british pilot john cunningham crashed and was killed while trying to break the sound barrier on september 27th 1946.
british pilot john cunningham crashed and was killed while trying to break the sound barrier on september 27th 1946.
british pilot crashed and was killed while trying to break the sound barrier on september 27th 1946?
john cunningham
meanwhile, test pilots achieved high velocities in the tailless, swept-wing de havilland dh 108. one of them was geoffrey de havilland, jr. who was killed on 27 september 1946 when his dh 108 broke up at about mach 0.9. john derry has been called "britain's first supersonic pilot" because of a dive he made in a dh 108 on 6 september 1948.









































section::::history.:sound barrier officially broken in aircraft.
sound barrier
contrary to what is depicted in the film, the first aircraft to break the sound barrier was the rocket-powered bell x-1 flown by chuck yeager of the united states air force in 1947. as yeager, who was present at the us premiere, described in his first biography, "the sound barrier" was entertaining, but not that realistic – and any pilot who attempted to break the sound barrier in the manner portrayed in the film (forcing the centre stick forward to pull out of a dive) would have been killed. because the 1947 bell x-1 flight had not been widely publicised, many who saw "the sound barrier" thought it was a true story, and that the first supersonic flight was made by a british pilot.
the sound barrier