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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

Airbus A380, the largest passenger jet in the world, entered commercial service in 2007.
Airbus A380, the largest passenger jet in the world, entered commercial service in 2007.
Airbus SAS is an aircraft manufacturing subsidiary of EADS, a European aerospace consortium. Based in Toulouse, France and with significant activity across Europe, the company produces around half of the world's jet airliners. Airbus began as a consortium of aerospace manufacturers. Consolidation of European defence and aerospace companies around the turn of the century allowed the establishment of a simplified joint stock company in 2001, owned by EADS (80%) and BAE Systems (20%). After a protracted sale process BAE sold its shareholding to EADS on 13 October 2006. Airbus employs around 57,000 people at sixteen sites in four European Union countries: Germany, France, the United Kingdom, and Spain. Final assembly production is at Toulouse (France) and Hamburg (Germany). Airbus has subsidiaries in the United States, Japan and China. (Full article...)

Selected image

Credit: User:Anynobody
Sequence of events leading to the collision between X - PSA 182 and ♦ - Cessna 172

Did you know

...that Swedish adventurer Saloman Andrée died in 1897 while trying to reach the geographic North Pole by hot-air balloon?

...that the Spartan Cruiser (pictured) was originally designed as mail plane and even flew a test flight to Karachi as such, but was then transformed into a passenger airplane in 1932?

... that 820 Naval Air Squadron was involved in attacks on the German battleships Bismarck and Tirpitz during the Second World War?

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

Benjamin Delahauf Foulois (1879-1967) was an early aviation pioneer who rose to become a chief of the U.S. Army Air Corps. The son of a French immigrant, he was born and raised in Connecticut. He enlisted in the Army at age 18 to serve in the Spanish–American War. After just a few month he was separated because of disease he had picked up in Puerto Rico. He re-enlisted in 1899 and was sent to the Philippines where he received a commission as a Second Lieutenant. Foulois believed that the new airplane would replace the cavalry for reconnaissance and in 1908 transferred into the Signal Corps.

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 Yakovlev Yak-42 is a line of tri-jet aircraft produced by the aircraft company Yakolev. The Yak 42 was produced from 1980-2003.

Historically, the yak-42 was competition for older Russian aircraft companies. The Yak-42 was only made in one passenger variant, but it was used in many tests of equipment.

  • Crew: 3
  • Span: 114 ft 5 in (34.88 m)
  • Length: 119 ft 4 in (36.38 m)
  • Height: 32 ft 3 in (9.83 m)
  • Engines: 3× Lotarev D-36 turbofan
  • Cruise Speed: 740 km/h (399 knots, 460 mph) (economy cruise)
  • Range: 4,000 km (2,158 nmi, 2,458 mi) (with maximum fuel)
More selected aircraft Read more...

Today in Aviation

March 15

  • 2011 – A U.S. Air Force MQ-1 Predator unmanned aerial vehicle overshoots the runway at Djibouti-Ambouli International Airport in Djibouti, Djibouti, and crashes into a fence. No one is injured. Investigators blame the accident on a melted throttle part and pilot confusion and inattention, as well as the inability of any remote pilot to react to cues such as wind rush or high engine pitch that would suggest to the pilot of a manned aircraft that the aircraft was approaching the runway too steeply and at too high a speed.
  • 2010 – Two United States Navy Boeing F/A-18E Super Hornet fighters from VFA-122 collided in mid-air at 2200 hrs., sending one crashing to the Nevada desert. One pilot ejected safely before his aircraft crashed near Naval Air Station Fallon and a second pilot landed the single-seat jet safely at Fallon.
  • 2009 – Launch: Space Shuttle Discovery STS-119 at 23:43 UTC. Mission highlights: ISS assembly flight 15A: S6 Truss, Solar Arrays.
  • 2008 – Deceased: Vicki Van Meter, 26, American pilot, youngest-pilot distance-flying record setter, suicide.
  • 2002 – An Aerotaxi Antonov AN-2 crashes in Baez, Cuba, killing all 16 passengers. The aircraft plunges into a pond after a wing separated.
  • 1996 – A Cecil Field Naval Air Station Lockheed S-3 Viking crashed shortly after take-off near Puerto Rico. Navy officials called off the search for the two pilots on 16 March.
  • 1985 – Pan Am puts the Airbus A300 B airliner into service, on its route from Miami, Florida to Mexico City.
  • 1983 – No. 6 FTTU that had trained all Voodoo techs since 1961, is disbanded.
  • 1982 – A Royal Swedish Air Force Saab Draken crashed into the Baltic, pilot killed.
  • 1974 – A Sterling Airways Caravelle (OY-STK) caught fire while taxiing to depart in Tehran, Iran. The right main gear collapses, rupturing the fuel line, resulting in the deaths of 15 of the 96 people on the plane.
  • 1972 – NASA announces Shuttle program. Since its inception in 1958, NASA has accomplished many great scientific and technological feats in air and space. NASA technology also has been adapted for many nonaerospace uses by the private sector. NASA remains a leading force in scientific research and in stimulating public interest in aerospace exploration, as well as science and technology in general. Perhaps more importantly, our exploration of space has taught us to view Earth, ourselves, and the universe in a new way.
  • 1972 – Sterling Airways Flight 296 crashed near Kalba in the United Arab Emirates on a flight from Colombo to Copenhagen in Denmark with a stop over in Dubai. The Sud Aviation Caravelle was registration OY-STL. 112 passengers and crew died in the crash which was attributed to pilot error. It was the deadliest air disaster in the history of the United Arab Emirates.
  • 1971 – First Argus exceeds 10,000 hrs on a 407 Squadron mission, commanded by Maj Mike Bradley.
  • 1967 – First flight of the Sikorsky MH-53, SAR long-range version of the CH-53 A for the USAF.
  • 1967 – Piedmont leases two Boeing 727 s to use pending delivery of their Boeing 737 s. This also marks the day that Piedmont places the Fairchild FH-227 into service.
  • 1967 – Air Southwest is incorporated by Herb Kelleher and Rollin King. They would go on to grow it into low-cost juggernaut Southwest Airlines.
  • 1964 – A Blue Angels pilot is killed during an attempted emergency landing at Apalach Airport near Apalachicola, Florida when his Grumman F-11A Tiger, experiences difficulties while transiting from West Palm Beach, Florida back to the Blue Angels home base at NAS Pensacola, Florida. Lt. George L. Neale, 29, who flew in the Number Four slot position of the diamond formation, was returning from a demonstration at West Palm Beach with one other of the six team jets and an Douglas R5D Skymaster support plane when he radios Tyndall Air Force Base, near Panama City, Florida, for emergency landing permission when he suffers mechanical problems S of Apalachicola. But, spotting the local airport, he attempts a landing there, ejecting on final approach at 1115 hrs. as the fighter comes down ~250 yards short of the runway. Although he clears the airframe at ~150–200 feet altitude, his chute does not have sufficient time to deploy and he is killed. He is survived by his wife Donna, of Pensacola, Florida, and his mother, Mrs. Katherine Neale, of Avalon, Pennsylvania. The Navy said that the cause of the accident is being investigated.
  • 1963 – A Lloyd Aereo Boliviano Douglas DC-6 B (CP-707) crashes into a mountain in Peru, killing all 39 aboard. The pilots were flying VFR (Visual Flight Rules) while operating in IFR (Instrument Flight Rules) conditions.
  • 1962 – Flying Tiger Line Flight 739 was a Super Constellation propliner chartered by the United States military that disappeared over the Western Pacific Ocean. The aircraft was transporting 93 Army men and 3 South Vietnamese from Travis Air Force Base, California to Saigon, Vietnam. After refueling at Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, the Super Constellation was en route to Clark Air Base in the Philippines when it disappeared. All 107 aboard were declared missing and presumed dead.
  • 1961 – Capt. Gary L. Herod of the Texas Air National Guard was killed when his Lockheed T-33A Shooting Star trainer crashed in a vacant field in suburban Houston, Texas. He was posthumously award the Distinguished Flying Cross for his heroism in not ejecting, but rather staying with his plane and guiding it to a vacant field saving the lives and homes of area residents.
  • 1957 – A U. S. Navy ZPG-2 nonrigid airship sets a new unrefueled endurance record when it lands, having remained aloft for 264 hours (11 days) 12 min, beating the record set by the Graf Zeppelin in 1929.
  • 1950 – AAvro Lincoln B Mk.2, RF511, of No.230 Operational Conversion Unit, crashes on Carnedd Llewelyn near Bethesda, Wales, this date.
  • 1949 – Second prototype of three Vought XF7U-1 Cutlass twin-tailed fighters, BuNo 122473, lost on test flight over the Chesapeake Bay, out of NAS Patuxent River, Maryland. Test pilot William H. B. Millar killed.
  • 1949 – The Sunkist Lady flies an endurance record of 1,008 hours and 2 min or just a couple of minutes over 42 days. The flight was the duo’s fourth attempt at breaking the 726-hour record set in 1939 by Long Beach pilots Wes Carroll and Clyde Scliepper. Their first three attempts failed because of mechanical problems. The plan was for the Lady to travel from Fullerton to Miami and back. The Lady would then stay aloft over Southern California until the record had been broken. At airports along the route, the ground crew would land, board Willys Jeepsters, and race along the runway while the Sunkist Lady passed low overhead. Three-gallon cans of gasoline and food would then be passed up to the pilots.
  • 1946 – The RCAF Fighter Wing, Nos. 411, 412, 416 and 443 Squadrons, was disbanded. It was serving with the British Air Forces of Occupation.
  • 1944 – (overnight)—Making a 3,500-nautical mile (6,481-km) round trip from Kwajalein Island, 13 U. S. Army Air Forces Seventh Air Force B-24 Liberators strike Japanese bases at Truk Atoll.
  • 1938 – de Havilland D. H. 88 Comet racer G-ACSS begins a record-breaking flight from England to New Zealand and back for what some regard as the most notable success of the Comet’s achievement: a return flight time of 10 days 21 hours 22 min.
  • 1932 – Alan Bean, American astronaut, was born. Bean was the fourth man to walk on the moon at the age of thirty-seven years in November 1969.
  • 1918 – After an extensive conversion, HMS Furious re-enters service with the Royal Navy as the world’s first aircraft carrier with aircraft lifts (elevators).
  • 1916 – The first Aero Squadron begins operations with Gen. John J. Pershing in a punitive expedition against Mexico and Pancho Villa.

References

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