North American X-15
Rocket-powered aircraft and spaceplane operated by the US Air Force and NASA
Why this is trending
Interest in “North American X-15” spiked on Wikipedia on 2026-02-26.
Categorised under Science & Nature, this article fits a familiar pattern. Science and technology topics tend to trend after breakthroughs, space missions, health announcements, or widely shared research findings.
At GlyphSignal we surface these trending signals every day—transforming Wikipedia’s vast pageview data into actionable insights about global curiosity.
Key Takeaways
- The North American X-15 is a hypersonic rocket-powered aircraft formerly operated by the United States Air Force and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the X-plane series of experimental aircraft.
- The X-15's highest speed, 4,520 miles per hour (7,274 km/h; 2,021 m/s), was achieved on 3 October 1967, when William J.
- 7 at an altitude of 102,100 feet (31,120 m), or 19.
- During the X-15 program, 12 pilots flew a combined 199 flights.
The North American X-15 is a hypersonic rocket-powered aircraft formerly operated by the United States Air Force and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the X-plane series of experimental aircraft. The X-15 set speed and altitude records in the 1960s, crossing the edge of outer space and returning with valuable data used in aircraft and spacecraft design. The X-15's highest speed, 4,520 miles per hour (7,274 km/h; 2,021 m/s), was achieved on 3 October 1967, when William J. Knight flew at Mach 6.7 at an altitude of 102,100 feet (31,120 m), or 19.34 miles. This set the official world record for the highest speed ever recorded by a crewed, powered aircraft and remains unbroken.
During the X-15 program, 12 pilots flew a combined 199 flights. Of these, 8 pilots flew a combined 13 flights which met the Air Force spaceflight criterion by exceeding the altitude of 50 miles (80 km), thus qualifying these pilots as being astronauts; of those 13 flights, 2 (flown by the same civilian pilot) met the FAI definition (100 kilometres (62 mi)) of outer space. The 5 Air Force pilots qualified for military astronaut wings immediately, while the 3 civilian pilots were eventually awarded NASA astronaut wings in 2005, 35 years after the last X-15 flight.
Content sourced from Wikipedia under CC BY-SA 4.0
