Through the viewfinder of
his camera,
Ensign John Gay could see the fighter plane drop from the sky heading
toward
the port side of the aircraft carrier Constellation. At 1,000 feet, the
pilot drops the F/A-18C Hornet to increase his speed to 750 mph, vapor
flickering off the curved surfaces of the plane. In the precise
moment
a cloud in the shape of a farm-fresh egg forms around the Hornet 200
yards
from the carrier, its engines rippling the Pacific Ocean just 75 feet
below,
Gay hears an explosion and snaps his camera shutter once.
I clicked the same time I heard the boom,
and I knew I had it",
Gay said.What he had was a technically
meticulous depiction of the sound barrier being broken July 7,
1999,somewhere
on the Pacific between Hawaii and Japan.
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