Yeager’s right stuff

Chuck Yeager refuses to slow down, said Marco della Cava in USA Today. “I’ll be 90 in February, and while I’m not gonna run no marathon, I still hunt and fish and fly,” says Yeager, who in 1947 became the first man to break the sound barrier, in the Bell X-1 rocket plane. The World War II fighter ace and former test pilot says his famously 20/20 vision remains sharp. His ears are another matter. “I can’t hear well. Damn P-51 Mustang noise. You go sit behind that engine for eight hours, with a leather helmet on. But that’s a handicap that came with the job.” Yeager shrugs off other dangers he faced, describing the day his experimental plane spun out of control in 1953 as if it were just another day in the office. “When I landed they took me to the hospital, but I was okay so they let me go home. But I had to drive to L.A. to give a speech at the Army and Navy Club. Got home at 2 a.m. and went to bed. That was my day. That’s the way we lived.” Was he afraid at any point? “What good does it do to be afraid? You better try and figure out what’s happening and correct it.” So none of his feats were heroic? “A lot of it was just being in the right place at the right time.”

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