Air Force

This propulsion wind tunnel (PWT) at Arnold AFB was the first large-scale facility for testing jet and rocket engines in simulated high-speed flight conditions. It has a unique combination of transonic (1955) and supersonic (1960) wind tunnels using a common 236,000 horsepower drive, the world's largest when built. It can achieve air speeds up to Mach 4.75 at altitudes up to 150,000 feet in its 16-foot square, removable test sections. Design engineers were Lief J. Sverdrup, John R. Parcel, Brice Smith, and Walter Cook, of Sverdrup and Parcel, St.

During the 1920s, Edwin A. Link was employed in his father's organ building and repair business. He obtained his pilot's license in 1927 and became convinced that a mechanical device could be built as an inexpensive method to teach basic piloting. Link received three patents on his flight trainer (No. 1,825,462, March 12, 1930; No. 2,244,464, June 3, 1941; and No. 2,358,016, Sept. 12, 1944).

Wind tunnel testing of aircraft models is essential to determine aerodynamic parameters such as lift and drag. The 5-foot Wright Field wind tunnel is an early example of the modern wind tunnel, well known from the early 1920s to the late 1950s for its contributions to research and the development of nearly every major aircraft and associated hardware used by the US Air Force and its predecessor, the Army Air Service.

Getafe Airfield was the site of the world’s first successful rotorcraft flight, on January 17, 1923. Lieutenant Alejandro Gómez Spencer piloted a C.4 Autogiro designed and built by Juan de la Cierva, who tested a series of autogiros between 1920 and 1924 at the Getafe site. Cierva’s autogiros introduced important technologies and flight techniques that led to the development of helicopters and other rotary wing aircraft. Getafe Air Base, established in 1911, now houses several training and transport units of the Spanish Air Force, as well as two aerospace manufacturing plants.

Established in 1935 as the Valparaiso Bombing and Gunnery Base, the base supported the U.S. Army Air Corps, the predecessor to the U.S. Air Force, as its primary facility for training new pilots in bombing and gunnery tactics. It also served as a test facility for aircraft, aircraft armament, air-delivered munitions and other aircraft systems. The base was renamed Eglin Field in 1937 in honor of Air Corps aviator Lt. Col. Frederick I. Eglin, who trained pilots during World War I, and who had recently died in an aircraft accident. After Congress created the U.S.

The Atlas E-2 Space Booster, or launch vehicle, is a modified intercontinental ballistic missile developed by the Convair Division of General Dynamics and the U.S. Air Force. The basic concept of the Atlas system was proven in its first flight on June 11, 1957, followed over the years by the launching more than five hundred vehicles including the Pioneer, Ranger, Mariner, and Surveyor. Many payloads were sent into orbit as detachable sections of Atlas missiles.