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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 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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British Airways Boeing 747-400 taking off at Heathrow Airport in October 2007
British Airways Boeing 747-400 taking off at Heathrow Airport in October 2007
British Airways is the flag carrier airline of the United Kingdom and its largest airline based on fleet size, international flights and international destinations. When measured by passengers carried it is second-largest, behind easyJet. The airline is based in Waterside near its main hub at London Heathrow Airport. A British Airways Board was established by the United Kingdom government in 1972 to manage the two nationalised airline corporations, British Overseas Airways Corporation and British European Airways, and two smaller, regional airlines, Cambrian Airways, from Cardiff, and Northeast Airlines, from Newcastle upon Tyne. On 31 March 1974, all four companies were merged to form British Airways. After almost 13 years as a state company, British Airways was privatised in February 1987 as part of a wider privatisation plan by the Conservative government. The carrier soon expanded with the acquisition of British Caledonian in 1987, Dan-Air in 1992 and British Midland International in 2012. British Airways is a founding member of the Oneworld airline alliance, along with American Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Qantas, and the now defunct Canadian Airlines. The alliance has since grown to become the third-largest, after SkyTeam and Star Alliance. British Airways merged with Iberia on 21 January 2011, formally creating the International Airlines Group (IAG), the world's third-largest airline group in terms of annual revenue and the second-largest in Europe. (Full article...)

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Did you know

...that on October 5, 1914, a French Voisin III pilot scored the first air-to-air kill of World War I? ...that on May 3, 2002 a military MiG-21bis aircraft crashed into the Bank of Rajasthan in India, killing eight? Two pilots of No. 7 EFTS RAAF discuss the day's flying next to their Tiger Moth training biplanes. ... that No. 7 Elementary Flying Training School RAAF (aircraft of unit pictured) was the only Royal Australian Air Force training unit to be based in Tasmania during World War II?

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
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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 became the first pilot (at age 24) 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

The Pregnant Guppy was a large, wide-bodied cargo aircraft built in the USA and used for ferrying outsized cargo items, most notably NASA's components of the Apollo moon program. The Pregnant Guppy was the first of the Guppy line of aircraft produced by Aero Spacelines, Inc. The design also inspired similar designs such as the jet-powered Airbus Beluga, and the Boeing 747 LCF designed to deliver Boeing 787 parts.

  • Span:141 feet, 3 inches.
  • Length: 127 feet.
  • Height: 31 feet, 3 inches.
  • Engines: 4 3500hp P&W R-4360.
  • Cruising Speed: 250 mph
  • First Flight:September 19, 1962
  • Number built: 1
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Today in Aviation

October 10

  • 1997 – Austral Líneas Aéreas Flight 2553, a Douglas DC-9-32, crashes near Fray Bentos, Uruguay traveling from Posadas to Buenos Aires, resulting in the death of all 74 occupants – 5 crew members and 69 passengers.
  • 1984 – UThe first of three Northrop F-20 Tigersharks, 82-0062, c/n GG1001, N4416T, during a world sales tour, crashes at Suwon Air Base, South Korea, killing Northrop chief test pilot Darrell Cornell. During the last manoeuvre of the final demonstration flight at Suwon, the aircraft stalled at the top of an erratic vertical climb and dove into the ground from 1,800 feet. High-G pilot incapacitation was suspected as the cause, as the investigation found no evidence of airframe failure.
  • 1972 – Douglas A-3B Skywarrior, BuNo 138968, of VAQ-33, crashes 1.6 statute miles NW of Holland, Virginia on old Highway 58 in Nansemond (Suffolk, Virginia), off Glen Haven Drive. LTJG David H. Grant, 25, of Westbury, New York, pilot; LTJG Ronald B. Ritchie, 25, of Virginia Beach, Virginia, navigator; and LTJG Jeffery R. Haushalter, 25, of Wauwatosa, Wisconsin, electronic-weapons officer, are KWF.
  • 1968 – Lockheed SR-71A, 61-7977, Article 2028, lost at end of runway, Beale Air Force Base, California after tire explosion and runway abort. Pilot Maj. Gabriel A. Kardong rode airframe to a standstill. RSO James A. Kogler ejected safely. Both survived.
  • 1962 – Vickers Viscount CF-THA was involved in a ground collision with CF-101 Voodoo 17452 of the Royal Canadian Air Force at RCAF Station Bagotville. The Voodoo had been given clearance to take-off before the Viscount had cleared the runway. It collided with the tail of the Viscount, killing a flight attendant and a passenger. The crew of the Voodoo ejected as the aircraft had been set on fire as a result of the collision. The Viscount was substantially damaged but it was repaired and returned to service.
  • 1958 – A C-123 B Provider serving as a maintenance support aircraft for the United States Air Force Thunderbirds air demonstration team flies into a flock of birds and crashes near Payette, Idaho, killing the entire flight crew of five and all 14 maintenance personnel on board. It remains the worst accident in Thunderbirds history.
  • 1956 – A United States Navy Douglas R6D-1 Liftmaster, BuNo 131588, c/n 43691/321, of VR-6, MATS, is lost at sea about 150 miles (240 km) north of the Azores. 59 died, 50 U.S. Air Force personnel from Lincoln AFB, and nine U.S. Navy personnel. Another source cites 11 October: as crash date.
  • 1947 Chuck Yeager's seventh powered flight. Chuck had the X-1 at .94 Mach when his controls suddenly ceased to function. Shock waves on the plane’s control surfaces made operation impossible. Always cool-headed in such situations, Chuck turned off the plane’s rockets to slow down and jettisoned the remaining fuel. He glided back in to the lakebed and explained to Ridley what had happened. Engineers had predicted that as the plane reached the speed of sound, its nose would pitch up or down. At .94 Mach, however, Chuck had lost the ability to operate the plane’s elevator. Without it, he could not correct for whatever pitch change might occur at Mach 1. It was Jack Ridley who came up with the solution. http://www.chuckyeager.com/1945-1947-mach-buster
  • 1944 – Aircraft from the 17 aircraft carriers of U. S. Navy Task Force 38 fly 1,396 sorties against targets on Okinawa and in the Ryukyu Islands, claiming 111 Japanese aircraft destroyed and sinking a submarine tender, 12 torpedo boats, two midget submarines, four cargo ships, and various smaller ships, in exchange for the loss of 21 U. S. aircraft, 5 pilots, and four aircrewmen. It is the closest Allied operation to Japan since the April 1942 Doolittle Raid.
  • 1944 – First Fisher P-75A-GC Eagle, 44-44549, crashes on flight test out of Eglin Field, Florida, when propellers apparently run out of oil, pilot Maj. Harold Bolster attempts dead-stick landing but crashes short on approach, dies.
  • 1933 – Fokker Y1O-27, 31-602, '3', of 30th Bombardment Squadron, Rockwell Field, California, en route from Burbank, California to Crissy Field, California, lands at Crissy with landing gear retracted. Both light and buzzer in cockpit that are supposed to activate when the throttles are retarded fail to function. Only serious damage is to the propellers but airframe is surveyed and dropped from inventory with 115 hours, 15 minutes flying time. Pilot 2nd Lt. Theodore B. Anderson uninjured.
  • 1933 – The United Airlines crash near Chesterton: a Boeing 247 is destroyed by a bomb over Chesterton, Indiana in the first proven case of air sabotage on a commercial aircraft; all seven on board are killed.
  • 1928 – Flying an Engineering Division XCO-5 observation aircraft, St. Clair “Bill” Streett (pilot) and Albert William Stevens (passenger) set an unofficial altitude record for an aircraft carrying a passenger of 11,538 m (37,854 feet). Temperatures of −61 C (–71 F) freeze the controls, preventing Streett from losing altitude or turning off the engine; he waits 20 min for the engine to run out of gasoline (petrol), then glides to a deadstick landing.
  • 1919 – On third day of transcontinental contest, an east-bound DH-4B, piloted by Maj. Albert Sneed, almost out of gas, makes fast landing at Buffalo, New York. Passenger Sgt. Worth C. McClure undoes his seatbelt and slides onto the rear fuselage to weight down the tail for a quicker stop. Plane bounces on landing, smashes nose-first into the ground, and McClure is thrown off and killed.
  • 1907 – Robert Esnault-Pelterie made the first airplane flight with a control stick; he used a single, broom handle-like lever.
  • 1898 – Augustus Herring pilots a powered biplane based on Octave Chanute’s glider design.

References

  1. ^ Yeager, Chuck and Janos, Leo. Yeager: An Autobiography. p. 252 (paperback). New York: Bantam Books, 1986. ISBN 0-553-25674-2.
  2. ^ "Turkey, Seeking Weapons, Forces Syrian Jet to Land". New York Times. 10 October 2012.
  3. ^ "Turkey: Syrian plane was carrying ammunition". San Francisco Chronicle. 11 October 2012.
  4. ^ "Turkey: Syrian plane was carrying ammunition". Associated Press. 12 October 2012.
  5. ^ Wilkinson, Stephan, "Yak Sets Speed Record," Aviation History, March 2012, p. 10.
  6. ^ "Libya's NTC fighters stage final advance in Sirte holdout - CNN.com". CNN. 12 October 2011.
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