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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 is 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

Hot air balloon
Hot air balloon
The hot air balloon is the oldest successful human-carrying flight technology. On November 21, 1783, in Paris, France, the first manned flight was made by Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier and François Laurent d'Arlandes in a hot air balloon created by the Montgolfier brothers.

A hot air balloon consists of a bag called the envelope that is capable of containing heated air. Suspended beneath is the gondola or wicker basket (in some long-distance or high-altitude balloons, a capsule) which carries the passengers and a source of heat. The heated air inside the envelope makes it buoyant since it has a lower density than the relatively cold air outside the envelope. Unlike gas balloons, the envelope does not have to be sealed at the bottom since the air near the bottom of the envelope is at the same pressure as the surrounding air. In today's sport balloons the envelope is generally made from nylon fabric and the mouth of the balloon (closest to the burner flame) is made from fire resistant material such as Nomex.

Recently, balloon envelopes have been made in all kinds of shapes, such as hot dogs, rocket ships, and the shapes of commercial products. Hot air balloons that can be propelled through the air rather than just being pushed along by the wind are known as airships or, more specifically, thermal airships. (Full article...)

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Wernher von Braun and Saturn V rocket
Wernher von Braun and Saturn V rocket
A portrait of Wernher von Braun standing in front of the cluster of F-1 rocket engines on the base of the first stage of a Saturn V launch vehicle. Von Braun had a lifelong aspiration to fly to the moon. A pioneer of rocket development, in the Second World War von Braun led the German development of the V-2 rocket at Peenemünde. Along with his team of engineers, he surrendered to the American forces in the closing stages of the war, then helped to establish the military rocket program in the United States. In 1958 he transferred to the newly established NASA program, developing the Saturn V rocket that successfully delivered a man to the moon in 1969.

Did you know

...that in the late 1940s the USAF Northrop YB-49 set both an unofficial endurance record and a transcontinental speed record? ...that the fighter pilot Aleksandr Kazakov destroyed 32 German and Austro-Hungarian planes during WWI, while his formal tally of 17 is explained by the fact that only planes crashed in the Russian-held territory were officially counted? ... that the collection of the Prague Aviation Museum, Kbely includes 275 aircraft, of which approximately 110 are on public display?

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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Associated Wikimedia

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

Selected biography

Portrait of Flynn taken in 1929.

The Reverend John Flynn (25 November 1880 – 5 May 1951) was an Australian Presbyterian minister and aviator who founded the Royal Flying Doctor Service, the world's first air ambulance.

Throughout his ministerial training, Flynn had worked in various then-remote areas through Victoria and South Australia. As well as tending to matters spiritual, Flynn quickly established the need for medical care for residents of the vast Australian outback, and established a number of bush hospitals. By 1917, Flynn was already considering the possibility of new technology, such as radio and the aeroplane, to assist in providing a more useful acute medical service, and then received a letter from an Australian pilot serving in World War I, Clifford Peel, who had heard of Flynn's speculations and outlined the capabilities and costs of then-available planes. Flynn turned his considerable fund-raising talents to the task of establishing a flying medical service.

The first flight of the Aerial Medical Service was in 1928 from Cloncurry. In 1934 the Australian Aerial Medical Service was formed, and gradually established a network of bases nationwide. Flynn remained the public face of the organisation (through name changes to its present form) and helped raise the funds that kept the service operating.

Selected Aircraft

Space Shuttle Discovery
Space Shuttle Discovery

NASA's Space Shuttle, officially called the Space Transportation System (STS), was the spacecraft which was used by the United States government for its human spaceflight missions. At launch, it consisted of a rust-colored external tank (ET), two white, slender Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs), and the orbiter, a winged spaceplane which was the space shuttle in the narrow sense.

The orbiter carried astronauts and payload such as satellites or space station parts into low Earth orbit, into the Earth's upper atmosphere or thermosphere. Usually, five to seven crew members rode in the orbiter. The payload capacity was 22,700 kg (50,000 lb). When the orbiter's mission was complete, it fired its Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) thrusters to drop out of orbit and re-enter the lower atmosphere. During the descent and landing, the shuttle orbiter acted as a glider, and made a completely unpowered ("dead stick") landing.

  • Span: 78.06 ft (23.79 m)
  • Length: 122.17 ft (37.24 m)
  • Height: 58.58 ft (17.25 m)
  • Engines: 3 Rocketdyne Block 2 A SSMEs
  • Cruising Speed: 25,404 ft/s (7,743 m/s, 27,875 km/h, 17,321 mi/h)
  • First Flight: August 12, 1977 (glider), April 12, 1981 (powered).
  • Operational Altitude: 100 to 520 nmi (185 to 1,000 km)
  • Number built: 6 (+2 mockups)
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Today in Aviation

February 7

  • 2009 – In the 2009 Manaus Aerotáxi crash, a Manaus Aerotáxi Embraer EMB-110 Bandeirante crashes near Santo António, Brazil, killing 24 of the 28 aboard.
  • 2008 – Launch: Space Shuttle Atlantis STS-122 at 19:45 UTC. Mission highlights: ISS assembly flight 1E: European Laboratory Columbus, crew rotation.
  • 2001 – Launch: Space Shuttle Atlantis STS-98 at 18:13 pm EST. Mission highlights: ISS assembly flight 5A: Destiny lab.
  • 2001 – Death of Anne Morrow Lindbergh, born Anne Spencer Morrow, pioneering American aviator, author, and spouse of fellow aviator Charles Lindbergh.
  • 1999 – Launch of Stardust, NASA robotic space probe to study the asteroid 5535 Annefrank and collect samples from the coma of comet Wild 2.It is the first sample return mission to collect cosmic dust and return the sample to Earth and the first to acquire images of a previously visited comet.
  • 1995 – Ramzi Yousef, mastermind of multiple airliner bombing-plots and the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, is arrested in Islamabad, Pakistan.
  • 1994 – First launch of a Milstar Satellite (Military Strategic and Tactical Relay) operated by the USAF.
  • 1990 – A USAF Fairchild-Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II crashes in the Black Mountains of Wales, ~eight miles S of Hay-on-Wye on the English border, less than 18 hrs. after an General Dynamics F-111 was lost in the North Sea. The unidentified A-10 pilot was killed. Gen. Marcus Anderson, commander of the Third Air Force, grounds all British-based tactical fighters for a one-day safety review, although an Air Force press spokesman said the two accidents were unrelated, calling it "a terrible coincidence" that they occurred so close together.
  • 1984 – Astronauts aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger STS-41-B Mission, become the first to use the Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU) in space during the first untethered space walk. Mission Specialist Bruce McCandless II makes the most distant space walk from a spacecraft at 320 feet.
  • 1981 – A Tupolev Tu-104 airliner belonging to the Soviet Pacific Fleet and carrying its top brass on the return from a staff maneuvers in Leningrad crashes on take-off at a military airfield in Pushkin, Leningrad oblast. Out of 52 aboard, including 16 generals and admirals and 20 captains, 51 are pronounced dead at the scene, and the co-pilot later dies in hospital from his injuries. Admiral Emil Spiridonov, Fleet's CO, was among the killed. The reason was later determined to be the improper loading of the plane, with a part of the cargo, two huge rolls of book paper, unsecured and shifting during the take-off, causing a wingstrike.
  • 1980 – Death of Richard Williams (RAAF officer), Australian WWI Pilot, WWII high-ranking officer, Australian director of Civil aviation postwar, first military pilot trained in Australia, widely regarded as the “father” of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF).
  • 1977 – Launch of Soyuz 24, Soviet mission to the Salyut 5 space station, 3rd and final mission to the station, last purely military crew for the Soviets and the final mission to a military Salyut.
  • 1973 – A US Navy LTV A-7E-8-CV Corsair II, BuNo 157539, c/n E-195, of VA-195 piloted by Lt. Robert Lee Ward, 28, one of two on a routine training flight to Sacramento, California from NAS Lemoore near Fresno, California, crashes at 2013 hrs. in Alameda, after breaking formation at 28,000 feet for unexplained reasons. Fighter strikes four-story Tahoe Apartments building at 1814 Central Avenue in the city center with fire spreading to other structures, killing pilot and ten civilians, 26 injured. Navy inquiry found evidence of a cockpit fire involving the pilot's oxygen hose, and that the in-flight blaze was "very near" Ward's oxygen mask. Speculation that smoking could have caused it, but no proof. Lawsuits for more than $700,000 were filed in connection with the disaster, including a $500,000 damage action filed in Alameda County Superior Court by owner of the demolished 36-unit Tahoe Apartments.
  • 1938 – Squadron Leader J. W. Gillan of N° 111 Squadron, makes headline news when he flies his Hawker Hurricane from Edinburgh in Scotland to Northolt in Middlesex at an average speed of 657kph (408 mph). The night flight benefited from a strong tail wind.
  • 1932 – Birth of Alfred Worden, American test pilot and astronaut who was the command module pilot for the Apollo 15 Moon Mission, one of only 24 people to have flown to the Moon.
  • 1931 – Sole Boeing XP-15, (Boeing Model 202), NX270V, c/n 1151, accepted by the U.S.Army for testing at Wright Field but never actually purchased, so no USAAC serial, suffers propeller blade failure during a high-speed dash, unbalanced engine tears from mounts.
  • 1927 – Georgetown University medical school in Washington, D. C., offers the first aviation medicine course in the United States.
  • 1920 – French aviator Joseph Sadi-Lecointe, piloting a Nieuport-Delage 29 V, becomes the first pilot to set a new Federation Aeronautique Internationale (FAI) world speed record after World War I. He reaches a measured speed of 171.141 mph along the 3,280-foot course.
  • 1918 – During U.S. Navy tests of a converted Curtiss N-9 biplane as an unpiloted flying bomb, equipped with a Sperry automatic control, Lawrence Sperry takes it up to prove airworthiness of the design, crashes, but pilot unhurt.
  • 1917 – Imperial German Navy Zeppelin LZ82 L 36, damaged during landing in fog at Rehben-an-der-Aller and decommissioned.
  • 1906 – Birth of Oleg Antonov, Soviet aircraft designer, founder of Antonov ASTC, world-famous aircraft company.

References

  1. ^ Tabuchi, Hiroko, "," The New York Times, February 7, 2013.
  2. ^ Oweis, Khaled Yacoub, "Syrian Jets Bomb Damascus Ring Road to Halt Rebel Push," Reuters, February 7, 2013, 3:52 p.m.
  3. ^ "U.S. helicopter crash in Iraq kills seven". Toronto: USA Today. 2007-02-07. Retrieved 2007-05-31.
  4. ^ "Light Warfare". Forbes.com. 2007-04-23. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
  5. ^ "Possible video of the incident". LiveLeak. 2007-02-09. Retrieved 2009-02-01.
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