Capt. Charles “Chuck” Yeager breaks the sound barrier. Piloting the XS-1, Glamorous Glennis, Yeager fires the rocket motor as the experimental plane is dropped from the B-29 mother ship. He accelerates to Mach 1.06 over the dry lake bed at Muroc, California. This is the first time that supersonic speed is reached in level flight by a powered aircraft. This is a joint USAF-NACA program.