The XB70 supersonic bomber was one of the most beautiful aircraft of all time! The image quality of surviving copies this film is variable. This is a new restoration now in HD.
The critical first four flight tests of the XB70A over 34 days at Edwards AFB are shown in detail culminating in the aircraft's first supersonic flight (with an B58 Hustler chase plane!). As might be expected, these early flights included some dramatic moments, including an in flight engine flame out and one of the landing gear bursting into flames during touch down. But, as mission chief test pilot Col Al White says, "if there were no problems during testing, you wouldn't need test pilots or test flights." You'll see the unflappable Col White and copilot Col Joe Cotton work the sleek Valkyrie through a series of critical tests, including landing gear, flaps, flight controls, advanced hydraulic systems, first deployment of the folding wing tips and more. A highlight of the film is a press conference/debriefing by the XB70 test flight team. As you'll see, there's nothing "routine" about testing a revolutionary and extremely complex aircraft like the XB70A Valkyrie.

The super size, supersonic XB70 was conceived to meet a specification from the Strategic Air Command issued in the early 1950s for a highaltitude bomber that could fly three times the speed of sound, and was the culmination of the "higher, faster" school of bomber design going back to the B29. The B70 was given the go ahead over a competing Convair atomic powered design. But, by the end of the decade, due to funding constraints, improvements in Soviet surfacetoair missiles and a new emphasis on cheaper to build ICBMs, the combat bomber specification was dropped and only two XB70s were actually produced as research aircraft for the study of aerodynamics, propulsion and supersonic flight.

The North American design was a huge, sleek, delta winged aircraft with an added canard, powered by six General Electric YJ93 after burning turbojet engines, with a thrust of nearly 30,000 pounds each. Gross weight was above 500,000 pounds. The six engines were housed sideby side in the rear of the large under fuselage box, fed by a variableinlet system with a series of movable ramps, optimizing the airflow into the engines at varying Mach numbers. Maximum speed was 1,982 mph at 75,550 feet. The Valkyrie was built of stainlesssteel honeycomb sandwich panels and titanium and was designed to use "compression lift" when the shock wave generated by supersonic speeds supported part of the aircraft's weight. For improved supersonic stability, the Valkyrie could droop its wingtips as much as 65 degrees.

The No.1 XB70 made its initial flight on Sept. 21, 1964, and achieved supersonic flight on Oct. 14th. The No. 2 airplane first flew on July 17, 1965, but on June 8, 1966, it crashed following a midair collision. The No. 1 airplane continued in its research program until flown to the Air Force Museum on Feb. 4, 1969, where it is now on display.
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