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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

Zeppelin
Zeppelin
A Zeppelin is a type of rigid airship pioneered by Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin in the early 20th century. Due to the outstanding success of the Zeppelin design, the term zeppelin in casual use came to refer to all rigid airships. The German defeat in World War I halted the business temporarily, but under the guidance of Hugo Eckener, the successor of the deceased count, civilian Zeppelins experienced a renaissance in the 1920s. They reached their zenith in the 1930s, when the airships LZ127 "Graf Zeppelin" and LZ129 "Hindenburg" profitably operated regular transatlantic passenger flights. The Hindenburg disaster in 1937 triggered the fall of the "giants of the air", though other factors, including political issues, contributed to the demise. (Full article...)

Selected image

A flight control system consists of the flight control surfaces, the respective cockpit controls, connecting linkage, and necessary operating mechanisms to control aircraft in flight.

Did you know

...that a Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcar was used in the 2004 film Flight of the Phoenix?

Aichi D1A

... 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
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Associated Wikimedia

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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

Avro Arrow replica at CASM Arrow rollout in 2006
Avro Arrow replica at CASM Arrow rollout in 2006

The Avro Canada CF-105 Arrow was a delta-winged interceptor aircraft, designed and built by Avro Aircraft Limited (Canada) in Malton, Ontario, Canada, as the culmination of a design study that began in 1953. Considered to be both an advanced technical and aerodynamic achievement for the Canadian aviation industry, the CF-105 held the promise of Mach 2 speeds at altitudes exceeding 50,000 ft (15,000 m), and was intended to serve as the Royal Canadian Air Force's primary interceptor in the 1960s and beyond. Not long after the 1958 start of its flight test program, the development of the Arrow (including its Orenda Iroquois jet engines) was abruptly and controversially halted before the project review had taken place, sparking a long and bitter political debate. The controversy engendered by the cancellation and subsequent destruction of the aircraft in production, remains a topic for debate among historians, political observers and industry pundits. "This action effectively put Avro out of business and its highly skilled engineering and production personnel scattered... The incident was a traumatic one... and to this day, many mourn the loss of the Arrow."

  • Span: 50 ft 0 in (15.24 m)
  • Length: 77 ft 9 in (23.71 m)
  • Height: 20 ft 6 in (6.25 m)
  • Engines: 2×Pratt & Whitney J75-P-3
  • Cruising Speed: Mach 0.91 (607 mph, 977 km/h) at 36,000 ft (11,000 m)
  • First Flight: 25 March 1958
  • Number built: 5
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Today in Aviation

August 29

  • 2012 – A United States Marine Corps Bell UH-1Y of HMLA-469 crashed in Helamand province, Afghanistan killing two soldiers from the 2nd Australian Commando Regiment.
  • 2012 – Syrian rebels claim to have attacked a Syrian government military air base in Taftanaz, Syria, damaging several government helicopters.[1]
  • 2009 – A United States Air Force Boeing E-3 Sentry catches fire on landing at Nellis Air Force Base, United States. All 32 people on board are safely evacuated.
  • 2007 – Airmen at Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota load six nuclear-tipped AGM-129 ACM cruise missiles onto a B-52H bomber for transport to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana without ensuring that the nuclear warheads had been replaced with training warheads. The nukes shoot the breeze without proper handling or security precautions in place for a full 36 hours before anyone notices. The Pentagon would classify it as a “Bent Spear” event, four USAF commanders would lose their jobs and many other airmen would be disciplined.
  • 2005 – Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport (MSY) is impacted by Hurricane Katrina, but suffering no flooding. The airport would reopen to supply and rescue flights by the following day, with commercial cargo flights resuming September 10th and passenger flights restarting on September 13th.
  • 2001 – Binter Mediterráneo Flight 8261, a CASA CN-235, suffers port engine failure and crashes onto the N-340 road while attempting to make an emergency landing at Ruiz Picasso International Airport, killing 4 of 43 on board, the pilot initially survives, but dies several hours later.
  • 1998 – A Cubana de Aviación Tupolev Tu-154 crashed during takeoff into buildings in Quito, Ecuador. Seventy-five of the 90 people on board died as well as 10 on the ground.
  • 1996 – Vnukovo Airlines Flight 2801, a Tupolev Tu-154, crashes into a mountain on Spitsbergen, an island in the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard, killing all 141 on board.
  • 1984 – Second prototype Rockwell B-1A Lancer, 74-0159, of the Air Force Flight Test Center, Edwards AFB, California, crashes 22 miles NE of the base, in the desert E of Boron, California, when control is lost during an aft centre of gravity test. The flight commander, Rockwell test pilot Doug A. Benefield, is killed when escape pod parachutes fail to fully deploy, module impacting in a right nose low attitude. The Co-pilot and flight test engineer are badly injured.
  • 1969 – In the TWA Flight 840 hijacking, two operatives from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine force a Boeing 707 to land at Damascus, Syria; all passengers were released except for two passengers who were released two months later; there are no casualties to the 127 on board, but the aircraft's nose section is blown up.
  • 1961 – A French military aircraft clips a cable of the aerial tramway connecting Pointe Helbronner and the Aiguille du Midi in the French Alps. Three cars of the tramway fall, killing five people. The pilot lands his plane safely.
  • 1959 – Chris Hadfield, first Canadian to walk in space, was born.
  • 1956 – RCAF Sabre-5 flew 2740 miles in 5 hours and 30 seconds (Vancouver-Gimli-Halifax) with F/Lt Ralph Annis and F/O Chick Childerhose.
  • 1952 – Boulton Paul P.120, VT951, first flown 6 August 1952, crashes this date on Salisbury Plain, Wilts, Great Britain after control failure, tail flutter. Pilot A.E. "Ben" Gunn ejects safely. Airframe had accumulated only ~eleven hours flying time. This is the first recorded loss of a delta-wing-design airframe.
  • 1948 – Northwest Airlines Flight 421, a Martin 2-0-2, crashes near Winona, Minnesota due to structural failure of a wing, killing all 37 on board in the worst ever accident involving the Martin 2-0-2. This crash is also the first loss of a 2-0-2.
  • 1947 – The world’s first ramjet helicopter, the McDonnell XH-20 Little Henry, makes its first flight. The ramjet-driven rotor eliminates the need for a torque-compensating tail rotor.
  • 1945 – Airborne medical teams and supplies were dropped to prisoners of war in Burma and Siam (now Thailand).
  • 1944 – The final airstrike of Operation Goodwood, Goodwood IV, is unsuccessful because a German smoke screen over Tirpitz makes her impossible to hit.
  • 1911 – Hilda Hewlett becomes the first British woman to receive a pilot’s licence.
  • 1909 – At the end of a two-day flight from Lake Constance during which Count von Zeppelin travels a total distance of more than 400 miles, he makes a spectacular flight in his dirigible LZ5 over the city of Berlin, Germany.
  • 1879 – In Ontario, Nellie Thurston becomes the first Canadian woman to fly in a balloon.

References

  1. ^ Anonymous, "Syria's Assad says military 'needs time to win battle,'" BBC News, August 29, 2012, 5:23 p.m. EDT
  2. ^ "ARMY AIR CREWS: Kiowa Crewmembers Line of Duty Deaths". Retrieved 2010-07-16. 4/3 CAV #90-00377. TF Freedom pilot killed by SA fire near Tal Afar. The A/C took rounds and the PI was able to recover but had to make an emergency landing north of the city, he was unable to fly back to base. Medevac had to come in to get the aircrew out, later that night an SP and MTP had to fly out to recover the aircraft.
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