I was hearing rumors of this last night through the grapevine, but some news outlets are now reporting the Scott Crossfield's private aircraft is missing, possibly (and even likely) with him aboard.

If he bought the farm, I imagine he wouldn't have wanted to go any other way. I'm thinking the worst in this, because someone of his caliber knows how to fly his plane, communicate with controllers, and handle aircraft that are unstable.

At about the time his aircrat went missing, 1100 4/19/06, there was some severe weather in Northern Georgia. I'm only a few miles east of the area his plane was last reported and it was pretty bad here.

Ah, man, that's a great loss. I only met Crossfield once, at Oshkosh in 2002. He was very supportive and encouraging of us at XCOR, and admired the EZ-Rocket. Good man, my condolences to his family.

Searchers are now saying a body has been found in the plane's wreckage.

Fox is reporting that Crossfields body has been recovered from the AC wreckage.

:-(

Crossfield was a truly great test pilot. My favorite story about his was his last flight in the X-15, which happened to be the first flight with the big engine and a full load of propellant. He was a company test pilot for North American and after his flight, the plane was turned over to the Air Force ready to set all sorts of records. The test card called for him to push it near but just below Mach 3.0. A less professional pilot might've been tempted to drop the hammer but Crossfield took it to Mach 2.97.

A similar temptation had to be felt by the Apollo 10 crew. They got the LM down to 10 miles above the lunar surface and I'm sure the thought had to cross their minds to just go ahead and attempt a landing. However, they knew that the LM they were flying was too heavy to successfully land. But still, to be that close, not knowing if you'd ever get back to the moon....

Scott Crossfield was a childhood hero of mine, and I got to work with the man for several years. He was a staffer in the late '80s/early '90s for the House Science Committee. He had a wicked sense of humor.

Posted above his desk was the patented Crossfield Yogometer, which, of course, measures how deep in the yogurt something is.

We once had a field hearing in Long Beach, but with the Chairman of the Subcommittee staying up in the Hollywood area. So there I am, with the rental car, and with Crossfield in the right front passenger seat, and we're both off to pick this guy up VERY early in the morning. Just to be ready, and to not be a screw-up, I'd (A) driven the route the day before to get familiar, and (B) had lots of specialized maps made up and sitting in the front with me.

What, screw up in front of Crossfield?! I'd have rather have died.

Anyway, what I *got* was a blow-by-blow tour as we drove up the 405 of his life as a boy living and growing up along that same route.

Wow.

RIP, Scotty. Ya done good all over the place.

One of my favorite stories came from the first ground test of the big rocket motor for the X-15. Due to faulty valve, the engine blew, and shot rest of the plane forward. Surrounded by fire, Scott waited for the fire crew to come get him. After being pulled out, he went before the press and said something to the effect of: "The only damage was to the pleat of my pants when the fire team wet me down." Sure enough, one paper had the headline "X-15 blows up, pilot wets pants".

The other good one was him finding out a test plane had no wheel brakes by running it into a hanger door. Chuck Yeager remarked: "The sonic wall is mine, but the hanger wall is Scott's"

R.I.P. Scott, you were one of a rare breed.

I have two special memories of Crossfield.

The first is from a conference we were both attending on hypersonic vehicles, long about 1994 or so. After hearing whine after whine from various presenters about how "we can't do anything anymore" I got fed up and said "We had none of this stuff in the 50s and 60s, and we went to the Moon. Just shut up and go build something." Mr. Crossfield came across the room to shake my hand (much to my amazement and chagrin, because he is one of my heroes).

The other fond memory is of him in 2002, at AirVenture in Oshkosh, WI. XCOR was in Kermit Weeks's hangar, putting the EZ-Rocket together after a long cross country trip with it on a trailer. I saw Crossfield come into the other end of the hangar, which is where the VIPs were sent to get their badges and such. I invited him to come see "a real rocket powered vehicle."
"Yeah?" he said. "I have a lot of paperwork to do here but I'll be over when it's done."
And then he _warped_ over to the EZ: he beat me back to it and I swear you could have read a book by the light in his face. That was a purely little-kid-in-candy-store grin he was wearing. We were very pleased to make him that happy.

He will be missed.