It seems like an urban legend. It seems like something that a fiction writer would dream up to make for good copy but we’re here to assure you that the United States Air Force had and operated (still operates?) a 35,000ft long, dead-nuts straight railroad track that used rocket powered sleds to test all kinds of stuff, especially the effects of speed and G-forces on people. Colonel John Stapp of the Air Force became a cult hero during his life and long past his death by being perhaps the only man willing enough and brave enough to strap himself to this rocket powered death machine and achieve speeds of 632mph while sitting OUT IN THE OPEN. Remember, the fastest open car at Bonneville was Art Arfons Cyclops at about 360mph…he was nearly 300mph faster than that with no control over the throttle, no ability to “shut it off” and only a helmet and a flight suit on for “protection”. Stapp suvived all kinds of brutal testing. At one point he survived some 63Gs of force during a test of rapid deceleration. His eyes filled with blood and the whole deal, but ultimately he was OK.
They tested parts for Saturn V rockets on here, jet ejection systems, and awesomely violent impact testing on missiles and stuff. Of course the missiles were dummies on the end of rockets but the video of those tests that you’ll see in the film below is awesome as hell. As completely nuts as the whole thing sounds, you’ll be pretty amazed at the breadth of research done on this thing and the ingenious solutions that the builders came up with to replicate circumstances like rainfall, etc.
Our favorite part of the whole thing is when they show the brakes used on some of the testing sleds. Masonite damns were built and placed into the spaced between the tracks. That space was then flooded. Sleds were equipped with a big steel scoop on the bottom and when the scoop got into the water that was the beginning of the “brakes”. The scoop would funnel the water up and forward throwing it against the progress of the sled. This was called “transfer of momentum” braking and when you see how well it worked, you’ll be trying to retrofit your hot rod with it.
This is a great way to chew up some time on a Sunday. Enjoy!
No video here? I have seen it before, its a whole new level of CRAZY