The most iconic of the X-Planes is perhaps the most straightforward: the bright orange X-1, piloted by Chuck Yeager, which broke the sound barrier in 1947. It currently hangs inside the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum. NASA’s X-15 hit a top speed of mach 6 and explored flight at the edge of space. The Forward-swept wings of NASA’s X-29 are rarely copied, but the X-29 program also tested a lot of new control surfaces for planes and automated systems for controlling flight. NASA’s own score sheet for the program, which flew planes from 1946 to 1995, it itself a history of what was possible at the time, what was impossible, and what needed other, further advancements to become real. Fittingly, NASA’s aims are both modest, such as better flaps: …and industry-changing, like a move away from the classic winged pointy tube. If NASA gets the funding to go ahead with a new X-Plane program, we at Popular Science couldn’t be more X-cited.
