Who broke the sound barrier

In aerodynamics, the sound barrier usually refers to flight at transonic speeds, between subsonic and supersonic speeds. The term came into use during World War II when a number of aircraft started to encounter the effects of compressibility, a grab-bag of unrelated aerodynamic effects. The term fell out of use in the 1950s when aircraft started to routinely “break” the sound barrier. Refer to the speed of sound for the science behind the velocity referred to as the sound barrier.

The first flight at faster than the speed of sound occurred on 14 October 1947. The aircraft was the Bell X-1 and the pilot was Captain Charles Yeager.

It was in the X-1 that Chuck Yeager was the first person to break the sound barrier in level flight on October 14, 1947, flying at an altitude of 45,000 ft (13.7 km).

The sound barrier was first broken in a vehicle in a sustained way on land in 1948 by a rocket-powered test vehicle at Muroc Air Force Base (now Edwards AFB) in California, United States. It was powered by 6000 pounds (27 kN) of thrust, reaching 1,019 mph (1,640 km/h).^[5]

Jackie Cochran was the first woman to break the sound barrier on May 18, 1953, in a Canadair Sabre, with Yeager as her wingman.