Portal:Aviation

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The Aviation Portal

A Boeing 747

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

Flight 11 flightpath
Flight 11 flightpath
American Airlines Flight 11 was a scheduled U.S. domestic passenger flight from Logan International Airport in Boston, Massachusetts, to Los Angeles International Airport. It was hijacked by five men and deliberately crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City as part of the September 11, 2001, attacks. Fifteen minutes into the flight, the hijackers injured at least three people, forcefully breached the cockpit, and overpowered the pilot and first officer. Mohamed Atta, who was a known member of al-Qaeda, and trained as a pilot, took over the controls. Air traffic controllers noticed the flight was in distress when the crew stopped responding to them. They realized the flight had been hijacked when Atta mistakenly transmitted announcements to air traffic control. On board, two flight attendants contacted American Airlines, and provided information about the hijackers and injuries to passengers and crew.

The aircraft crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center at 08:46 local time; the impact killed all 92 people aboard, including the hijackers. Many people in the streets witnessed the collision, and Jules Naudet captured the impact on video. News agencies began to report on the incident soon after and speculated that the crash had been an accident. The impact and subsequent fire caused the North Tower to collapse, which resulted in thousands of additional casualties. During the recovery effort at the World Trade Center site, workers recovered and identified dozens of remains from Flight 11 victims, but many other body fragments could not be identified. (Full article...)

Selected image

Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier on October 14, 1947 in the Bell X-1, as shown in this newsreel.
A newsreel showing the breaking of the sound barrier on 14 October 1947 by Chuck Yeager in the rocket-powered Bell X-1. Flying at an altitude of 45,000 ft (13.7 km), Yeager became the first person to break the sound barrier in level flight.

Did you know

...that the Vickers machine gun was the standard weapon on all British and French military aircraft after 1916?

Bede BD-4

...that the Silver Centenary biplane, built in Beverley, Western Australia in 1930, received its airworthiness certificate 77 years after its first flight?

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

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Selected biography

Helmut Paul Emil Wick (5 August 1915 – 28 November 1940) was a German Luftwaffe ace and the fourth recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves (German: Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub). The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross and its higher grade, the Oak Leaves, was awarded by the Third Reich to recognise extreme bravery in battle or successful military leadership. It was Germany's highest military decoration at the time of its presentation to Helmut Wick.

Born in Mannheim, Wick joined the Luftwaffe in 1936 and was trained as a fighter pilot. He was assigned to Jagdgeschwader 2 "Richthofen" (JG 2—2nd Fighter Wing), and saw combat in the Battles of France and Britain. Promoted to Major in October 1940, he was given the position of Geschwaderkommodore (wing commander) of JG 2—the youngest in the Luftwaffe to hold this rank and position. He was shot down in the vicinity of the Isle of Wight on 28 November 1940 and posted as missing in action, presumed dead. By then he had been credited with destroying 56 enemy aircraft in aerial combat, making him the leading German fighter pilot at the time. Flying the Messerschmitt Bf 109, he claimed all of his victories against the Western Allies.

Selected Aircraft

Airbus A380
Airbus A380

The Airbus A380 is a double-deck, four-engined airliner manufactured by Airbus S.A.S. It first flew on 27 April 2005 from Toulouse–Blagnac Airport. Commercial flights began in late 2007 after months of testing, with the delivery of the first aircraft to launch customer Singapore Airlines. During much of its development phase, the aircraft was known as the Airbus A3XX, and the nickname Superjumbo has also become associated with the A380.

The A380 is double decked, with the upper deck extending along the entire length of the fuselage. This allows for a spacious cabin, with the A380 in standard three-class configuration to seat 555 people, up to maximum of 853 in full economy class configuration. Only one model of the A380 was available: The A380-800, the passenger model. It is the largest passenger airliner in the world superseding the Boeing 747. The other launch model, the A380-800F freighter, was canceled and did not join the ranks of the largest freight aircraft such as the Antonov An-225, An-124, and the C-5 Galaxy.

  • Span: 79.8 m (261 ft 10 in)
  • Length: 73 m (239 ft 6 in)
  • Height: 24.1 m (79 ft 1 in)
  • Engines: 4 * Rolls-Royce Trent 900 or Engine Alliance GP7200 (311 kN or 69,916 lbf)
  • Cruising Speed: 0.85 Mach (approx 1,050 km/h or 652 mph or 567 kn)
  • First Flight: 27 April 2005
  • Number built: 254 (including 3 prototypes)
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Today in Aviation

May 16

  • 2011 – Launch: Space Shuttle Endeavour STS-134 at 12:56:28 UTC. Mission highlights: ISS assembly flight ULF6, ELC 3, ROEU, Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer. Final flight of Endeavour.
  • 2001 – A Turkish Air Force CASA CN-235M-100 crashes into a field in Malatya, Turkey killing all 34 on board.
  • 1977 – The landing gear failed on a New York Airways Sikorsky S-61 while it was taking on passengers on the roof of the Pan Am building. The aircraft rolled onto its side. Its spinning rotor blades killed four passengers waiting to board (including movie director Michael Findlay) and injured a fifth. Parts of a broken blade fell into the streets below, killing one pedestrian and injuring another.
  • 1958 – Captain Walter W. Irwin sets a new airspeed record of 1,404 mph (2,259 km/h) in a F-104 Starfighter, the first record over 2,000 km/h.
  • 1954 – Birth of Dafydd Rhys "Dave" Williams, Canadian physician and a retired CSA astronaut. He had two space flights, both of which were Space Shuttle missions.
  • 1946 – A B-17G Flying Fortress crashes into White's Hill near Fairfax, California, while en route to Hamilton Field in Marin County, California, after running out of fuel. Two crew members are killed.
  • 1919 – A naval Curtiss aircraft NC-4 commanded by Albert Cushing Read leaves Trepassey, Newfoundland, for Lisbon via the Azores on the first transatlantic flight.
  • 1918 – The Imperial German Navy recommissions the light cruiser Stuttgart after her conversion into a seaplane carrier. She is the only German seagoing aviation ship capable of working with the fleet commissioned during either World War I or World War II.
  • 1915 – (16-17 overnight) Two Royal Naval Air Service Avro 504s interceot the Imperial German Navy Zeppelins LZ 38 and LZ 39, badly damaging LZ39 with four 20-lb (9-kg) bombs dropped on its envelope from above.

References

Edit today's anniversaries – May Archive – All anniversaries...


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