[en] In a prematurely aborted attempt to demonstrate the feasibility of using a gas core nuclear reactor as a rocket engine, NASA initiated a number of studies on the relevant fluid mechanics problems. These studies were carried out at NASA laboratories, universities and industrial research laboratories. Because of the relatively sudden termination of most of this work, a unified overview was never presented which demonstrated the accomplishments of the program and pointed out the areas where additional work was required for a full understanding of the cavity flow. This review attempts to fulfill a part of this need in two important areas