Portal:Aviation
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The Aviation Portal
Aviation includes the activities surrounding mechanical flight and the aircraft industry. Aircraft includes fixed-wing and rotary-wing types, morphable wings, wing-less lifting bodies, as well as lighter-than-air craft such as hot air balloons and airships.
Aviation began in the 18th century with the development of the hot air balloon, an apparatus capable of atmospheric displacement through buoyancy. Some of the most significant advancements in aviation technology came with the controlled gliding flying of Otto Lilienthal in 1896; then a large step in significance came with the construction of the first powered airplane by the Wright brothers in the early 1900s. Since that time, aviation has been technologically revolutionized by the introduction of the jet which permitted a major form of transport throughout the world. (Full article...)
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The Luftwaffe became an essential component in the "Blitzkrieg" battle plan. Operating as a tactical close support air force, it helped the German armies to conquer the bulk of the European continent in a series of short and decisive campaigns in the first nine months of the war, experiencing its first defeat during the Battle of Britain in 1940 as it could not adapt into a strategic role, lacking heavy bombers with which to conduct a strategic bombing campaign against the British Isles.
Despite this setback the Luftwaffe remained formidable and in June 1941 embarked on Adolf Hitler's quest for an empire in eastern Europe by invading the USSR, with much initial success. However, the Luftwaffe's striking victories in the Soviet Union were brought to a halt in the Russian winter of 1942-1943. From then on, it was forced onto the strategic defensive contesting the ever increasing numbers of Soviet aircraft, whilst defending the German homeland and German occupied Europe from the growing Allied air forces pounding all aspects of German industry.
Having failed to achieve victory in the Soviet Union in 1941 or 1942, the Luftwaffe was drawn into a war of attrition which extended to North Africa and the Channel Front. The entry of the United States into the war and the resurgence of the Royal Air Force's (RAF) offensive power created the Home Front, known as Defense of the Reich operations. The Luftwaffe's strength was slowly eroded and by mid 1944 had virtually disappeared from the skies of Western Europe leaving the German Army to fight without air support. It continued to fight into the last days of the war with revolutionary new aircraft, such as the Messerschmitt Me 262, Messerschmitt Me 163 and the Heinkel He 162, even though the war was already hopelessly lost. (Full article...)
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Did you know
...that four planes were simultaneously hijacked in the 1970 Dawson's Field hijackings? ...that the Cessna 165 aircraft was instrumental in the recovery of the Cessna Aircraft Company in the years following the Great Depression? ... that Coast Aero Center and Norving were the first airlines with scheduled services at Geilo Airport, Dagali located in Hol, Norway?
General images - load new batch
- Image 2One of Leonardo's sketches (from History of aviation)
- Image 3Concorde, G-BOAB, in storage at London Heathrow Airport following the end of all Concorde flying. This aircraft flew for 22,296 hours between its first flight in 1976 and final flight in 2000 (from History of aviation)
- Image 5Experimental helicopter by Enrico Forlanini (1877), exposed at the Museo nazionale della scienza e della tecnologia Leonardo da Vinci of Milan, Italy (from History of aviation)
- Image 6Early Voisin biplane (from History of aviation)
- Image 8Maxim's flying machine (from History of aviation)
- Image 10Alberto Santos-Dumont flying the Demoiselle over Paris (from History of aviation)
- Image 13Planophore model aeroplane by Alphonse Pénaud, 1871 (from History of aviation)
- Image 14Nieuport IV, operated by most of the world's air forces before WW1 for reconnaissance and bombing, including during the Italian-Turkish war (from History of aviation)
- Image 15French reconnaissance balloon L'Intrépide of 1796, the oldest existing flying device, in the Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna (from History of aviation)
- Image 16First failure of Langley's manned Aerodrome on the Potomac River, 7 October 1903 (from History of aviation)
- Image 17The Wright Flyer: the first sustained flight with a powered, controlled aircraft (from History of aviation)
- Image 19Clément Ader Avion III (1897 photograph) (from History of aviation)
- Image 20"Governable parachute" design of 1852 (from History of aviation)
- Image 22Map of record breaking flights of the 1920s (from History of aviation)
- Image 23La France flying in 1885 (from History of aviation)
- Image 25Flagg biplane from 1933 (from History of aviation)
- Image 26The Biot-Massia glider, restored and on display in the Musee de l'Air (from History of aviation)
- Image 29Woodcut print of a kite from John Bate's 1635 book The Mysteryes of Nature and Art (from History of aviation)
- Image 31"Map of Air Routes and Landing Places in Great Britain, as temporarily arranged by the Air Ministry for civilian flying", published in 1919, showing Hounslow, near London, as the hub (from History of aviation)
- Image 321928 issue of Popular Aviation (now Flying magazine), which became the largest aviation magazine with a circulation of 100,000. (from History of aviation)
- Image 33D.H. Comet, the world's first jet airliner. As in this picture, it also saw RAF service (from History of aviation)
- Image 39Santos-Dumont's "Number 6" rounding the Eiffel Tower in the process of winning the Deutsch de la Meurthe Prize, October 1901 (from History of aviation)
- Image 401843 artist's impression of John Stringfellow's plane Ariel flying over the Nile (from History of aviation)
In the news
- May 29: Austrian Airlines cancels Moscow-bound flight after Russia refuses a reroute outside Belarusian airspace
- August 8: Passenger flight crashes upon landing at Calicut airport in India
- June 4: Power firm helicopter strikes cables, crashes near Fairfield, California
- January 29: Former basketball player Kobe Bryant dies in helicopter crash, aged 41
- January 13: Iran admits downing Ukrainian jet, cites 'human error'
- January 10: Fire erupts in parking structure at Sola Airport, Norway
- October 27: US announces restrictions on flying to Cuba
- October 3: World War II era plane crashes in Connecticut, US, killing at least seven
- September 10: Nevada prop plane crash near Las Vegas leaves two dead, three injured
- August 6: French inventor Franky Zapata successfully crosses English Channel on jet-powered hoverboard
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Selected biography
Foulois conducted the acceptance test for the Army's first aircraft, a Wright Model A, in 1909. He participated in the Mexican Expedition from 1916–17 and was part of the American Expeditionary Force in France during World War I where he was responsible for the logistics and maintenance of the U.S. air fleet. During World War I he and Billy Mitchell began a long and hostile relationship over the direction of military aviation and the best method to get there. After the war he served as a military attaché to Germany where he gathered a great deal of intelligence on German aviation. He later went on to command the 1st Aero Squadron and ultimately commanded the Air Corps.
He retired in 1935 as part of the fallout from the Air Mail scandal. Foulois continued to advocate for a strong air service in retirement. In 1959, at the invitation of the Chief of Staff of the Air Force, Foulois began touring Air Force bases advocating national security. He died of a heart attack on 25 April 1967 and is buried in his home town of Washington, Connecticut.
Selected Aircraft
The Antonov An-225 Mriya (Антонов Ан-225 Мрія, NATO reporting name: Cossack) was a strategic airlift transport aircraft built by Antonov, and was the world's largest powered aircraft before its destruction in February 2022. Mriya (Мрія) means "dream" (inspiration) in Ukrainian.
With a maximum gross weight of 640,000 kg (1,400,000 lb), the An-225 was the world's heaviest aircraft. Although its wingspan is less than that of the Hughes H-4 "Spruce Goose", the latter never went beyond a single short low-altitude test flight, making the An-225 the largest aircraft in the world to take off more than once. Both the An-124 and An-225 are larger than the C-5 Galaxy, the largest aircraft in the U.S. inventory. The An-225 was also larger than the Airbus A380.
- Span: 88.40 m (291 ft 2 in)
- Length: 75.30 m n(246 ft 11 in)
- Height: 18.1 m (59.3 ft)
- Engines: 6× ZMKB Progress D-18 turbofans, 229 kN (51,600 lbf) each
- Cruising Speed: 750 km/h (400 knots, 465 mph)
- First Flight: December 21, 1988
Today in Aviation
- 2013 – The Israeli Air Force scrambles an F-16 Fighting Falcon fighter to intercept an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) as it approaches Israel from the coast of Lebanon. The F-16 shoots down the UAV, which Israel suspects belonged to Hezbollah, over the Mediterranean Sea at an altitude of 6,000 feet (1,829 meters) six miles (9.7 km) from Haifa, Israel.[1]
- 2011 – Prime Minister of Italy Silvio Berlusconi approves the use of Italian aircraft in ground-attack missions in Libya as part of NATO's Operation Unified Protector.[2]
- 2010 – A Royal New Zealand Air Force Bell UH-1H Iroquois crashed in heavy fog about 40 km north east of Wellington. Three persons were killed and a fourth seriously injured.
- 2009 – Lockheed P-2 V Neptune N442NA of Neptune Aviation Services crashes into a hill at Stockton, Utah, while on a ferry flight. The aircraft is destroyed and all three crew were killed.
- 1996 – First flight of the Yakovlev Yak-130
- 1992 – Second prototype Lockheed YF-22A, N22YX, suffers severe damage during start of a go-around when it belly-flops at Edwards AFB, California, following eight seconds of pilot-induced oscillation at an altitude of 40 feet when test pilot Tom Morgenfeld ignored a test-card requiring the 2-D convergent-divergent thrust nozzles to be locked in position during this stage of the PIO tests. Control surface actuators hit rate limiters causing commands to get out of synchronization with their execution, and the test fighter hit the ground, skidded several thousand feet, inducing fire that destroyed 25 percent of the airframe. Crash footage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdfIiZnVhTI Aircraft never flew again, being rebuilt as a shell and subsequently used to test antennae at the Rome Air Development Center, Griffiss AFB, New York.
- 1990 – McDonnell-Douglas F-15 Eagle s/n 81-0049 flown by the 32nd TFS based at Soesterberg AB, Netherlands suffered an engine fire while flying in a three ship formation during Exercise Elder Forest and subsequently lost all hydraulic power. Pilot major George D. Hulsey ejected safely and was picked up by an oil-rig supply vessel. Aircraft crashed into the North Sea, 9 miles off Spurn Point Humberside, United Kingdom.
- 1986 – First flight of the Air Tractor AT-501
- 1983 – NASA exploration spacecraft Pioneer 10 flies past the orbit of Pluto.
- 1980 – Dan-Air Flight 1008, a Boeing 727, crashes into a mountain near Tenerife, Spain; all 138 passengers and eight crew die.
- 1972 – Hans-Werner Grosse sets a new sailplane distance record of 1,460 km (908 miles) in a Schleicher ASW 12
- 1968 – Apollo 6's SIV-B staqe re-enters the Earth's atmosphere and the Apollo 6 command module is recovered.
- 1967 – A USAF Lockheed EC-121H-LO Warning Star, 53-549, of the 551st AEWCW, out of Otis AFB, Massachusetts, ditches in the North Atlantic ~one mile off of Nantucket, Massachusetts, just after having taken off from that base. One survivor, 15 crew KWF. Five bodies were not recovered. Col. James P. Lyle, the Commander of the 551st AEW&C Wing to which all the aircraft and crew members were assigned, was the pilot. Colonel Lyle had been assigned to take over that command nine months earlier. It was he who presented each of the next of kin of 11 November 1966 crash victims with the United States Flag during that memorial service.
- 1962 – The United States Department of Defense announces its choice of the Northrop F-5 Freedom Fighter for its Military Assistance Program.
- 1957 – Northrop SM-64 Navaho, 53-8272, falls back onto launchpad at Cape Canaveral, Florida, a few seconds after liftoff and explodes.
- 1956 – First flight of the Bensen B-8 Gyro-Boat with a basic free-turning rotor system, known as the Roto-sail
- 1952 – John Jay Hopkins founds General Dynamics Corporation.
- 1951 – Cubana de Aviación Flight 493: Douglas DC-4, registration CU-T188, (ex-C-54A-15-DC, 42-72263) c/n 10368, en route from Miami, Florida, United States, to Havana, Cuba, has a mid-air collision with US Navy Beechcraft SNB-1 Kansan, BuNo 39939, which was on an instrument training flight in the vicinity of Naval Air Station Key West at the same time. All 43 aboard the airliner and four on the SNB were killed. Flight 493 departed Miami at 1109 hrs. and was cleared to climb to 4,000 feet (1,200 m) on a direct heading to Key West. Approximately ten minutes later, the SNB-1 took off from NAS Key West for simulated instrument training. Although the flight was not cleared to a specific altitude or heading, standard instrument training procedures were in place. At 1149 hrs. Flight 493, heading south, and the SNB-1, heading west, collided over NAS Key West at an estimated altitude of 4,000 feet (1,200 m).
- 1948 – A North American YP-86 becomes the first jet-powered aircraft to exceed Mach 1.
- 1945 – 275 B-17 s escorted by four groups of P-51 Mustangs attack the Pilzen-Škoda armament factory in Czechoslovakia. It is the last heavy bomber mission by the United States Army Air Forces’ 8th Air Force against an industrial target.
- 1945 – The incomplete German aircraft carrier Graf Zeppelin is scuttled at Stettin to prevent her capture by the Soviet Union.
- 1945 – The last bombing attack was carried out by No. 6 (RCAF) Group with 192 aircraft dropping over 902 tons of bombs on Wangerooge Island.
- 1940 – McGee Airways pioneers the transportation of fresh meat and milk to the Alaskan interior.
- 1940 – Swordfish and Skuas from the British aircraft carriers HMS Ark Royal and HMS Glorious raid targets in the Trondheim area in Norway.
- 1940 – Oberfeldwebel Hermann Förster is the first German night fighter pilot to shoot down a British bomber during World War II. Flying a Messerschmitt Bf 109D-1, he downs a Handley Page Hampden laying naval mines off the coast of Schleswig-Holstein.
- 1939 – First flight of the Arsenal VG-33
- 1928 – Charles A. Lindbergh landed on the Plains of Abraham, Quebec City, in a Curtiss Falcon carrying pneumonia serum for Floyd Bennett.
- 1922 – Known as the Stout ST-1, the first all-metal airplane designed for the U. S. Navy makes its first flight piloted by Eddie Stinson.
- 1918 – Belgium's top-scoring ace, Willy Coppens, claims his first victory.
- 1914 – The first combat flight by a U. S. Navy aircraft takes place. It is a flight to observe Mexican positions during the Veracruz Incident.
- 1868 – John Bevins Moisant, designer, builder and pilot of the first aluminum airplane, is born in Kanakee, Illinois.
References
- Staff (25 April 2011). "Libya: Berlusconi Backs Nato Strikes by Italy Jets". BBC News. Retrieved 27 April 2011.
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