Offline
from Time magazine, April 25, 1960. (Note - "Uplands Airport" is a former name of today's Ottawa's MacDonald-Cartier Airport, IATA code "YOW".)
The sonic boom was never so explosive as it was last August, when a U.S.A.F. fighter pilot demonstrated his Lockheed F-104 Starfighter to Canadian officials at Ottawa's Uplands Airport. It was a trial run. Next day the pilot was to put on a show at the dedication of the airport's new terminal building, a great, shiny green-glass cavern with an aluminum and stainless-steel structure. Answering an official's request to see him buzz the field, the pilot swung the Starfighter out in an arc, then leveled and came in low and flat. Like a bullet, he was gone. And—boom—so was the new terminal. Only splinters were left of more than $10,000 worth of glass; the whole north wall was smashed; tiles fell from the ceiling, and insulating material poured to the floor. Door frames, window frames, and even structural beams were twisted. Damage: $500,000.
To Air Force public relations men, the sonic boom is a splitting headache, without apparent remedy. "We must learn to live with it," said one recent Air Force release, "for in today's unsettled world we cannot live without it. The boom is unavoidable. It is the sound of security."
Maybe not such a good idea to buzz a glass building at the speed of sound, 500 ft AGL.
Tom M.
The sonic boom was never so explosive as it was last August, when a U.S.A.F. fighter pilot demonstrated his Lockheed F-104 Starfighter to Canadian officials at Ottawa's Uplands Airport. It was a trial run. Next day the pilot was to put on a show at the dedication of the airport's new terminal building, a great, shiny green-glass cavern with an aluminum and stainless-steel structure. Answering an official's request to see him buzz the field, the pilot swung the Starfighter out in an arc, then leveled and came in low and flat. Like a bullet, he was gone. And—boom—so was the new terminal. Only splinters were left of more than $10,000 worth of glass; the whole north wall was smashed; tiles fell from the ceiling, and insulating material poured to the floor. Door frames, window frames, and even structural beams were twisted. Damage: $500,000.
To Air Force public relations men, the sonic boom is a splitting headache, without apparent remedy. "We must learn to live with it," said one recent Air Force release, "for in today's unsettled world we cannot live without it. The boom is unavoidable. It is the sound of security."
Maybe not such a good idea to buzz a glass building at the speed of sound, 500 ft AGL.
Tom M.