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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

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...)

Selected image

The inverted Jenny (or Jenny Invert) is a United States postage stamp of 1918 in which the image of the Curtiss JN-4 airplane in the center of the design was accidentally printed upside-down; it is probably the most famous error in American philately. Only 100 of the inverts were ever found, making this error one of the most prized in all philately; an inverted Jenny was sold at a Robert A. Siegel auction in June 2005 for US$525,000.

Did you know

...that the Heinkel He 46, designed for the Luftwaffe in 1931, was still being used to fight the Soviets in 1943? ...that Wing Commander Stanley Goble and Flying Officer Ivor McIntyre, piloting a single-engined seaplane (pictured), became the first men to circumnavigate Australia by air in 1924? ... that Flying Officer (later Air Commodore) Frank Lukis was one of the original twenty-one officers in the RAAF when it was formed in 1921?

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

Jeana Yeager (born May 18, 1952 in Fort Worth, Texas) is an aviator, most famous for flying with Dick Rutan on a non-stop, non-refueled flight around the world in the Voyager aircraft from December 14 to December 23, 1986. The flight took 9 days, 3 minutes, and 44 seconds and covered 24,986 miles (40,211 km), more than doubling the old distance record. She received the US annual Harmon Trophy for outstanding international achievements in the aeronautics, and is the first woman recipient of the Collier Trophy for "the greatest achievement in aeronautics in America, with respect to improving the performance, efficiency, and safety" of aircraft.

Despite her surname, Jeana Yeager is not related to Chuck Yeager, the first man to break the sound barrier in level flight.

Selected Aircraft

An A400M flying
An A400M flying

The Airbus A400M Atlas is a four-engine turboprop aircraft, designed by Airbus Military (now Airbus Defence and Space) to meet the demand of European nations for military airlift. Since its formal launch, the aircraft has also been ordered by Malaysia, Kazakhstan and Indonesia.

The A400M is assembled at the Seville plant of Airbus Military. The first test flight occurred in December 2009.

  • Span: 42.4 m (139 ft 1 in)
  • Length: 45.1 m (148 ft)
  • Height: 14.7 m (48 ft 3 in)
  • Engines: 4 EPI TP400-D6 (8,250 kW power)
  • Cruising Speed: 780 km/h (480 mph, 420 knots)
  • First Flight: 11 December 2009
  • Number built: 119 as of 31 August 2023
More selected aircraft Read more...

Today in Aviation

July 18

  • 2009 – Deceased: British World War I veteran and last surviving founder member of the Royal Air Force, Henry Allingham, 113.
  • 2009 – A United States Air Force McDonnell Douglas F-15E Strike Eagle from the 336th Fighter Squadron, based at Seymour Johnson AFB, North Carolina, flying in support of ISAF coalition operations, crashes in eastern Afghanistan. The two aircrew, Capt. Thomas J. Gramith and Capt. Mark R. McDowell both die in the incident.
  • 2007 – An Antonov An-24 of Malift Air shortly after taking off from Bandundu, DRC had an engine failure, lost altitude and crashed 8 km from Bandundu. Of the 2 crew and 8 passengers, all survived.
  • 2005 – A Boeing F/A-18E Super Hornet and a Boeing F/A-18F Super Hornet from NAS Lemoore, California, collide over the China Lake, California, weapons testing ground. The pilot of the E is KWF, while the two crew of F eject with injuries.
  • 2002 – Airtanker crashes: C-130 Hercules and a PB4Y-2 Privateer – crashed about a month apart while performing aerial firefighting operations.
  • 1984 – Beverly Lynn Burns becomes the first female Boeing 747 airline captain, flying PEOPLExpress flight 604 from Newark to LAX. The achievement earned her extensive media attention, congratulatory honors from several local politicians – And even an invitation to President Ronald Reagan’s second inauguration. By the time she retired from Continental in 2008, she had captained the 727, 737, 747, 757, 767, 777 and DC-10.
  • 1974 – NASA buys a Boeing 747 from American Airlines, and under a $30 million contract from Rockwell International, Boeing begins modifying it into the first Shuttle Carrier Aircraft.
  • 1966 – Gemini 10, the first mission to complete a double rendezvous with other spacecraft, is launched from Cape Canaveral.
  • 1966 – A fuel tank on a Boeing B-52D Stratofortress of the 509th Bombardment Wing (Heavy) out of Pease AFB, New Hampshire, comes off and lands 4,000 feet up on Sugarloaf Mountain in Kingfield, Maine.
  • 1965 – The first Russian satellite to complete a lunar flyby, Zond 3, is launched.
  • 1960 – RCAF Douglas DC-4 Ms started the airlift of 22 tons to assist in UN operations in the Republic of the Congo.
  • 1957 – The 380th Bomb Wing suffers its first peacetime major accident when Boeing KC-97G-28-BO Stratotanker, 52-2737, c/n 16768, from the 380th Air Refueling Squadron with a crew of eight explodes and crashes into Lake Champlain at 2128 hrs. when 2 of the 4 engines fail 3 minutes after take-off from Plattsburgh AFB, New York. Three survivors.
  • 1956 – The first Boeing KC-135 rolls out from the Renton plant, followed a few minutes later by the last KC-97.
  • 1950 – AD Skyraiders and F4U Corsairs from the aircraft carrier USS Valley Forge (CV-45) strike targets near Pyongyang, Korea, then completely destroy an oil refinery at Wonsan. Aircraft from HMS Triumph provide a combat air patrol and antisubmarine patrols for Task Force 77 during the strikes.
  • 1950 – The Peruvian Aviation Corps is reorganized to become the Peruvian Air Force.
  • 1945 – Task Force 38 carrier aircraft conduct heavy strikes against targets along the shore of Tokyo Bay, concentrating on the Yokosuka Naval Arsenal, where they damage the battleship Nagato and sink a submarine, a destroyer, and three smaller vessels.
  • 1945 – Consolidated TBY-2 Seawolf, BuNo 30414, overshoots runway while landing at Convair Field, Fort Worth, Texas. Two KWF.
  • 1944 – At 7.15 am on 18 July 1944 a Lancaster Mk.111 bomber belonging to 115 Squadron RAF crashed into the farm house at West End Farm (51°56′03″N 0°20′35″W) killing the crew as well as the farmer’s wife and two daughters (one of whom was home on leave from the Auxiliary Territorial Service). The aircraft LM616 (KO J) had left its base at RAF Witchford near Ely several hours earlier to support Allied ground forces taking part in Operation Goodwood during the Normandy campaign. The Royal Air Force and United States Army Air Forces objective was to bomb units of the 16th Luftwaffe Field Division and the 21st Panzer Division which were located around the Manneville area in France. LM616 received severe damage during the raid, in which its controls and navigation aids were shot up. The aircraft had descended through low cloud only to see the high escarpment of the Chiltern Hills at Offley loom into view too late for the crew to take immediate action. The aircraft hit trees in a wood on top of Birkitt Hill before colliding with the farm house at West End Farm.
  • 1944 – Hauptman Werner Thierfelder, unit commander of Erprobungskommando 262, out of Lechfeld, is lost in crash of Me 262A-1a under unclear circumstances. Luftwaffe records indicate that he was shot down but U.S. and British records show no comparable engagement. A possible cause is that Thierfelder exceeded the airframe's limiting Mach number in a dive, perhaps while pursuing an Allied reconnaissance aircraft, leading to an irrecoverable dive.
  • 1943 – US Navy airship US airship K-74| is shot down by a German submarine, the only airship lost to enemy fire during World War II.
  • 1943 – Six Eleventh Air Force B-24 s make the first confirmed Allied strike against the Kurile Islands, damaging the Japanese base at Paramushiro and claiming a ship sunk without suffering any losses. It is the first time since the Doolittle Raid of April 1942 that Allied aircraft have struck the inner portions of the Japanese Empire.
  • 1941 – The first Boeing B-17 s fly into combat, serving with the British Royal Air Force on a daylight bombing raid from 30,000 feet against Wilhelmshaven, Germany.
  • 1941 – The first RAF aircraft equipped with radar
  • 1940 – First successful helicopter flight in the US, Stratford, Ct. in the Vought-Sikorsky US-300.
  • 1937 – Supporting Nationalist forces, German fighters of the Condor Legion begin to dominate the air over the Battle of Brunete, shooting down 21 Republican aircraft during the day. The Nationalists will hold the advantage in the air over central Spain for the rest of the Spanish Civil War.
  • 1919 – Riding as a passenger, Raymonde de Laroche dies along with the pilot in the crash of an experimental Caudron airplane at Le Crotoy airfield in France.
  • 1914 – The United States Congress creates an Aviation Section in the United States Army Signal Corps.
  • 1905 – Daniel Maloney makes a launch in a tandem-wing glider designed by John Montgomery at Santa Clara, California. However, a balloon cable damages the glider and upon release Maloney and the aircraft fall uncontrolled to the ground, leading to Maloney’s death.
  • 1803, Etienne Gaspar Robertson and Lhoest climb from Hamburg (Germany) up to 7,280 m in a balloon.

References

  1. ^ "Dreamliner lands at Farnborough". BBC News. 18 July 2010. Archived from the original on 20 July 2010. Retrieved 20 July 2010.
  2. ^ http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/news/nation/15070082.htm
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