday mayday, inbound for emergency landing at Los Angeles"
This is incorrect, it was an SR-71 that did this not a X-15
One of the best opening scenes of any movie. Fantastic!
You da man, Jesus 👉😎👉
Why are you everywhere?
@@zwolfrants7107 because he is jesus
Neil Armstrong's balls must have been MASSIVE.
Lordy, Lordy ... Jesus Christ, that was a Damn good movie!
My father worked on the X-15 project and was friends with Neil Armstrong the smoke that you were referring to in the cockpit is not from paint but from actually wood that was place behind the leading edges of the plane acting as an insulation and many times caught on fire
Neil Armstrong was best of the best clutch pilots to ever have to lived. All the near catastrophic events he pulled are amazing. Never phased at all.
One of the best Stick and rudder man ever lived 👍.Absolut Agree with you.
fazed
can you imagine, dude never cracked under pressure i guess no reason to panic and die=)
Nasty cough you got at 7:55, you better get that checked out or it could snowball into a big expensive problem.
Might even explode once or twice
lmao
"Snot is supersonic" *static mic noise*
Roll Program.
Might even be fatal
I’m happy thinking about the fact that the number of humans who have flown a missile not remotely is larger than 1
Japanese kamikaze pilots were basically human missiles
The Earth isn't actually spherical, it's wider at the equator and flatter at the poles.
@@PiePieTheSpartan
It's not perfectly spherical, but spherical nonetheless.
@@argh1989 Sort of...
@@PiePieTheSpartan
On a 23 inch LED monitor the Earth is 1 pixel wider than it is tall.
And spheres are perfectly round, but something doesn't need to be perfectly round to be spherical.
The Earth is NOT spherical "more or less".
The Earth is spherical...... Period.
Learn your definitions.
Scott Crossfield was the pilot in the aircraft when the motor exploded. He is a cool customer. He just sat there and watched as he was covered by a fireball for a few minutes. He said that the craft was rated for higher temperatures for longer times, he was not worried. until the fire crew got the cockpit clear of flame and he popped the canopy and felt the great heat. Then he said he made a fast exit. (an understatement)
Cool bit of info here ❤
whether the film was entirely accurate or not, the x-15 scene depicted just how intense and challenging these test flights were. Neil's pulse rate when landing the eagle was around 150 or so, yet he managed to keep his concentration and land. The original film clips cannot capture what he was experiencing in a physical and emotional sense. We just assumed by his voice he was cool,calm and collected. His heart rate begs to differ. What a guy!
In that last part I feel you should have mentioned that Adams did not survive, making him the first US "Space" mission fatality.
He died when his aircraft broke up, at 65,000 feet...AKA, not in space.
What do you mean the space shuttle is a bad glider
*just enable infinite fuel*
Just hack gravity
Good one mate!
It's a spaceplane. Glides exactly as designed. Strapping an actual glider to a rocket would be a bad idea.
What do you expect of a flying brick?
@@RealityIsTheNow
^This! I don't get the edgy remarks including Scott's cough. It was designed to bleed off speed, a controlable heatshield if you want.
This was one if the first tests that I had heard about and later saw as a kid that got me hooked into watching and following the amazing "Space Race" as it was called back then.
I was 5 years old.
Throughout grammar school in every school year there were things we would learn about and see on the black and white Television that the school had on a cart to be shared among the classrooms and different grades.
It was an amazing time to be alive and watch almost weekly reports of what was going on in the Space program.
From Mercury to Gemini to the docking procedure practiced with Gemini, the first American space walk, on up thru Apollo it was certainly a magical time to see the advancements as they would show clips in the classroom, and sometimes watch the action live for a launch or a reentry while holding your breath waiting to see the parachutes open as they would descend into the Pacific Ocean and wait for the helicopter pick up.
It was fascinating as a kid to follow this, seeing the incremental developments, and the disappointments when the Russians would beat us being first in a lot of things until Appollo.
People who claim it was all a hoax and we never went to space are just sore losers that they weren't part of a glorious time of National Pride and determination of making it the Moon before the Russians did so we could honor JFK'S gauntlet he had laid down before his untimely death.
We went to the moon, space does exist, and the Earth is a globe and isn't flat.
Can I get an Amen?👍🏼👍🏼
You gotta build the X20 in KSP now. No excuses.
He already did.
It's in Orbiter, has been for at least 10 years.
Kentucky space program?
@@davidkirby6928 I think it's kenya space program
Derek Ortiz Kanye, stop please
Fantastic explanation of Neil Armstrong's difficult X-15 flight. It should be obvious from his actions that Armstrong was the most choice to pilot the Lunar Module down to the surface of the moon.
The man was a total professional with ice water in his veins.
Thanks so much Scott!
My uncle an cousin worked in S. California on the X-15. They drilled all the canopy an vent rivet holes, every hole had to be almost perfect, so only one special drill bit per hole. Bits not being used again, they brought a hand full of bits for me, I still use them, Cool! I have drill bits that constructed the X-15! Tim
Ain't gonna lie even if First Man does have a few inaccuracies, it's way more accurate than most Hollywood space movies.
I'm doing my best to fix that twitter.com/MysteryGuitarM/status/1057331046457339904
@@scottmanley Someone has to make sure they get the zero-G boobs correct.
The sets were great and very realistic (except Pad 19) and I was surprised how accurate the story was but all the shaking and crazy noises were pointless and just silly. I mean, when Gemini 8 launched, you get all this banging around and insane noises, *then* you can actually hear the Titan’s turbo cart start charge go off (which would be at ignition mind you). My guess is that someone actually put the scene together correctly then the director insisted on all that other junk be added to make it ‘more dramatic’. What a mistake.
@@Strike_Raid I still don't know why they made all the brand new spacecraft filthy with grime-coated switches, peeling paint, and chipped knobs.
@@scottmanley DJ?
Still throwing shade on the Space Shuttle, I dig it.
The space shuttle was a camel
If only the military didn’t get involved. Without those giant wings, the space shuttle would be far safer and more practical.
Robert Lutece
No, the Air Force had cool Air Force fantasies of zooming off into the wild blue yonder in the shuttle to screw around with other people's satellites. There's plenty of shuttle blame to go around and they can accept their fair share.
That's a crock. I was around back then and saw the whole thing unfold. What happened was that NASA was trying to do something that had never been done before; build a reusable spacecraft. They found out that this task was a lot more complex and expensive than they had hoped and they (NASA) ran out of money. (The original shuttle design was a LOT different than what they ended up with.) Nor would Congress allocate any more money to finish the job.
So NASA approached the DoD. The DoD/Air Force said OK, but we will need this vehicle to meet our mission requirements, which needless to say were a lot different than NASA's, mainly in terms of payload. The Air Force needed to put their big, bus-sized satellites into orbit, which the NASA design could not do.
So there was a major redesign and the result was the shuttle that we got, a heavy lifter, not the one that NASA had originally envisioned (fully reusable, for carrying passengers and only a moderate cargo payload into orbit). And they end up with a design compromise that satisfied no one. Even so, overall it flew successfully (and no, you don't have to remind me that they lost two of them; I know that better than you.) for 30 years.
At least you can bet they know a hell of a lot more about how to build something like this than they did in the early 1970s when the shuttle program started. Whether they will try again remains to be seen.
@@patmyers7750
That's all true but it glosses over so many unpleasant facts. Such as, NASA had a much better heavy lift capability sitting on the shelf in 1972 than it does today. There was absolutely no need to spend billions developing a new system, except NASA promised the shuttle would be super cheap to fly, if we could only develop it. Story Musgrave said it best. "We said it would fly for $10 million per launch and it cost $1.2 billion per launch, so we were only off by 1200 times over". Your comment has a thin veneer of "the shuttle was a good idea at the time", when of course it was never a good idea. The development costs and operational costs and lives lost all destroy this romantic notion. People who worked on or near the shuttle program often have an affinity for it that isn't really justified. That's because they worked hard on it or because shuttle dollars clothed them and sent their kids to college all those years. Fortunately for the taxpayers and for the astronauts who must actually ride the machine, those romantic shuttle notions have mostly faded in the harsh light of reality. The shuttle was the result of a series of mistakes. It doesn't matter whether it was well intentioned or not. We must take care to acknowledge this reality so the mistakes won't be repeated. If NASA wanted a complex, expensive, dangerous "horse built by committee" vehicle, they'd build one. They don't, and neither does anyone else. They're going back to the 1972 way, at least to the extent that congress will allow it. (You're welcome, Northrop Grumman). Personally, I'm looking forward to returning to a launch vehicle with reasonable expectations that doesn't throw its crew into the Atlantic, nor scatter them all over east Texas. It's going to be a breath of fresh air.
The "(cough) space shuttle" part got me. Right when Manley did that I thought it was an accident and something caught his throat but then I realized a split second after t was intentional and I cracked up
In 1954 my family moved to a little village in northern New Jersey called Lake Telemark. In Rockaway Township.. I was 5 years old. Just over the hill was a place called Picatinny Arsenal. It was the original test site for all of the rocket engines developed for the X planes. We had one little store where we lived where we would stand and watch trucks with huge tubes of liquid oxygen passing by. The roar of the engines cracked concrete sidewalks and broke windows. While playing touch football we had to stop while the test was blasting away. We would sneak up there as kids would do and check it all out. We loved every day of it. We lived with it for my entire childhood. History being made everyday.
Cough"Shuttle"cough
Google:"Do you mean Flying Brick?"
or maybe a truck ?
Cough, cogh. XD ( 7:54 ).
@ *bowl of petunias or a sperm whale.
@@LeCharles07 42 is the answer.
@@LeCharles07 what an iconic reference.
Shuttle and X-15 had about the same glide ratio as an autorotating helicopter. I still haven't decided if that makes helicopters look good or spaceplanes look bad. For comparison, airliners are around 15:1, fighter jets are a bid behind airliners (there are exceptions in both directions, but big wings for maneuvering in dogfights/retaining control at 60kft and plaid speed are generally also good for gliding), and sailplanes (the things built for gliding) get up to 70:1.
It glided exactly as it was designed to, and had a thirty year record of perfect landings. Spaceplanes are not gliders. That it glided as well as it did is kind of amazing, considering how gigantic it was, and the sorts of stresses it had to endure.
Glide ratio is one measure, steady state sink rate is also important, and I think you will find the sink rate of an autorotating chopper is well below the X15 and shuttle.
but then fighter jets usually have a TTW slightly below 1, somewhere on the 0.8 to 0.98 range. Some few are above it.
My supercub has a 5.5 glide ratio at 50 mph indicated airspeed. The tradeoff is it flies really well at slow speed and can carry a relatively large load off of a short strip.
You should try it. The first harnessing of a thermal will amaze you.
The X-15 program was badass...just seeing the rockets kick in to Mach plus defines "going like a bat outta hell." Respect.
The Space Shuttle owed lot to the X-15 program, including similar glide characteristics. It was the X-15 where they proved the concept and developed that ability to manage energy for a high speed glide that was eventually used to bring the Shuttle to its landing sites. Even though they look nothing alike there are remarkable similarities in their glide characteristics.
Love stories like this, I grew up in Palmdale and worked on those lakebed runways during my high school summers at Edwards AFB. So much cool history in an otherwise drab place at the time.
Moral of the story Neil Armstrong’s name should be called “Ballstrong”
Serious brass!
Imagine Neil sliding down 7L at LAX at around 200 KIAS with sparks off the skids flying 500' in the air, screaming The Wild Blue Yonder on terminal...
I imagined the exact same scenario
That would have been quite a sight!
Lost again, sonifoabitch
NASA: "we built this thing. Don't know if it works. Any volunteers to fly it?" All hands go up. We'll likely never see the likes of these guys again. NASA thought about grounding Armstrong, because the fuel cost of lifting his balls was just too high.
Dude...😂👍
That’s funny
Armstrong was only planned for 11 X+15 flights while John McKay was planned to fly 50 test flights !
HopelessNerd nope we sure wont. Instead we have a young gen of morons needing safe spaces becuz of facts challenging their dement-iologies, and whose highlights are mostly making vids of their indestructibility in the face of a semi serious v|rus, by licking toilet seats and posting for the world to see...such bravery, such heroic risk taking.
In all seriousness, there will always be those people who want to push the boundaries of what’s possible with little regard for their own personal safety. It’ll take a lot more than a few societal changes to make explorers obsolete.
The shuttle cough was not only funny absolutely appropriate your shows are greatly appreciated thank you
Finesse for the X-15 was 4.5 while finesse for the Space Shuttle was 4.7 ... modern performance gliders have a finesse of 70.0
Totally guessed as to why and was pleasantly surprised that my guess was pretty right. Essentially the reason why Neil Armstrong had not hit his target runway was because he ended up basically pushing the X-15 past it's guesstimated max ceiling and lost lift, his inertia carrying him a ways until he was able to regain lift and glide back down. That's a man with some nerves of steel.
I think the 'bouncing' is interesting. Water skiing ... if you are over 50 mph, you can't enter the water in a fall, you just bounce along on top for several seconds. Painful seconds hahaha.
I've had to make an effort to JAM my arm in the water to stop, like when a dock is coming up.
Durn hard to do.
100 feet..... "either side" so he was below treetop level and flew between them 😲😨
I met Neil when he taxied his Cessna 310 onto our ramp in 1993 and I was the guy with the wands and chocks. Before he departed I got him to sign my logbook. Nice, quiet man.
You find that a lot with test pilots. Nothing gets their heartrate up! Laconic I think is the word. You hear it when Scott Crossfield talks too.
Fun fact, to simulate the gliding conditions in the shuttle, the test plane dove down with its engines in full reverse. It was that horrible at gliding.
It glided exactly as it was designed to, and had a thirty year record of perfect landings. Spaceplanes are not gliders. That it glided as well as it did is kind of amazing, considering how gigantic it was, and the sorts of stresses it had to endure.
Unfortunately the STS system was never as intended. The program was unable to find "customers" - however the USAF needed a vehicle to hoist surveillance satellites into orbit (that's the good news). It was intended to be a vehicle much more like the X-20 lifting body and placed atop the booster where it could be removed from harms way in a launch abort situation. Instead it was required to lift huge surveillance sats into orbit, (the bad news) requiring a much larger payload bay, - solid rocket boosters and a gigantic tank filled with liquid hydrogen. In engineering terms, it became what is known as a "kluge". And because of its immense size (roughly the size of a Boeing 737 aircraft), a contiguous heat shield could not be used, so they turned to a puzzle of fragile ceramic tiles, and reinforced carbon carbon panels. Turn around times could never be met and the schedule went sideways, and pressure to launch increased,against the advice of the engineers. The huge vehicle now had to dissipate immense energy upon atmospheric entry, due to its increased mass. In its original configuration, the Challenger catastrophe would never have happened, the human piloted vehicle would not be strapped to the side of a gigantic tank of hydrogen (lessons learned from the Hindenberg in 1937 - hydrogen goes boom very easily) and SRB's reliant on o rings to keep the gasses bottled up in the SRB stack. A kluge is always going to be a kluge, and it was becoming an increasingly dangerous kluge, that never met all (or many) of its mission objectives. However it did do some amazing things, leading to the success of the ISS, and the repair of the Hubble telescope. But it was an increasingly and unnecessarily dangerous kluge, thus its eventual grounding and program termination. The next gen low earth returnable vehicle is pretty much back to the original concept. Scott's videos are excellent.
Fun Fact 2:- KSC has a plastic slide chute set to replicate exactly the same glide angle as the Shuttles' approach. If you remove your shoes you can slide down it to experience the glide rate...it's very swift and steep.
@@cynthiaklenk6313 Without the Shuttle and its large payload bay, you've got no long-term space observatories like Hubble and Compton. Spitzer had to be downsized when the cryogenic upper stage was banned from the Shuttle. The ISS could never have been built up to a 6 crew configuration in a short enough period of time to satisfy politicians' short attention spans and the crew would still be spending over half their duty time on maintenance instead of science, or the only off-planet National Laboratory would be visiting Mir at Point Nemo before the first decade of the 21st century was finished. In that second case, China would be the only country with an operating space station.
@@RealityIsTheNow I'm pretty sure some of those landings wasn't the way they planned. Wasn't it supposed to be landing in one piece? Hard to land perfectly when you can't even take off without blowing up.
I had the fortune to speak with Gary Lockwood at a convention, and he stated that the portrayal of the Discovery astronauts in 2001 was heavily based on Lockwood's impressions after meeting Armstrong at an event. Which may be why Bowman and Poole were some of the very few fictional astronauts you could imagine being entrusted with a multi-billion dollar mission.
If Neil Armstrong was first man on the moon, then who took the pictures of him climbing down the ladder?
@Tru Quality I just think history should remember the mystery photographer who risk his life and made his own giant great leap for mankind to record that historical moment.
After watching the movie, one of my first questions was what happened when he "bounced" off of the atmosphere? I wanted to know more. Thank you for providing the answers!
When I was little the X 15 was my favorite. I never knew they could do what they did. Just learned only 3 were built!
2:10 That's some awesome AGI "Animated Generated Effects" I love that old school.
OMG, Scott When you were talking about the glide ratio of the X15 and coughed the words "Space Shuttle " I about pissed myself laughing 🤣😂🤣😂
As a youngster I found news of the X-15 fascinating. As a retiree I find it an even more remarkable aircraft for what it accomplished pioneering spaceflight. Thanks for the video.
First Man was a big disappointment for me, I enjoyed this video much more than the movie! I was frustrated by the lack of exterior shots in the movie, most of the movie seemed to be just close ups of things shaking. I think they really cheaped out on the special effects. The movie somehow made one of the most exciting events in human history look dull (and very shaky). There was an excellent opportunity to show exterior shots of the moon landing, instead it became a re run from 1969. I'm a huge Apollo fan, but I left the theater wishing I hadn't seen this movie.
Well said, I kind of thought the same. The X-15 flight looked like a soapbox on a gravel track. I doubt that this was accurate.
@Long Range Rifle you are probably a fake
I think this was their idea to show history from Neil's perspective, as it is film about him, not Apollo program. Also the scenes from exterior would be much more boring than from interior
@Long Range Rifle Because after Apollo 13 failure Congress decided to cancel Apollo 18-20
@Long Range Rifle exactly
I enjoyed the film, thanks for the extra details, Armstrong definitely had the "Right stuff".55 years later and Branson is struggling with a watered down version, however the X prize definitely spurred development in sub orbital flights.
Keep up the good work, it is much appreciated.
Thanks, although, to be fair Bransons version has to carry a bunch of paying passengers into space.
My dad designed the tail section of the X-15 and attended college with Neil.
Awesome
Scott, thank you for the breakdown. I knew of Neil Armstrong's test flight of an X-15 but was unaware of the details. Your video brought this into nail-biting focus.
The report should have been, "Experimental aircraft explodes. Fireman wets pants.”
Or better still: "Experimental aircraft explodes. Fireman wets Pilot's pants”
"Fireman Wets Pilot's Pants. Experimental Aircraft Explodes."? Or "Fireman Wets Pilot's Pants. Pilot Never Achieves 100% Thrust." (I'm sorry--it's late and I'm punchy ;-) )
You should get a life. A real life.
Preferably under the guidance of a social professional.
"Experimental aircraft explodes, pilot's demeanor dampened"
A Hollywood movie not entirely accurate? Shocking...
Neil Armstrong, what a life full of perfect skilled decisions at key moments!
Why - so the answer is Neil was looking at a g meter and pulled up too much?
....i.e. pilot error ?
Although pilots undergo a monumental amount of training I would say in general most pilots are not used to how much altitude you will gain during a 4G climb at Mach 3.
You mentioned the Dynasoar program. My father worked on that back in the early 1960s when he worked for Boeing. This is the only time I have heard reference to it. Good.
Kids can get away with more than adults in museums. It must have been late spring of 1969 when I was touring the old Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, looking large to a 13-year-old kid, but small in comparison to the museum today. The Smithsonian archivists must have just safed the X-15 #1 (arrived around December 1958) and rolled it out for display. It wasn't hanging up high or anything, it had been rolled into the museum and a rope barrier placed way too close to deter a 13-year-old. I had watched the security people and caught them looking elsewhere, reached up under the rope and put my hand on that wonderful piece of equipment. For as long as I live I will never forget the feel of that quick, stolen moment (as well as another similar feel when I was 16, but not of an aircraft.).
There were spots of paint peeling in some leading surfaces, but otherwise it looked like it could have been gassed up and taken back into flight. Still, after all these years I kick myself for not going after a piece of the peeling black paint instead of a nervous grope, but alas, it's hanging much too far out of reach when it is on display.
So are you saying he didn't bounce off the atmosphere?
Yea right..??
Thats the only reason I watched this... the bounce.. wth??
6:03
1:13>Scott Crossfield was head of development for North American Aviation. Soon after the explosion he called my Dad. I was just a kid at the time. Anyway...Dad left JPL and relocated to his new job cooling the X15 rocket engine during ground test. He managed to get the base commander to allow me to become the ‘Test Kid’. Many incredible memories....
Any chance you could share a few? There are many people out there that would love to hear the human interest side of these space programs.
Yeah that first sequence of the movie was really cool, but lacking on context. Luckily we have Scott to explain it to us! Thx!
I like how they worked Yeager in
Totally agree with you. This is top notch content
For the record, as soon as he said the X15 was a terrible glider, I instantly thought of the Space Shuttle, just before he had a coughing spasm
It's a trip to land on the lake bed in a regular aircraft at Edward's. Pretty easy to stick a landing on a 12 mile long runway. Alot smoother/harder than you would think it is. Got my chance in one of the aero clubs C172s when I was stationed there a 20 years ago as an avionics troop
Neil was the best pilot we had, He not only broke speed records in almost every new plane being tested but YES Did fly to the moon.
The astronaut's astronaut.
Ah no he didn't
With planets it's correct to photograph/video them center in the view, unlike normal photography where you put the subject off-center. This is also why it's correct that Scott Manley's head is at the center as his brain is as big as a planet.
saints and religious icons are also usually centered. not sure what i'm implying...
@@dextrodemon LOl!!
And his answer to the big question is: 42.
@@dextrodemon rocket jesus
Bolus of madcow ,run amuck !
Hi Scott, This video just popped years after you uploaded it. Hey, a couple of cool things...I brought my grandsons to the movie at an Imax Theater, it was awesome! One of my grandsons was so inspired by the movie he said that he wants to be an aerospace engineer! The other cool thing is...my family lived in that part of California when this flight happened. I was three years old and heard sonic booms on a regular basis.
I worked on B-52s for 12 years I specifically remember working on balls 8 I believe I saw that plane twice running through the depot the B-52 was the first aircraft I ever worked on I'm kind of partial to it.
From Edwards to LA and back in 12 minutes - that’s a fast commute Southern California drivers can envy!
“He’s bouncing off the atmosphere, and he’s seconds away from falling out of gravity and into space.”
-The Wrap
You serious???????
I read that too lol
Now that’s funny!
Considering escape velocity from earth is about Mach 33 and the X-15 did about Mach 6....not really a chance of "falling out of gravity into space"
jorgensenmj it’s a quote from an article in the wrap magazine. I’m quoting it here because it’s funny.
At 3500 you would have to nose down constantly.. or bounce off the atmosphere into outer place ?
If you're looking for the answer to the question in the title, jump to 6:03
1:20 and it just suddenly explodes
that was sudden
"Engine test notes:
Forgot to check staging"
Fun Fact, the team at North American that developed the X-15 was led by Harrison Storms, the same man who was in charge of the Apollo CSM program at NAA until the Apollo 1 fire. 2nd Fun Fact, the reason that Scott Crossfield survived that explosion was because the X-15 cockpit was pressurized with pure nitrogen during flight and ground runs. The pilot's pressure suit was also pressurized with pure nitrogen with a neck dam separating the helmet (which was pressurized with pure oxygen) from the rest of the suit. Had the X-15 been pressurized with pure oxygen, it would have been very likely that Crossfield would have been incinerated and killed.
@@richardvernon317 Unlikely to happen, the two accidents don't correlate to each other in any regard other than the fire itself, unlike the Appollo 1 capsule, Crossfield could manually release and open the canopy and get out, not to mention he was protected from the explosion by the rear cockpit bulkhead. Unlike the Mercury and Gemini capsules which had outward opening hatches, the Appollo capsule had an inward opening plug door design, that even if all 3 men were pulling on it, they couldn't have gotten it open because of the capsule being pressurized, Frank Borman testified to that fact at the congressional inquiry of the Appollo 1 accident. Also, NASA chose to over-pressurize the capsule with 100% Oxygen, that wasn't a decision made by North American or Stormy, in fact, he had protested NASA's practice of doing the plugs out test that way. So I have no idea why you're trying to equate the deaths of the Appollo 1 crew with the potential for Crossfield's death in the X-15 explosion, much less blame it on Stormy.
Explosions rather tend to be sudden events.
I was told this story by a friend of Mr. Armstrong. He me about a time an X-15 didn't catch air until he was over Catalina Island. To return to Edwards AFB there was a mountain range in the way. He made it and landed on the dirt just in front of the runway.
Oh hey. It's that video you told me was coming outside Twitch Con last week. Great to meet you out there. Love the videos.
I think the world would be a bit different if "Rocket space plane makes unplanned visit to LAX" was a thing.
Saw the movie yesterday. 9/10. Just wish the dramatic in-flight scenes were not so exaggeratedly shakey such as the launches. I found that annoying. Except for the stuck RCS in Gemini 8. That really would have been awfully dramatic.
IIRC the smakeyness was the part that real astronaughts (buzz aldrin, I think) like the most. Most space movies do not do justice to the reality of how jarring and overwhelming the noise of space travel is. Imagine trying to do what they have to do in THOSE conditions. Insane
@@Zack_Taylor Perhaps that's where I get my impression from. Hollywood :)
But the thing that suggests to me the visual shaking we saw in the movie is excessive is because the Astronauts would not have been able to read instruments or select switch settings during accent if it really was as bad as the movie suggested.
@@robguyatt9602 Maybe that just shows how incredible they are. Even without the shaking the movie can't make you experience the G forces they had to endure. They are amazingly capable human beings. I have yet to see the movie so will leave it there.
@@Zack_Taylor Get your arse into a cinema PRONTO. :) Regardless of suspicions of exaggerated vibration, it's a minor concern. The movie is great.
so your saying sitting in gemini rocket or a fuckin saturn v rocket at lift off isn't gonna be shakey....think mate.... armstrong aldrin and collins and any of the other guys in the apollo programme said at lift off those rockets would shake extremely violently with that amount of thrust... the launches in the film were totally accurate.
Weird cough you got there.
You might want to watch that, it might blow up. Twice.
* cough * flying brick * cough *
He's got shuttle fever caused by too many cooks cooking the broth
Weird flex but ok
Florian Messner
Cough-cough * F-104 * cough-cough
it's amazing what we have now based off of what we had then~USAF Vet
I read Tom Wolfe's book :The Right Stuff". You always hear the line, "Read the book, you'll love it." Well, I did that..AFTER I saw the movie. The book is outstanding, and gives great insight into not only the space program in general, but into the lives and personalities of the main players, one of then being Armstrong. Wolfe also adds his own brand of humor and tongue-in-cheek observation, which made for very good reading of what could be considered dry and very technical information. In my opinion, he was one very strange individual. Very accomplished and an excellent technical flyer and engineer, he was portrayed as being a very cold and unfeeling person. Couple that with the film "First Man" and I can sort of agree with that analysis.
Whatever else was wrong with the Shuttle's design, its glide ratio was exactly what it needed to be and was never an issue on any flight. If you want to fly a U2 into orbit you're doing it wrong.
The jokes about the bad glide ratio aren’t an implication it should be better (among those who know what the point was at least), it’s just humorous how bad it was given what aircraft usually have.
*another great video; by the way, what do you think about the Boeing x-37?*
It's pretty cool, would love to know what it's up to.
Good video as always. Would like to see more videos discussing aspects of that movie and what they got right and wrong. Enjoyed the movie.
Amy Shira Teitel did a movie review of it as well, where she discusses a few points.
As a boy in grade school I was excited about all things space and exploration. I wrote a book report about the X-15 and have marveled over that “plane” ever since.
Brave men back then, have the use of computers reduced the danger to test pilots today?
Armstrong's mental precision and priority organizational skills were unmatched at NASA.
Armstrong certainly had "The Right Stuff."
the title “Experimental aircraft explodes. Pilot wets pants” actually never happened. it was a joke that crossfield made after the accident. "Recalling the event later he would muse 'I pictured the headline: space ship explodes - pilot wet pants!' he was saved the embarassment" ("North American X-15" by David Backer, Hayes Publishing, page 137)
Saw this aircraft in person at wright patterson AFB museum. It's stunning. Sadly I didn't realize just how much history was in it and it's unfortunately overshadowed by that giant Valkyrie they have in the hanger with it. I spent all of my time with my jaw on the floor looking up at that giant thing. It has quite the presence. Whereas the X-15 is about car height, and you look down at it which you'd have to stop and realize what you're looking at. The valkyrie kind of demands your gaze in that place though. Overshadowing all the other (amazing and incredible) aircrafts in the hangar. That place is a candy store for aviation enthusiasts. If you go to Ohio, you MUST visit. :D
Yea I've been there too and unfortunately did the same thing you did. My favorite part by far about the museum though is the Memphis belle in their restoration hangar
@@davidatwater3744 LOL glad i'm not the only one. Feel a little guilty for not giving that X-15 more of my attention. But there was so much there. I could have spent a week there lol. Didn't get to see that one either, sadly. :( I spent a lot of time in the first hangar with all the early planes. Was fascinating. :) What was your fav part of that place I wonder?
@youtubasoarus
My father was stationed at Wright Patterson when I was a teen. The museum was a 10 minute bike ride, so I spent many many hours in the museum. Back then the XB-70 was parked outside and you could walk right up to it. The XB-70 is the coolest plane ever.
My favorite part was getting to visit back when the X planes were still in an old hanger on the base. No ropes, no barriers, just a guide asking you to please not touch then letting you go like school kids being dropped off at the playground. I spend probably 20 minutes laying on the ground under the A-12 looking up at it, and that again standing up inside its landing gear bay. The XB-70 BARELY fit in the hangar, maybe 5ft to spare. The whole collection was just so awesome to experience up close like that.
@@5000TQ Awesome I remember that A-12 in the hangar just to the front right of the Valkyrie. Incredible presence as well. That SR-71 did it for me though, the dark ambiance of that hangar (hangar 3?) really added to it. Sounds like youv'e been more than a few times? Lucky.
The X - 15 was my Big Interest when I was a Kid. What a Machine.
Wow that really puts into perspective just how sharp a best of the best test pilot is.
7:55 *_*cough*_* *SPACESHUTTLE*
3:38 - Oh, just say "indicated airspeed"!
I haven't seen the movie but I don't think I need to any more!
Anyway I've never been totally on board with the let's-take-liberties-with-modern-history-for-dramatic-effect genre of movie. It has its place, but I'd much rather watch something like Mr. Manley.
The movie is great and you should watch it, if only for the space scenes.
ugh fiiiiiiine 😅
I actually met Mr. Armstrong once. He lived in my home town. I set up his Blockbuster account.
Now I'm curious as to what kind of movies he would rent from Blockbuster.
I wish I knew! I never saw him again, it was a vacation home for him, I believe. I grew up in Park City, Utah, and there were a fair number of recognizable people around from time to time. I also set up a Blockbuster account for Larry Bird. And Cheech Marin came in for batteries once and I directed him to the Shopko next door. Exciting stuff! haha
Scott Manley stated "The movie is great and you should watch it, if only for the space scenes."
The completely fictional scene of Neil dropping his daughter's bracelet into Little West Crater was a big turnoff for me. That did NOT happen. I don't understand why Hollywood can't just tell the story as it was. They did the same thing in Apollo 13 with the made-up argument between Fred Haise and Jack Swigert. You've just experienced a massive explosion from your spacecraft. You're venting your oxygen to space. Most of your electrical capacity has apparently been lost in the explosion. You most likely don't have enough oxygen or power to get you back to Earth. Oddly, that's not enough drama for Hollywood so they make up a scene of the Astronauts arguing.
Great video. Neil Armstrong is a national treasure of the U.S. and deserves all the credit and praise that we can bestow upon him.
The Cough at 7:55 wins the internet for Oct 30th, 2018 Hilariously well done!!
Off topic, would it be feasible to lift the international space station into a lunar orbit? I have heard that there are slow low energy transfer options that might work.
I agree with most of what you say, yet a low thrust module might be added, or a extra fuel to help the thrusters it does have... again slow low thrust long duration transfer. As for shielding does water work well? Wouldn’t outside bladders help with long term shielding? The transfer does not need to be manned. It just seems like a trillion dollars plus hardware already in space should be preserved if possible.
Why would you even want to do such a thing?
Adding shielding is the main issue. The existing boost thrusters are sufficient as long as a deep inspection doesn't reveal any pending failure. Age does not effect the main structure but the electronics are likely in need of some fresh capacitors.
The cost of getting anything out of the Earths atmosphere and into orbit should justify thinking about this.
I agree about the manning through the Van Allen belts. With a low energy slow transition. But why would it have to be manned during the orbital change?
Hey Scott, can you make a video about the upcoming sparrow moon lander and it's unique flight path? Due to be launched on a falcon 9. Made in Israel
what is supposed to be different with it? Just wondering
It's a piece of junk.
It'll use several gravity assists of the moon to reduce delta v requirements for the mission.
I think
And it's not a "piece of junk"
It's a beautiful, well designed lander. And NASA takes part in it's mission.
oh yeah! those early days so much going on then..and my hero of the time chuck yeager.. those were exciting times. maybe because I was young ( and everything is exciting to the young) But then merc, Gem, and apollo.. man did we think all the dreams of Asimov, heinlein, clarke and others was about to unfold on us and the utopian world about to come to Fruition... Well maybe in the next life eh?
There isn't one.
Excellent video, dumbed down enough so that this flight-ignorant enthusiast could understand all of the issues of this historic event. The more I learn about Armstrong, the more awe-inspiring he becomes. Thank you, Scott.
"How close was the X-15 to the trees near the lake bed?"
"About 100 feet...either side"
There is no trees there. There were no trees there. Video of the landing shows he came nowhere near even a scrub brush or cactus.
You know what... that might also have been a joke