Space History Photo: Submarine in Full Scale Tunnel at NACA Langley

space history, nasa, submarine, drag, wind tunnels

The world's fastest submarine in 1950, the Albacore, is tested at Langley for drag characteristics in a NACA wind tunnel. (Image credit: NASA.)

In this historical photo from the U.S. space agency, in 1950 Langley tested the drag characteristics of what was then the world's fastest submarine, the Albacore, in the 30 x 60 Full Scale Tunnel.

Water and air are both essentially fluids of different densities. Air traveling at high speed can simulate water traveling at lower speed for many purposes.

The National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics (NACA) was a precursor to NASA. NACA was created by Congress in 1915.

Each weekday, SPACE.com looks back at the history of spaceflight through photos (archive).

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The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is the U.S. government agency in charge of the civilian space program as well as aeronautics and aerospace research. Founded in 1958, NASA is a civilian space agency aimed at exploring the universe with space telescopes, satellites, robotic spacecraft, astronauts and more. The space agency has 10 major centers based across the U.S. and launches robotic and crewed missions from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral Florida. It's astronaut corps is based at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. To follow NASA's latest mission, follow the space agency on Twitter or any other social channel, of visit: nasa.gov.