Final Dispositions

In November 1968, William P. Albrecht and Vincent N. Capasso inspected X-15A-2, which had been in storage at the FRC since the completion of the thermal tests. The engineers determined what work would be needed to prepare the aircraft for display in a museum, or to return it to flight status if necessary. As the airplane stood, it was missing control surfaces, most of its cockpit displays, and the removable right outer wing panel. All of the pieces were stored nearby.[393]

A cursory inspection of the airplane showed signs of minor corrosion in unprotected areas, and the engineers believed the aircraft needed "a thorough inspection for corrosion with cleaning and repainting as required. A lubrication would be accomplished at the same time to protect moving surfaces…. This would take two men approximately 2 to 4 weeks to accomplish."*394

To restore the vehicle to flight status, the engineers believed three to four months of work would be required, including installing the engine plumbing, control surfaces, actuators, and SAS pump. All of the wiring would have to be checked and the hydraulic system would need servicing. In addition, the instrument panel would have to be installed and the landing gear made flight-ready.

If the airplane went to a museum, the engineers thought that some items (mainly bars to replace the control surface actuators) would have to be fabricated. A rough estimate included three people for a month to prepare the airplane for display, plus time to paint and stencil the exterior.-1395!

Officially, the X-15 program simply "expired" at the end of its authorized funding on 31 December 1968. After the New Year holiday, things began to happen quickly. Between the Apollo program and the increasing tempo of the air war in Southeast Asia, neither NASA nor the Air Force seemed particularly interested in the small black airplanes that were stored in the High – Temperature Loads Calibration Laboratory at the FRC.

On 4 January 1969, officials at Edwards formally requested reassignment instructions for the two remaining X-15 airplanes. A response came on 20 February directing that the "number one X-15 be made available for display in the Smithsonian Museum. The Smithsonian is prepared to receive the X-15 and it may be transported to Andrews as soon as it is ready for shipment. In order to protect the option of any future flight test program, extreme care should be taken in handling the X-15 so that it will not be altered or damaged. The Air Force Museum should retain accountability for the aircraft and reassign it to the Smithsonian for display." A later message directed NASA to transfer X-15A-2 to the Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson AFB.!396

A meeting on 7 January 1969 at North American discussed how best to dispose of the remaining program assets for which North American still had responsibility. Unlike many programs that require the contractor to account for every pencil purchased with government funds, the X-15 ended much more casually. For instance, the "contractor was advised … that no physical inventory of X-15 assets will be required," and that the North American working inventory would be "accepted by the Air Force as the formal X-15 inventory record." The Air Force justified this casual attitude by noting that "(a) it is a research type program, (b) the last physical inventory was taken less than a year ago, (c) [it is] in the interest of program economy." Nevertheless, North American had to assign class codes (indicating how to dispose of the item) to some 9,000 line items having a monetary value in excess of $6,000,000.[397]

On 18 March 1969, the public affairs officer at the FRC wrote to his counterpart at NASA Headquarters. The opening paragraph was telling: "Sometime this spring, probably May, the number one X-15 will go into the Smithsonian. Because of the haste of the announcements and Apollo 8, the world didn’t seem to care much when the program was concluded last December. I’d like to see if we can’t remind the world about the X-15 and use the Smithsonian as an excuse."!3981

The Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum (NASM) had begun its efforts to acquire an X-15 as early as 1962, but nothing was likely to happen as long as the flight program continued. After the funding expired, the Air Force agreed to lend X-15-1 to NASM for two years. NASA partially disassembled X-15-1, loaded it onto a flatbed trailer, and flew it to Andrews AFB inside an Air Force transport. On 13 May 1969, a truck moved X-15-1 from Andrews to the Silver Hill Facility (later the Paul E. Garber Facility) in Maryland. After some minor refurbishment, the Smithsonian installed the X-15 near the original 1903 Wright Flyer on the floor in the north hall of the Arts and Industries building, which housed the NASM at the time. On 7 July 1971, the Air Force officially transferred ownership of X-15-1 to the NASM, which subsequently loaned the airplane to the FAA for display at Transpo 72 in the spring of 1972. The airplane then traveled to the FRC to help commemorate its 25th anniversary. The NASA loan was effective for one year beginning in August 1972, but ultimately was extended until the summer of 1975. The X-15 returned to the Smithsonian for installation in the new NASM building on the mall before it

opened to the public on 1 July 1976. X-15-1 currently hangs in the Milestones of Flight Gallery at the NASM in Washington, D. C.[399]

X-15A-2, completely refurbished after its unhappy experience with the ablative coatings, became the property of the National Museum of the United States Air Force at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio. However, prior to the airplane arriving in Ohio, the museum loaned it to the Alabama Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville (now the U. S. Space & Rocket Center). The airplane arrived on a one – year loan on 27 March 1970, although for some reason the Air Force did not installed the right wing while the airplane was in Huntsville. The airplane now sits—in black Inconel finish—in the Presidential and Research & Development Galleries of the National Museum of the United States Air Force. A set of external tanks and a dummy ramjet are part of the display.

The Air Force buried the remains of X-15-3 at an undisclosed location on the Edwards reservation. In 1991 the Astronaut Memorial at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, added Mike Adam’s name, a tacit reminder of an oft-forgotten manned space program.*400

The two NB-52s remained at Edwards to support the heavyweight-lifting-body program. Not long after the end of the lifting-body program, NASA retired the NB-52A to the Pima Air & Space Museum outside Tucson, Arizona. The NB-52B continued to serve as a carrier aircraft, launching the X-38 and X-43 vehicles, through the beginning of 2005. NASA finally received a B-52H in mid-2005 to serve as a carrier aircraft, but a lack of requirements resulted in the airplane returning to the Air Force in 2006. At the time of its retirement, the NB-52B was the oldest operational (and lowest flight time) B-52 in the Air Force.*401