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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

Mirabel Satellite photo
Mirabel Satellite photo
Montréal-Mirabel International Airport is a large airport located in Mirabel, Quebec, near Montreal and was opened 4 October 1975. The airport serves mainly cargo flights, and is a manufacturing base of Bombardier Aerospace, where final assembly of regional jets (CRJ700 and CRJ900) aircraft is conducted. It is part of the National Airports System. It is the second largest airport in the world in terms of area, covering more land area than the five New York City boroughs.

The airport's location and lack of transport links, as well as Montreal's economic decline relative to Toronto, made it unpopular with airlines. Eventually relegated to the simple role of a cargo airport, Mirabel became an embarrassment widely regarded in Canada as being a boondoggle, or a "white elephant," and one of the best examples of a failed megaproject. (Full article...)

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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 five USAAF airmen were awarded the Medal of Honor following Operation Tidal Wave, a low-level bombing of Romanian oil refineries on 1 August 1943? ...that Garuda Indonesia flight 152 was the deadliest air disaster of 1997, claiming the lives of over 230 people? ...that François Denhaut built the world's first flying boat, or seaplane with a hull?

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

Marshal of the Royal Air Force Hugh Montague Trenchard, 1st Viscount Trenchard GCB OM GCVO DSO (3 February 1873 – 10 February 1956) was a British officer who was instrumental in establishing the Royal Air Force. He has been described as the Father of the Royal Air Force.

During his formative years Trenchard struggled academically, failing many examinations and only just succeeding in meeting the minimum standard for commissioned service in the British Army. As a young infantry officer, Trenchard served in India and in South Africa. During the Boer War, Trenchard was critically wounded and as a result of his injury, he lost a lung, was partially paralysed and returned to Great Britain. While convalescing in Switzerland he took up bobsleighing and after a heavy crash, Trenchard found that his paralysis was gone and that he could walk unaided. Some months later, Trenchard returned to South Africa before volunteering for service in Nigeria. During his time in Nigeria, Trenchard commanded the Southern Nigeria Regiment for several years and was involved in efforts to bring the interior under settled British rule and quell inter-tribal violence.

In 1912, Trenchard learned to fly and was subsequently appointed as second in command of the Central Flying School. He held several senior positions in the Royal Flying Corps during World War I, serving as the commander of Royal Flying Corps in France from 1915 to 1917. In 1918, he briefly served as the first Chief of the Air Staff before taking up command of the Independent Air Force in France. Returning as Chief of the Air Staff under Winston Churchill in 1919, Trenchard spent the following decade securing the future of the Royal Air Force. He was Metropolitan Police Commissioner in the 1930s and a defender of the RAF in his later years.

Selected Aircraft

The Avro Lancaster was a British four-engine Second World War bomber aircraft made initially by Avro for the British Royal Air Force (RAF). It first saw active service in 1942, and together with the Handley-Page Halifax it was one of the main heavy bombers of the RAF, the RCAF and squadrons from other Commonwealth and European countries serving within RAF Bomber Command. The "Lanc" or "Lankie," as it became affectionately known, became the most famous and most successful of the Second World War night bombers, "delivering 608,612 tons of bombs in 156,000 sorties." Although the Lancaster was primarily a night bomber, it excelled in many other roles including daylight precision bombing, and gained worldwide renown as the "Dam Buster" used in the 1943 Operation Chastise raids on Germany's Ruhr Valley dams.

  • Span: 102 ft (31.09 m)
  • Length: 69 ft 5 in (21.18 m)
  • Height: 19 ft 7 in (5.97 m)
  • Engines: 4× Rolls-Royce Merlin XX V12 engines, 1,280 hp (954 kW) each
  • Maximum Speed: 240 knots (280 mph, 450 km/h) at 15,000 ft (5,600 m)
  • First Flight: 8 January 1941
  • Number built: 7,377
More selected aircraft Read more...

Today in Aviation

September 5

  • 2005 – An Antonov An-12BP cargo aircraft (reg 4L-SAS) owned by Transaviaservice of Georgia, operated for Galaxy Kavatsi of DRC, and flying with an expired Georgian license overshoots and burns at Goma DRC while stopping en route to Bukavu. Five crew (two Ukrainians, two Georgians, one Congolese) and three minor passengers (Congolese girls) were killed.
  • 2005 – Sukhoi Su-33 landing on the Russian aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov at 1627 hrs. gets the trap, but arresting wire breaks and the fighter goes off the deck into the North Atlantic, pilot Sub Colonel Yuri Korneev ejecting immediately. Jet sinks in ~1,000 metres of water, pilot deploys raft from his survival pack and is rescued by a Kamov Ka-27P rescue helicopter and brought on board in a "normal condition." According to a source in Naval Headquarters, "it is possible that the pilot also made a mistake during the incident. The jet pilot, according to instructions, should have revved the engine after the cable broke and performed an emergency takeoff. However, the fault of the pilot can be determined only after analysis from the Su-33’s black box," reported Kommersant. Capt. Of First Rank Igor Dygalo, head of the press center of the Main Staff of the Navy, said that the black box released as it was designed and surfaced after the plane sank. This was the first loss of the type during a "sea flight."
  • 2005 – Mandala Airlines Flight 091, a Boeing 737-200, crashes in Medan, Indonesia, killing 103 of the 111 passengers and all 5 crew members on the plane and an additional 47 people on the ground.
  • 1994 – The first production version of the advanced McDonnell Douglas Explorer twin-turbine, eight-place helicopter makes its maiden flight at Mesa, Ariz.
  • 1986 – Pan Am Flight 73, a Boeing 747, is hijacked on the ground at Jinnah International Airport in Karachi, Pakistan, by Palestinian militants. About twenty passengers and crew out of 379 on board die during a shootout inside the plane.
  • 1984 – Landed: Space Shuttle Discovery STS-41-D at 13:37:54 UTC Edwards AFB. Mission highlights: Multiple comsat deployments; first flight of Discovery, test of OAST-1 Solar Array.
  • 1983 – Landed: Space shuttle Challenger STS-8 at 07:40:43 UTC. Mission highlights: Comsat deployment, first flight of an African American in space, Guion Bluford; test of robot arm on heavy payloads with Payload Flight Test Article, First night landing.
  • 1982 – Douglas Bader, RAF fighter pilot in World War II, died. Bader was a successful fighter pilot, claiming 22 German planes shot down in WWII. He claimed the fifth highest total in the RAF, despite having lost both legs in a pre-war flying accident. He was shot down 1941 and spent the rest of the war in a German prison camp. He made so many escape attempts that the Germans threatened to take his prosthetic legs away from him.
  • 1960 – A United States Navy McDonnell F4 H-1 Phantom II sets a world speed record over a 500-km (310.5-mi) closed-circuit course, averaging 1,216.78 mph (1,958.16 km/hr). September 10, 1960 – NORAD carries out Operation Sky Shield, testing US and Canadian radar systems took place on 10 Sep 1960.[3]
  • 1957 – Royal Canadian Air Force Avro Canada CF-100 Mk.4B, 18455, pulled up, flamed out, went into inverted spin and at the Canadian International Air Show, Toronto, Ontario. F/O's H. R. Norris and R. C. Dougall were killed.
  • 1954 – KLM Flight 633, a Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation, ditches after takeoff from Shannon Airport in Ireland, killing 28 of 56 on board.
  • 1943 – 1,700 men of the United States Army’s 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment parachute onto the Japanese airfield at Nadzab, New Guinea, capturing it easily. An airlift of several thousand more Allied troops to the airfield occurs over the next few days.
  • 1939 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt orders the United States Navy to organize a Neutrality Patrol to report and track any belligerent air, surface, or underwater naval forces approaching the United States East Coast or the West Indies.
  • 1918 – First flight of the Orenco C
  • 1918 – Establishment of Royal Canadian Naval Air Service; authorized to operate two stations in Nova Scotia.
  • 1908 – Goupy No.1, is the world’s first triplane. The French Goupy, was built by Ambroise Goupy, it has three sets of wings; each stacked above the others and is powered by 50-hp Renault engine.
  • 1862 – After a dramatic take-off, aeronaut Coxwell and English physicist Glaisher reach 9,000 m.

References

  1. ^ Stanglin, Douglas (September 6, 2012). "Putin Pilots Hang Glider to Point Cranes to New Winter Home". (USA Today)Content.usatoday.com. Retrieved December 2, 2012.
  2. ^ Kramer, Andrew E. (September 5, 2012). "Putin Pulls Off Latest Feat: Flying With the Birds". Russia: The New York Times(Nytimes.com). Retrieved December 2, 2012.
  3. ^ http://www.airspacemag.com/history-of-flight/this-is-only-a-test-3119878/?no-ist=&page=2
  4. ^ http://www.militaryfactory.com/aircraft/detail-page-2.asp?aircraft_id=1094
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