Lockheed XF-90

The Lockheed XF-90 was a long-range penetration fighter and bomber escort built for the United States Air Force to a requirement that also produced the McDonnell XF-88 Voodoo. Designed by Willis Hawkins and the Skunk Works team under Kelly Johnson, it shared the intake and low-wing layout of the P-80 Shooting Star but had wings swept back 35 degrees and two Westinghouse J34 turbojets side by side in the rear fuselage. Two prototypes were built, and the first flight was on 3 June 1949 with chief test pilot Tony LeVier at the controls. The aircraft was underpowered, needing rocket-assisted takeoff for most early flights even though the second prototype had afterburners. It was the first USAF jet with an afterburner and the first Lockheed jet to fly supersonic, in a dive. McDonnell won the production contract in September 1950; one prototype was tested to destruction at the NACA laboratory in Cleveland and the other survived three atomic blasts at the Nevada Test Site in 1952 and is now at the National Museum of the United States Air Force.