Space shuttle Enterprise is seen as the United States Marine Corp Drum and Bugle Corps and Color Guard march by at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center Thursday, April 19, 2012 in Chantilly, Va. Enterprise was the first space shuttle orbiter, built for NASA to perform test flights in the atmosphere and was not capable of spaceflight. It has been on display at the Udvar-Hazy Center's Space Hangar since 2004. Enterprise will be transferred to the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York City. Photo Credit: (NASA/Carla Cioffi)

"Taps" is played during the funeral service for former astronaut and U.S. Senator John Glenn, who was buried with full military honors, at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia on Thursday, April 6, 2017, the day on which he and his wife Annie were married in 1943. Glenn was the first American to orbit Earth on Feb. 20, 1962, in a five-hour flight aboard the Friendship 7 spacecraft. In 1998, he broke another record by returning to space at the age of 77 on the Space Shuttle Discovery. Photo Credit: (NASA/Aubrey Gemignani)

The 8- by 6-Foot Supersonic Wind Tunnel at the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory was the largest supersonic wind tunnel in the nation at the time and the only one able to test full-scale engines at supersonic speeds. The 8- by 6 was designed as a non-return and open-throat tunnel. A large compressor created the air flow at one end of the tunnel, squeezed the flow to increase its velocity just before the test section, then reduced the velocity, and expelled it into the atmosphere at the other end of the tunnel. This design worked well for initial aerodynamic testing, but the local community was literally rattled by the noise and vibrations when researchers began running engines in the test section in January 1950. The NACA’s most modern wind tunnel was referred to as “an 87,000-horsepower bugle aimed at the heart of Cleveland.” NACA Lewis responded to the complaints by adding an acoustic housing at the end of the tunnel to dampen the noise. The structure included resonator chambers and a reinforced concrete muffler structure. Modifications continued over the years. A return leg was added, and a second test section, 9 -by 15-foot, was incorporated in the return leg in the 1960s. Since its initial operation in 1948, the 8- by 6-foot tunnel has been aggressively used to support the nation's aeronautics and space programs for the military, industry, and academia.