Snapshot
September 28, 2009
Take Your Pick
A Northrop M2F2 lifting body lands at NASA Dryden Research Center with an F-104 flying chase. On this date 43 years ago, the M2F2 made its ninth safe landing, which meant a heck of a good day for anyone at the controls. The least stable of all the lifting body designs that NASA tested during this era, with a rounded belly and a flat top, the M2F2 would crash eight months later on May 10, 1967, during its 16th and final glide flight before its first planned powered flight. The wreck seriously injured test pilot Bruce Peterson, but became the well known intro of the 1970s TV show "The Six Million Dollar Man."
Photo: NASA
Comments