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The Aviation Portal

A Boeing 747 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...)

Selected article

PanAm Airbus A310-222
PanAm Airbus A310-222
Pan American World Airways, most commonly known as "Pan Am", was the principal international airline of the United States from the 1930s until its collapse in 1991. Originally founded as a seaplane service out of Key West, Florida, the airline became a major company; it was credited with many innovations that shaped the international airline industry, including the widespread use of jet aircraft, jumbo jets, and computerized reservation systems. Identified by its blue globe logo and the use of "Clipper" in aircraft names and call signs, the airline was a cultural icon of the 20th century, and the unofficial flag carrier of the United States. Pan Am went through two incarnations after 1991. The second Pan Am operated from 1996 to 1998 with a focus on low-cost, long-distance flights between the U.S. and the Caribbean. The current incarnation, based in Portsmouth, New Hampshire and known as the Pan Am "Clipper Connection", is operated by Boston-Maine Airways. The airline currently flies to destinations in the northeastern United States, Florida, Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico. (Full article...)

Selected image

Schlieren photography (from the German word for "streaks") allows the visualization of density changes, and therefore shock waves, in fluid flow. Schlieren techniques have been used for decades in laboratory wind tunnels to visualize supersonic flow about model aircraft, but not full scale aircraft until recently. Dr. Leonard Weinstein of NASA Langley Research Center developed the first Schlieren camera, which he calls SAF (Schlieren for Aircraft in Flight), that can photograph the shock waves of a full sized aircraft in flight. He successfully took a picture which clearly shows the shock waves about a T-38 Talon aircraft on December 13, 1993 at Wallops Island, MD. The camera was then brought to the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center because of the high number of supersonic flights there.

Did you know

...that the Fairey Seafox was a Second World War reconnaissance floatplane of the Fleet Air Arm? ...that during World War II, Marine Fighting Squadron 215 established four new U.S. Marine Corps records in the South Pacific including having the most ace pilots? ... that when Lilian Bland built an aircraft in 1910, she used her aunt's ear-trumpet and a whisky bottle to feed petrol to the engine?

More Did you know facts

General images - load new batch

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

Elizabeth Muriel Gregory "Elsie" MacGill (27 March 1905 – 4 November 1980), known as the Queen of the Hurricanes, was the world's first female aircraft designer. She worked as an aeronautical engineer during the Second World War and did much to make Canada a powerhouse of airplane construction during her years at Canada Car and Foundry (CC&F) in Fort William, Ontario. After her work at CC&F she ran a successful consulting business. Between 1967–1970 she was a commissioner on the Royal Commission on the Status of Women in Canada, published in 1970.

Selected Aircraft

The Convair B-36 was a strategic bomber built by Convair for the United States Air Force, the first to have truly intercontinental range. Unofficially nicknamed the "Peacemaker", the B-36 was the first thermonuclear weapon delivery vehicle, the largest piston aircraft ever to be mass-produced, and the largest warplane of any kind.

The B-36 was the only American aircraft with the range and payload to carry such bombs from airfields on American soil to targets in the USSR, as storing nuclear weapons in foreign countries was diplomatically delicate. The nuclear deterrent the B-36 afforded may have kept the Soviet Army from fighting alongside the North Korean and Chinese armies during the Korean War. Convair touted the B-36 as an "aluminum overcast," a "long rifle" to give SAC a global reach. When General Curtis LeMay headed SAC (1949-57) and turned it into an effective nuclear delivery force, the B-36 formed the heart of his command. Its maximum payload was more than four times that of the B-29, even exceeding that of the B-52.

  • Span: 230 ft 0 in (70.10 m)
  • Length: 162 ft 1 in (49.40 m)
  • Height: 46 ft 9 in (14.25 m)
  • Engines: 6× Pratt & Whitney R-4360-53 "Wasp Major" radials, 3,800 hp (2,500 kW) each
  • Cruising Speed: 230 mph (200 kn, 380 km/h) with jets off
  • Range: 6,795 mi (5,905 nmi, 10,945 km) with 10,000 lb (4,535 kg) payload
  • First Flight: 8 August 1946

Today in Aviation

July 24

  • 2009 – Aria Air Flight 1525, an Ilyushin Il-62, skids off the runway at Mashhad International Airport, killing 17 of 153 on board.
  • 2009 – The Italian Civil Aviation Authority suspends the operating licence of MyAir due to financial problems and service failures.
  • 1999 – All Nippon Airways Flight 61, a Boeing 747, is hijacked by a passenger, Yuji Nishizawa, wielding a knife; after fatally stabbing the captain, he is overpowered by the crew; the first officer lands the plane safely at Haneda, Japan.
  • 1993 – At 1517 hrs. two Mikoyan MiG-29s, 526, c/n 25887, and 925, c/n 15564, of the Russian Flight Research Institute took off for a demonstration at RIAT RAF Fairford 1993, but during display suffer mid-air collision, both pilots, Alexander Beschastonov and Sergey Tresvyatsk,2] ejecting safely. Video of this accident is widely available on the internet.
  • 1992 – Mandala Airlines Flight 660, a Vickers Viscount 816, crashed on approach to Pattimura Airport, Ambon, Indonesia, killing all 7 crew and 63 passengers on board.
  • 1978 – McDonnell Douglas completes the 5,000th F-4 Phantom II.
  • 1970 – USAF McDonnell Douglas F-4C-20-MC Phantom II, 63-7609, crashes SE of McNeal, Arizona.
  • 1969 – Apollo 11 splashes down safely in the Pacific Ocean.
  • 1965 – Four F-4 C Phantoms escorting a bombing raid at Kang Chi are the targets of SA-2 Guideline surface-to-air antiaircraft missiles in the first such attack against American planes in the Vietnam war. One is shot down and the other three sustain damage.
  • 1961 – Deliveries of the McDonnell CF-101 Voodoo to the Royal Canadian Air Force commence.
  • 1953 – (24-26) Operating off the east coast of Korea, the U. S. Navy aircraft carriers USS Boxer (CVA-21), USS Lake Champlain (CVA-39), USS Philippine Sea (CVA-47), and USS Princeton (CVA-37), supporting United Nations ground forces, break records for the number of sorties flown with the highest sortie rates of the Korean War. They average 170 sorties per day, and Princeton aircraft fly 184 sorties on one day.
  • 1946 – Bernard Lynch becomes the first person to be “shot” out of an airplane. Lynch was involved in the first airborne test of a British “ejection seat. ” Lynch ejected from a Gloster Meteor Mk III at 320 mph.
  • 1945 – Task Force 38 carrier aircraft fly 1,747 sorties against no air opposition, striking targets in the Inland Sea of Japan in one of the heaviest days of carrier air strikes of World War II. At Kure, Japan, they sink the battleship Hyūga, the heavy cruisers Tone and Aoba, and the obsolete battleship Settsu and armored cruiser Iwate, heavily damage the aircraft carrier Amagi, and damage the aircraft carrier Kaiyo. In addition, 570 U. S. Army Air Forces B-29 s drop 3,445 tons (3,125,283 kg) of bombs on Osaka and Nagoya, Japan.
  • 1945 – (24-26) Aircraft from carriers of the British 21st Aircraft Carrier Squadron strike Japanese airfields and shipping in northern Malaya.
  • 1944 – U. S. forces land on Tinian.
  • 1943 – The Royal Air Force (RAF) use “Window, ” code name for metal foil dropped to confuse enemy radar, for the first time.
  • 1943 – (Overnight) 791 British bombers attack Hamburg, Germany, beginning Operation Gomorrah or the “Battle of Hamburg, a systematic effort by Bomber Command chief Air Marshal Arthur Harris to destroy the city. For the first time, the Royal Air Force uses chaff, codenamed “Window”, to foil German radar. About 1,500 people are killed, more than in all 137 previous air attacks on the city combined. Twelve British bombers are lost.
  • 1941 – The Boeing-built Douglas DB-7 B attack bomber makes its first flight.
  • 1938 – At Campo de Marte, Santa Ana, Usaquén, Colombia, a pilot performing an aerobatic display crashes a Curtiss F11C Goshawk into a crowd attending a military review. Sources differ on the number killed and injured up to 75 died and 100 or more were injured. According to TIME magazine, the pilot, Flt. Lt. Cesar Abadia of the Colombian Air Force, disregarded standing orders not to fly below 500 feet and attempted to dive through a narrow gap between two grandstands. The pilot misjudged his approach and a wingtip hit the Diplomatic stand the plane then smashed against the Presidential stand and exploded, raining flaming debris down on spectators located between the two grandstands.
  • 1917 – Congress approves the expenditure of $640 million on military aviation. It is the largest single appropriation approved by Congress.
  • 1897 – Amelia Earhart, the first woman to fly alone across the Atlantic Ocean and one of the world’s most famous aviators, is born in Atchinson, Kansas.

References

  1. ^ Weaver, Matthew; Whitaker, Brian (24 July 2012). "Syria crisis: clashes and prison mutiny in Aleppo". The Guardian.
  2. ^ The Independent, 25 July 2012
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