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The Aviation Portal

A Boeing 747 in 1978 operated by Pan Am

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 aircraft 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. Clément Ader built the "Ader Éole" in France and made an uncontrolled, powered hop in 1890. This was the first powered aircraft, although it did not achieve controlled flight. 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...)

Selected article

Air Force One
Air Force One
Air Force One (the ATC callsign of any U.S. Air Force aircraft carrying the President) has, since 1990, consisted of two specifically-configured, highly customized Boeing 747-200B series aircraft, known as the VC-25. The planes' three floors (4,000 square feet – 372 m²) include multiple modifications including the president's executive suite which includes a private dressing room, workout room, lavatory, shower, and private office. (Full article...)

Selected image

Aircraft catapult officer, aka "Shooter" gives the signal to launch an FA-18 from a US aircraft carrier.

Did you know

...that the mysterious objects known as Black Triangles may actually be hybrid airships? ...that Indra Lal Roy of the Royal Air Force became India's first flying ace after he achieved 10 victories in thirteen days during World War I? ...that the Lockheed NF-104A (pictured), equipped with a reaction control system as well as a rocket engine to supplement a jet engine, was a low-cost training vehicle for American astronauts in the 1960s?

More Did you know facts

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The following are images from various aviation-related articles on Wikipedia.

In the news

Wikinews Aviation portal
Read and edit Wikinews

Associated Wikimedia

The following Wikimedia Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:

Selected biography

Charles Yeager
Charles Elwood "Chuck" Yeager (born February 13, 1923) is a retired Brigadier-General in the United States Air Force and a noted test pilot. In 1947, he, at age 24, became the first pilot to travel faster than sound in level flight and ascent.

His career began in World War II as a private in the U.S. Army Air Forces. After serving as an aircraft mechanic, in September 1942 he entered enlisted pilot training and upon graduation was promoted to the rank of Flight Officer (WW 2 U.S. Army Air Forces rank equivalent to Warrant Officer) and became a P-51 Mustang fighter pilot. After the war he became a test pilot of many kinds of aircraft and rocket planes. Yeager was the first man to break the sound barrier on October 14, 1947, flying the experimental Bell X-1 at Mach 1 at an altitude of 45,000 ft (13,700 m). Although Scott Crossfield was the first man to fly faster than Mach 2 in 1953, Yeager shortly thereafter exceeded Mach 2.4.[1] He later commanded fighter squadrons and wings in Germany and in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, and in recognition of the outstanding performance ratings of those units he then was promoted to Brigadier-General. Yeager's flying career spans more than sixty years and has taken him to every corner of the globe, even into the Soviet Union during the height of the Cold War.

Selected Aircraft

A spitfire in flight
A spitfire in flight

The Supermarine Spitfire was a single-seat fighter used by the RAF and many Allied countries in World War II.

Produced by Supermarine, the Spitfire was designed by R.J. Mitchell, who continued to refine it until his death from cancer in 1937. The elliptical wing had a thin cross-section, allowing a faster top speed than the Hurricane and other contemporary designs; it also resulted in a distinctive appearance. Much loved by its pilots, the Spitfire saw service during the whole of World War II, in all theatres of war, and in many different variants.

More than 20,300 examples of all variants were built, including two-seat trainers, with some Spitfires remaining in service well into the 1950s. It was the only fighter aircraft to be in continual production before, during and after the war.

The aircraft was dubbed Spitfire by Sir Robert MacLean, director of Vickers (the parent company of Supermarine) at the time, and on hearing this, Mitchell is reported to have said, "...sort of bloody silly name they would give it." The word dates from Elizabethan times and refers to a particularly fiery, ferocious type of person, usually a woman. The name had previously been used unofficially for Mitchell's earlier F.7/30 Type 224 design.

The prototype (K5054) first flew on March 5, 1936, from Eastleigh Aerodrome (later Southampton Airport). Testing continued until May 26, 1936, when Mutt Summers (Chief Test Pilot for Vickers (Aviation) Ltd.) flew K5054 to Martlesham and handed the aircraft over to Squadron Leader Anderson of the Aeroplane & Armament Experimental Establishment (A&AEE).

  • Length: 29 ft 11 in (9.12 m)
  • Wingspan: 36 ft 10 in (11.23 m)
  • Height: 12 ft 8 in (3.86 m)
  • Number Built: 20,351 (excluding Seafires)
  • Maximum speed: 330 knots (378 mph, 605 km/h)
  • Maiden flight: March 5, 1936
  • Powerplant: 1× Rolls-Royce Merlin 45 supercharged V12 engine, 1470 hp at 9250 ft (1096 kW at 2820 m)

Today in Aviation

April 18

  • 2009 – Royal Air Maroc Boeing 747-2 B6 B CN-RME is substantially damaged when it lurches forward during an engine ground run and subsequently goes through a fence at Mohammed V International Airport, Morocco.
  • 2005 – A United States Air Force F-16D crashed next to the Ashley River near Charleston, South Carolina. The two crew members ejected safely. Both the main power and backup power failed moments before the crash, the pilot said.
  • 1999 – Royal Australian Air Force General Dynamics F-111G, A8-291, c/n B1-63, of 6 Sqn., crashes about 2230 hrs. while on exercises in Malaysia. Believed to have hit one of two peaks on small island Pulua Aur, off the east coast of the Malay Peninsula, and then crashed into the South China Sea. The two crew, Sqn. Ldr. Steve Hobbs and Flt. Lt. Anthony Short, are killed.
  • 1993 – USAF aircraft attack and destroy an Iraqi radar station
  • 1991 – Eastern Air Lines is dissolved after 64 years of operation. Many of its remaining assets are parceled out to American and Continental.
  • 1988 – The U. S. Navy conducts Operation Praying Mantis against Iranian forces and facilities in the Persian Gulf. A-6E Intruders from the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise (CVN-65) sink a speedboat, assist surface ships in sinking the frigate Sahand, and cripple the frigate Sabalan. Two Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force F-4 Phantom fighters approach the guided-missile cruiser USS Wainwright (CG-28), which damages one of them with a surface-to-air missile.
  • 1982 – Death of Josef Mai, German WWI fighter ace and WWII instructor.
  • 1981 – Bell Helicopters delivered its 25.000th helicopter, a Model 222, to Omniflight Helicopters.
  • 1979 – Death of Giovanni Ballestra, Italian Air Force pilot, not bailing out of his F-104 Starfighter on fire in order to avoid victims in a high denisity population zone.
  • 1977 – Philippine Airlines DC-8-53 RP-C803 was operating Philippine Airlines Flight 421 when during takeoff at Haneda, Japan it lifted off prematurely, banked, touched down, and ran off the runway tearing off the undercarriage and all 4 engines. There were no fatalities; however the aircraft was damaged beyond repair.
  • 1974 – Court Line Flight 95, a BAC One-Eleven, collides with a Piper Aztec on the runway at London Luton Airport, killing the pilot of the Aztec; there are no casualties on board the One-Eleven, but the aircraft is substantially damaged; the Aztec is written off.
  • 1973 – Results of the USAF A-X fly-off announced, with the Fairchild YA-10 selected over the Northrop YA-9.
  • 1969 – Soyuz 5 reenters earth.
  • 1965 – Death of Charles Marie Joseph Leon Nuville, French WWI fighter ace and WWII officer.
  • 1960 – Capital Airlines Flight 20 Vickers 745D Viscount crashes into a farm in Charles City County, Virginia, killing all 50 aboard.
  • 1958 – The Avro CF-105 Arrow prototype exceeded M 1.5 at 50,000 ft during a test flight at Malton, Ontario, piloted by J. Zurakowski.
  • 1958 – US Navy Lieutenant-Commander George Watkins flies from Edwards Air Base in California to a world record absolute altitude within the atmosphere of 76,932 feet in a Grumman F11 F-1 Tiger.
  • 1957 – End of Operation Power Flite, 3 B-52 B aircraft of the 93rd Bombardment Wing of the 15th Air Force lands at March Air Force Base near Riverside, California after flying for a total of 45 hours and 19 min, first jet aircraft to circle the world nonstop.
  • 1955 – Second prototype Lockheed XF-104A Starfighter, 53-7787, c/n 083-0002, is lost when airframe sheds the bottom ejection seat hatch fairing during 20 mm gun firing causing an explosive decompression. Test pilot Herman R. "Fish" Salmon ejected as aircraft broke up, injured landing in rough country. Joe Baugher cites date of 14 April for this accident.
  • 1952 - The Convair YB-60 makes a successful first flight at Carswell Air Force Base at Fort Worth, Texas.
  • 1945 – Luftwaffe ace (six victories) Oberst Johannes Steinhoff, of the jet experten Jagdverband 44, suffers tire blow-out on take-off from Flughafen München Riem when his Messerschmitt Me 262 hits a bomb crater. He lifts off, but without sufficient flying speed, he crashes, suffering severe burns, spending two years in hospital.
  • 1944 – Death of Eugene Jules Emile Camplan, French WWI flying ace.
  • 1944 – Air Solomons (AirSols) begins a very successful series of photographic reconnaissance flights over the Mariana Islands. The missions continue into June.
  • 1943 – P-38 Lightnings intercepted Japanese aircraft and take down two Mitsubishi bombers over Bougainville, killing Admiral Yamamoto, Japan’s leading military strategist.
  • 1942 – First jet engine test in the United States: General Electric 1-A engine successfully tested in Lynn, Massachusetts.
  • 1930 – Death of Tommaso (Tomaso) Dal Molin, Italian pilot in the crash of his seaplane racer Savoia-Marchetti S.65 on Lake Garda.
  • 1929 – First flight of the Bourgois-Sénemaud AT 40, French two-seat, single-engine parasol wing monoplane tourer prototype
  • 1920 – Death of Albert René Chabrier, French WWI flying ace.
  • 1919 – CMA (Compagnie des Messageries Aériennes) commences a mail and freight service between Paris and Lille, using ex-military Breguet 14s.
  • 1918 – Birth of Frederick C. Bock, WWII pilot who took part in the atomic bombing of Nagasaki in 1945, flying the B-29 bomber 'The Great Artist'
  • 1917 – William E. Boeing’s Pacific Aero Products Company is renamed the “Boeing Airplane Company. ”
  • 1916 – Birth of Giorgio Savoja (Savoia), Italian WWII fighter pilot.
  • 1916 – The first all-American air squadron in Europe is formed at the French spa town of Luxevil-les-Bains. Nieuport Squadron Nº 124, unofficially known as the “Escadrille Américaine” (American Squadron), is composed of volunteers who will be under the command of a French captain, Georges Thénault.
  • 1913 – Birth of Wing Commander George Cecil Unwin DSO, DFM & Bar, British WWII fighter ace.
  • 1911 – Eugene B. Ely makes the first landing by an aircraft on a ship when he flies his Curtiss Model D pusher biplane from Selfridge Field near San Francisco to a specially prepared wooden deck on the stern of the armored cruiser USS Pennsylvania.
  • 1893 – Birth of Douglas Evan Cameron, British WWI flying ace.
  • 1893 – Birth of Dr. Wolfgang Benjamin Klemperer, German prominent aviation and aerospace scientist and engineer, who ranks among the pioneers of early aviation.
  • 1891 – Birth of Herbert Wilhelm Franz Knappe, German WWI flying ace
  • 1888 – Birth of Sir Thomas Octave Murdoch Sopwith, CBE, Hon FRAeS, English aviation pioneer, founder of the Sopwith Aviation Company and yachtman.
  • 1882 – Birth of Gaston Caudron, French aviation pioneer and aircraft designer along with his brother René.

References

  1. ^ Yeager, Chuck, and Janos, Leo. Yeager: An Autobiography. p. 252 (paperback). New York: Bantam Books, 1986. ISBN 0-553-25674-2.
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