{"id":22032717,"date":"2026-09-13T13:18:03","date_gmt":"2026-09-13T11:18:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/northrop-n-9m-flying-wing-b-2-ancestor-1942-2019\/"},"modified":"2026-09-13T13:19:04","modified_gmt":"2026-09-13T11:19:04","slug":"northrop-n-9m-flying-wing-b-2-ancestor-1942-2019","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/it\/northrop-n-9m-flying-wing-b-2-ancestor-1942-2019\/","title":{"rendered":"Northrop N-9M: The Flying Wing That Led to the B-2"},"content":{"rendered":"<style>.et_pb_title_container h1.entry-title { padding-top: 40px !important; }<\/style>\r\n\r\n<p>In April 1980 a very ill old man was wheeled into a room at Northrop and shown a model of an aircraft. He had spent his career insisting that the ideal aeroplane was a wing and nothing else &mdash; no fuselage, no tail, no drag it did not need &mdash; and the industry had spent decades proving it could not be made to work.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>Jack Northrop could no longer speak by then. He wrote his reaction instead. According to the account in Air &amp; Space Forces Magazine, the words were: now I know why God has kept me alive for 25 years. He died ten months later, in February 1981, having seen the classified shape of what would become the <a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/aircraft\/b-2-spirit\/\">B-2 Spirit<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>The little yellow aircraft in the photograph above is the reason he was right.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f5f5f5;padding:20px;margin:26px 0\"><p style=\"margin:0 0 10px;font-weight:700\">Quick Facts<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>What it was:<\/strong> A roughly one-third-scale flying wing testbed, 60 ft (18 m) span, for the full-size 172 ft (52 m) Northrop XB-35 and YB-35 bombers<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>First flight:<\/strong> 27 December 1942, Northrop test pilot John Myers<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Built:<\/strong> Four aircraft: N-9M-1, N-9M-2, N-9MA and N-9MB<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Construction:<\/strong> Partly wooden framework, laminated plywood wing skins, welded tubular steel centre section<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Engines:<\/strong> Two 290 hp Menasco C6S-1 Buccaneer inverted air-cooled sixes; the N-9MB used two 300 hp Franklin XO-540-7<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>First loss:<\/strong> 19 May 1943, near Muroc Army Air Base. Pilot Max Constant killed<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Last loss:<\/strong> 22 April 2019, the restored N-9MB, at Norco, California. The pilot was killed<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Legacy:<\/strong> Northrop&rsquo;s all-wing lineage led to the B-2 Spirit, which entered USAF service in 1989<\/p><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Why a Wing and Nothing Else<\/h2>\r\n\r\n<p>The argument for a flying wing is brutally simple. Every part of a conventional aeroplane that is not the wing creates drag without creating lift. Delete the fuselage and the tail, spread the payload and crew inside the wing itself, and you should get more range from the same fuel.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>Northrop had been chasing this since 1929, with the twin-boom X-216H, and then more purely with the N-1M of 1939 to 1941. The problem was never the aerodynamic theory. It was control. Without a tail there is nothing to damp yaw and pitch, so an all-wing aircraft wants to wander, and it will happily depart into a spin that a conventional design would shrug off.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>In 1941 the Army ordered the XB-35, a 172-foot flying wing bomber. Nobody knew how to fly such a thing, so on 30 October 1941 the contract was confirmed with a one-third-scale trainer attached: the N-9M, built to gather flight data and to teach pilots what a wing without a tail actually does.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px;width:100%\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/northrop-n-1m-flying-wing-demonstrator.jpg\" alt=\"The Northrop N-1M flying wing demonstrator\" style=\"width:100%;height:auto;max-width:100%;display:block\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">The N-1M of 1939 to 1941, the pure flying wing that preceded the N-9M. Jack Northrop had been pursuing the all-wing idea since 1929. Photo: Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Plywood, Menasco Engines and Constant Failure<\/h2>\r\n\r\n<p>The N-9M was not a precious prototype. Its framework was partly wood to save weight, its outer wing surfaces were skinned in specially laminated plywood, and the centre section was welded steel tube. It was a flying slide rule.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>John Myers took the first one up on 27 December 1942. Over the following five months the aircraft made 45 flights, and nearly every single one ended early because something broke. The Menasco engines were the main culprit, which is a familiar story for any wartime programme forced to use whatever powerplant was available rather than the one it wanted.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>Then, on 19 May 1943, with about 22.5 hours on the airframe, the first N-9M entered a right-hand spin, 60 degrees nose down, roughly twelve miles west of Muroc Army Air Base &mdash; the place now called Edwards. Max Constant did not get out. The investigation found control reversal: during his recovery attempt the control column had been forced back against his chest, and he could not move it.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>That is the flying wing&rsquo;s original sin in one sentence. The aerodynamics that make it efficient also make it capable of loading up the controls until a pilot physically cannot win.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"position:relative;padding-bottom:56.25%;height:0;overflow:hidden;margin:24px 0\"><iframe class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/7Dfj3SeMI-s\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;border:0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>Restored colour film of the later, jet-powered YB-49 &mdash; the aircraft the whole N-9M programme was building toward.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Three Scrapped, One Saved<\/h2>\r\n\r\n<p>Three more N-9Ms were built and the programme ran on until the Flying Wing bomber was cancelled. Then every remaining test aircraft was scrapped except the last one, the N-9MB, which was left to rot for more than thirty years.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>In 1982 the Planes of Fame Air Museum at Chino, California, took it on. Over the next two decades former Northrop employees and volunteers rebuilt it to flight condition &mdash; people who had worked on the original programme putting their own aircraft back together. From 1993 the yellow-and-blue wing flew display sequences at airshows every year. It survived an in-flight engine fire in April 2006, was repaired, and flew again at Chino in May 2010.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px;width:100%\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/northrop-n-9mb-flying-wing-front.jpg\" alt=\"The Northrop N-9MB flying wing\" style=\"width:100%;height:auto;max-width:100%;display:block\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">The N-9MB, the only N-9M not scrapped, restored to flight by Planes of Fame volunteers and flown at airshows from 1993. Photo: Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Norco, 22 April 2019<\/h2>\r\n\r\n<p>On 22 April 2019 the N-9MB took off from Chino on a low-altitude test flight following its annual inspection. Witnesses on the ground, at least one of them a qualified pilot, described it flying straight and level at what sounded like normal cruise power when it pitched up into a climb, banked left, and then rolled abruptly to the right.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>It came down at 12:10 pm inside the grounds of the California Rehabilitation Center, a state prison at Norco. The pilot was killed. Nobody on the ground was hurt.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #d32f2f;padding:20px 22px;margin:18px 0 24px;font-size:16px;line-height:1.7;display:flex;gap:20px;align-items:flex-start\"><div><em>&ldquo;Given the significant fragmentation of the wreckage, the reason for the loss of control could not be determined.&rdquo;<\/em><div style=\"margin-top:10px;font-size:14px;color:#555\"><strong>National Transportation Safety Board<\/strong> &mdash; Findings on the 22 April 2019 loss of the Northrop N-9MB<\/div><\/div><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>The NTSB attributed the accident to the pilot&rsquo;s loss of control for undetermined reasons. Seventy-six years after Max Constant, the last flying N-9M was lost in a departure from controlled flight that nobody has been able to explain.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"position:relative;padding-bottom:56.25%;height:0;overflow:hidden;margin:24px 0\"><iframe class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/lSf5TX_FcBw\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;border:0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>The N-9MB flying at Planes of Fame, in footage that can never be repeated.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">The Vindication<\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #1565c0;padding:20px 22px;margin:18px 0 24px;font-size:16px;line-height:1.7;display:flex;gap:20px;align-items:flex-start\"><div><em>&ldquo;Now I know why God has kept me alive for 25 years.&rdquo;<\/em><div style=\"margin-top:10px;font-size:14px;color:#555\"><strong>Jack Northrop<\/strong> &mdash; Aircraft designer, on being shown a model of the future B-2 in April 1980; he had lost the ability to speak and wrote the words down<\/div><\/div><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>The flying wing did not fail. It was simply forty years early. What the N-9M could not solve with cables, pulleys and a pilot&rsquo;s arm strength, the B-2 solved with computers making hundreds of tiny control corrections per second &mdash; a fly-by-wire system quietly doing the job a tail would otherwise do.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>Stealth then turned the wing&rsquo;s shape from an efficiency argument into a strategic one: no vertical surfaces means very little to reflect radar back at the transmitter. The configuration Jack Northrop wanted for range turned out to be the configuration you would choose for invisibility.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>Every B-2, and every flying-wing drone that followed it, traces back through a 60-foot wooden aeroplane that broke down on 45 flights out of 45 and killed two pilots seventy-six years apart.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"position:relative;padding-bottom:56.25%;height:0;overflow:hidden;margin:24px 0\"><iframe class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/iWFNohd5i-A\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;border:0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<style>.mfq{margin:34px 0 8px}.mfq h2{font:26px\/1.3 \"Gilroy semiBold\",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#0d1117;padding-top:22px;margin:0 0 6px}.mfq .qa details{border-top:1px solid #5C91FF;margin:0;padding:0}.mfq .qa details:last-of-type{border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee}.mfq .qa summary{cursor:pointer;list-style:none;display:flex;justify-content:space-between;align-items:center;gap:16px;padding:22px 26px;font:18px\/1.7 \"Gilroy semiBold\",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#0d1117}.mfq .qa summary::-webkit-details-marker{display:none}.mfq .qa summary::after{content:\"+\";font:24px Helvetica,sans-serif;color:#3568e0;flex:0 0 auto}.mfq .qa details[open] summary::after{content:\"\\2013\"}.mfq .qa details:hover summary{color:#3568e0}.mfq .qa .a{font:16px\/1.7 \"Gilroy regular\",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#454e5e;padding:0 26px 24px}.mfq .qa .a a{color:#3568e0}@media(max-width:680px){.mfq .qa summary{padding:18px 14px;font-size:17px}.mfq .qa .a{padding:0 14px 20px}}<\/style>\r\n\r\n\r\n<section class=\"mfq\"><h2>Frequently Asked Questions<\/h2><div class=\"qa\"><details open><summary>What was the Northrop N-9M?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">The N-9M was a roughly one-third-scale flying wing testbed with a 60 ft (18 m) wingspan, built to support development of the full-size Northrop XB-35 and YB-35 flying wing bombers, which spanned 172 ft (52 m). It first flew on 27 December 1942 with Northrop test pilot John Myers at the controls, and its purpose was to gather flight data and familiarise pilots with an aircraft that had no tail.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>How many N-9Ms were built and what happened to them?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">Four were built, designated N-9M-1, N-9M-2, N-9MA and N-9MB. The first was destroyed in a fatal crash on 19 May 1943. When the Flying Wing bomber programme was cancelled, all the remaining aircraft were scrapped except the N-9MB, which deteriorated for over three decades before the Planes of Fame Air Museum acquired it in 1982 and restored it to flying condition.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Why did the first Northrop N-9M crash?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">On 19 May 1943, after roughly 22.5 hours of flight time, the first N-9M entered a right-hand spin at about 60 degrees nose down around twelve miles west of Muroc Army Air Base, now Edwards Air Force Base. The pilot, Max Constant, was killed. The investigation found he had suffered control reversal, with the control column pressed back against his chest during the recovery attempt, preventing him from moving it.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>What caused the 2019 crash of the restored N-9MB?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">The National Transportation Safety Board attributed the 22 April 2019 accident at Norco, California, to the pilot&rsquo;s loss of control for undetermined reasons, noting that given the significant fragmentation of the wreckage the reason for the loss of control could not be determined. The aircraft had taken off from Chino Airport on a low-altitude test flight after its annual inspection. The pilot was killed and there were no casualties on the ground.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>How is the N-9M connected to the B-2 Spirit?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">The N-9M was part of Northrop&rsquo;s long lineage of all-wing designs, which began with the X-216H in 1929 and the N-1M of 1939 to 1941. That body of work led Northrop, later Northrop Grumman, to the B-2 Spirit stealth bomber, which entered US Air Force service in 1989. What the N-9M could not achieve with mechanical controls, the B-2 achieved with a computerised fly-by-wire flight control system.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Why is a flying wing more efficient than a conventional aircraft?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">On a conventional aeroplane the fuselage and tail produce drag without producing lift. A flying wing removes them, carrying crew, fuel and payload inside the wing itself, which reduces drag and can increase range for the same fuel load. The penalty is stability and control: with no tail surfaces there is little to damp pitch and yaw, which made early flying wings prone to departing controlled flight.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Did Jack Northrop live to see the B-2?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">He saw a classified model of it. In April 1980, after the necessary security clearances were arranged, Northrop Corporation showed him a model of the forthcoming flying wing bomber. Illness had left him unable to speak, so he wrote his response, reportedly: now I know why God has kept me alive for 25 years. He died on 18 February 1981, some eight years before the B-2 was publicly rolled out.<\/div><\/details><\/div><\/section>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@type\":\"FAQPage\",\"mainEntity\":[{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"What was the Northrop N-9M?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"The N-9M was a roughly one-third-scale flying wing testbed with a 60 ft (18 m) wingspan, built to support development of the full-size Northrop XB-35 and YB-35 flying wing bombers, which spanned 172 ft (52 m). It first flew on 27 December 1942 with Northrop test pilot John Myers at the controls, and its purpose was to gather flight data and familiarise pilots with an aircraft that had no tail.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"How many N-9Ms were built and what happened to them?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"Four were built, designated N-9M-1, N-9M-2, N-9MA and N-9MB. The first was destroyed in a fatal crash on 19 May 1943. When the Flying Wing bomber programme was cancelled, all the remaining aircraft were scrapped except the N-9MB, which deteriorated for over three decades before the Planes of Fame Air Museum acquired it in 1982 and restored it to flying condition.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Why did the first Northrop N-9M crash?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"On 19 May 1943, after roughly 22.5 hours of flight time, the first N-9M entered a right-hand spin at about 60 degrees nose down around twelve miles west of Muroc Army Air Base, now Edwards Air Force Base. The pilot, Max Constant, was killed. The investigation found he had suffered control reversal, with the control column pressed back against his chest during the recovery attempt, preventing him from moving it.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"What caused the 2019 crash of the restored N-9MB?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"The National Transportation Safety Board attributed the 22 April 2019 accident at Norco, California, to the pilot\u2019s loss of control for undetermined reasons, noting that given the significant fragmentation of the wreckage the reason for the loss of control could not be determined. The aircraft had taken off from Chino Airport on a low-altitude test flight after its annual inspection. 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The penalty is stability and control: with no tail surfaces there is little to damp pitch and yaw, which made early flying wings prone to departing controlled flight.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Did Jack Northrop live to see the B-2?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"He saw a classified model of it. In April 1980, after the necessary security clearances were arranged, Northrop Corporation showed him a model of the forthcoming flying wing bomber. Illness had left him unable to speak, so he wrote his response, reportedly: now I know why God has kept me alive for 25 years. He died on 18 February 1981, some eight years before the B-2 was publicly rolled out.\"}}]}<\/script><p><em>Sources: Air &amp; Space Forces Magazine, National Transportation Safety Board, Planes of Fame Air Museum, Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, Vintage Aviation News.<\/em><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f0f4ff;border-left:4px solid #5C91FF;padding:16px 20px;margin:32px 0 8px\"><p style=\"margin:0 0 8px;font-weight:600;color:#333\">Related Posts<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/northrop-yb-49-flying-wing-b2-spirit\/\">The Northrop YB-49: The Flying Wing That Died So the B-2 Could Live<\/a><\/p><\/div>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jack Northrop spent fifty years insisting a wing needed nothing else. A 60-foot wooden aeroplane proved him right, broke down on nearly every flight, and killed two pilots seventy-six years apart.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":22032395,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"editor_notices":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[666,664],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22032717","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history-and-legends","category-military-aviation"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Northrop N-9M: The Flying Wing That Led to the B-2<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Northrop N-9M was a 60-foot wooden flying wing that proved Jack Northrop right, broke constantly, and killed two pilots 76 years apart.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, 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