One Hundred Years of Flight USAF Chronology ... - The Air University

1956
August 23–24: An Army crew in an H–21 helicopter made the first transcontinental
nonstop helicopter flight, covering 2,610 miles from San
Diego to Washington, D.C.
September 7: Capt. Iven C. Kincheloe, Jr., USAF, set the altitude record for
manned flight at Edwards Air Force Base, California, piloting a Bell
X–2 transonic, rocket-powered aircraft to a height of 126,200 feet.
Captain Kincheloe received the Mackay Trophy for this flight.
September 27: Capt. Milburn G. Apt, USAF, while flying a Bell X–2 rocketpowered
airplane launched from a B–50 bomber, became the first
pilot to fly at three times the speed of sound. Unfortunately, the flight
ended in a fatal crash.
October 1: The National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics awarded its
Distinguished Service Medal to Dr. Richard T. Whitcomb, inventor of
the area-rule concept for the design of supersonic aircraft. The F–102
was the first aircraft to incorporate the concept.
October 20: Cmdr. Conrad Shinn and Lt. Cmdr. Roy E. Curtis, USN, made
the first airplane landing at the South Pole.
October 26: At Fort Worth, Texas, Bell pilot Floyd Carlson piloted the first
flight of the XH–40 helicopter, later redesignated the UH–1 or Iroquois
(Huey)—one of the most useful of the U.S. helicopters in Vietnam.
November 26: Secretary of Defense Charles E. Wilson issued a memorandum
to the Armed Forces Policy Council, giving the Air Force responsibility
for developing intercontinental ballistic missiles.
November 30: A Martin TM–61 Matador, a jet-propelled missile, completed
its final flight test and became the Air Force’s first operational tactical
missile. With a range of several hundred miles, the Matador cruised at
650 miles per hour and had a ceiling of 35,000 feet. It equipped the
701st Tactical Missile Wing at Hahn Air Base, Germany.
December 9: The 463d Troop Carrier Wing received the Air Force’s first
C–130 Hercules tactical-airlift aircraft. This four-engine turboprop airlifter
had an unrefueled range of over 2,500 miles, could carry outsized
cargo of almost 50,000 pounds or up to 92 troops, and could take
off and land within about 3,600 feet.
December 11: Operation SAFE HAVEN began. By June 30, 1957, cargo aircraft
of the Military Air Transport Service had airlifted more than
10,000 Hungarian refugees from West Germany to asylum in the
United States. The refugees had fled their country when Soviet troops
crushed an anticommunist rebellion there.
79