Science: Self-Knockout

Supersonic speed has brought a new hazard for jet-plane pilots: shooting themselves down with their own gunfire. Last week the Navy told how Test Pilot Tom Attridge was trying out the 20-mm. guns of a Grumman F11F-i fighter off Long Island. He put the airplane into a dive, speeded up to 880 m.p.h. and fired a four-second burst (about 70 rounds). Then he went into a steeper dive and fired another burst. As the last bullets left his guns, something struck and shattered his windshield. Pilot Attridge thought he had run down a bird. He headed for the Grumman base at...

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