Warbirds Online » Blog Archive » This Week In Military/Aviation History 8

Hello Folks, seven more gone and I’m back once again. Wow! You should see the new interface I have to work with when I write these posts. Bells and whistles up the ying-yang, and i have no clue on how to use them….yet. The darn thing even gives me a word count when it saves my draft every so often. Not to mention the time it saved it. There are all kinds of new icons for me to explore…………Sorry, i got hung up watching it save my draft again. This is sooooo cool. Oh well, let’s get down to some serious history, shall we?

Have an AB FAN week,

Take Care and Be Safe,

Tom K.

8 December 1903
A second attempt to launch Langley’s ‘Aerodrome’, once again piloted by Charles M. Manly, fails when the rear wing fouls the launcher and the ‘Aerodrome’ falls into the river. With this accident, official American support for the project is withdrawn.

14 December 1903
Wilbur Wright attempts, and fails to achieve, the first sustained flight in ‘Flyer’. The aircraft is slightly damaged.

10 December 1910
Romanian Henri Coanda makes a brief flight in the world’s first jet-powered aeroplane. It is powered by a 37kW (50 horse-power) Clerget piston engine driving a centrifugal air compressor.

12 December 1912
The first ejector seat, developed by Baron d’Odkolek, is tested at Issy-les-Moulineaux in France, when a dummy wearing the parachute is ejected by a small cannon from a flying aeroplane.

9 December 1914
German Leutnant Oswald Boelke receives a Fokker A1 reconnaissance monoplane.

10 December 1914
The Russian Army EVK (Flotilla of Flying Ships) is formed and equipped with the first Ilya Mourometz long range bombers. The unit will eventually grow to 40-50 aircraft.

11 December 1915
German Navy Schutte-Lanz airship SL4 (C2) is wrecked in a storm while still in its shed.

12 December 1915
The German Junkers J1 Blechesel ‘Tin Donkey’, the world’s first all-metal reconnaissance and close-support monoplane, flies for the first time at Dessau in Germany.

11 December 1917
Aviatrix Katherine Stinson flies from San Diego to San Francisco, thereby establishing a new American non-stop distance record of 975 kilometers (606 miles).

12 December 1920
The Blériot-Spad 33 airliner makes its first flight.

13 December 1924 The first attempt to hook on to the United States Army TC3 dirigible (steerable airship) is a failure and 1st Lieutenant Clyde Finter, flying a Sperry Messenger, has to make a forced landing.

14 December 1927
The United States Navy’s third carrier, USS Lexington, is commissioned.

8 December 1938
The ‘Graf Zeppelin’, the first and only German aircraft carrier, is launched. However, the ship will never be completed and is scuttled in 1945.

11 November 1940
Regia Aeronautica, Italy’s air force, makes its one and only major raid on the United Kingdom.

8 December 1941
The United States declares war on Japan.

Following heavy air attacks on Royal Air Force (RAF) bases in Malaya and Singapore, the Japanese invade northern Malaya. The United Kingdom declares war on Japan.

10 December 1941
After a heavy air attack on Cavite naval base in the Philippines Japan begins small amphibious landings at Aparri and Vigan in Northern Luzon.

United States Army Air Force (USAAF) Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bombers, operating from the Philippines, attack Japanese shipping. This is the first American air offensive action of the Second World War.

11 December 1941
Germany and Italy declare war on the United States.

13 December 1943
The 8th United States Army Air Force (USAAF) begins long range fighter escort missions.

8 December 1948
A United States Air Force (USAF) Consolidated B-36 completes a 15,128 kilometer (9,400 mile) un-refuelled, non-stop flight from Fort Worth in Texas to Hawaii and back again.

9 December 1950
It is announced that No.77 Squadron of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) using North American Mustang piston-engined fighters in Korea will be re-equipped with Gloster Meteor VIII jet fighters.

12 December 1953
Captain Charles Yeager flies the air-launched Bell X-1A rocket-powered high-speed research aircraft at Mach 2.44 or 2,655 kph (1,650 mph) at an altitude of 21,340 meters (70,000 feet).

11 December 1954
The United States Navy’s aircraft carrier Forrestal is launched.

13 December 1954
The first of 22 Vickers Viscount propeller-turbine airliners, ordered by Trans-Canada Air Lines, are delivered.

12 December 1957
Major Adrian Drew sets a new world speed record of 1,943 kph (1,207 mph), flying a McDonnell F-101A Voodoo.

12 December 1958
The balloon ‘Small World’, commanded by A.B. Elloart, ascends from the Canary Isles in an attempt to traverse the South Atlantic. It lands in the sea on 15 December having travelled 2,800 kilometers (1,740 miles).

9 December 1959
A Kaman H-43B rescue helicopter sets a new helicopter altitude record of 9,097 meters (29,846 feet).

14 December 1959
The world altitude record is broken again by a Lockheed F-104C Starfighter, flown by Captain J.B. Jordan to a height of 31,513 meters (103,389 feet).

11 December 1961
The first direct military support for South Vietnam from the United States - a United States Navy (USN) carrier transports two United States Army helicopter companies to Saigon.

14 December 1962
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) Mariner II scans the surface of Venus for 35 minutes as it flies past at a distance of 34,830 kilometers (21,642 miles). A surface temperature of 428°C (834°F) is recorded.

12 October 1964
The Soviets launch Voskhod 1 into earth orbit. This is the first launch to carry a multiple crew - Vladimir Komarov, Konstantin Feoktistov and Boris Yegorov, who operate without spacesuits during the mission.

9 December 1976
The 008 Escadrilla of the Arma Aéreade La Armada Española, Spain’s first AV8A Matador jump-jet squadron, becomes operational.

13 December 1977
Eastern Airlines in the United States inaugurates services, with Airbus A300B4 aircraft leased from the manufacturer, opening American markets to the Airbus machines.

9 December 1980
Boeing complete their 500th 747 airliner - the aircraft will see service with Scandinavian Airlines (SAS).

9 December 1983
Boeing completes its 1,000th Model 737 airliner.

14 December 1984
The future of aircraft design may be about to change as the Grumman X-29 forward swept-wing advanced-technology demonstrator starts its test program.

14 December 1986
The Voyager composite trimaran aircraft begins the first unrefuelled, non-stop flight around the world. Piloted by Richard G. Rutan and Jeana Yeager the flight takes 9 days 3 minutes 44 seconds and sets new world distance records for straight flight and a closed circuit course of 40,212 kilometers (24,986 miles). The aircraft carries five times its own weight in fuel on the flight, which begins and ends at Edwards Air Force Base in California.

8 December 1987
The United States of America and the Soviet Union sign an Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty.

12 December 1990
The Boeing Vertol/Bell Helicopter Textron V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor technology aircraft completes its sea trials with the United States Navy (USN).

14 December 1999
Boeing unveils the X-32A and X-32B Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) demonstrator, which will be used to develop conventional take-off and landing and Vertical/Short Take-Off and Landing (V/STOL) versions.

11 December 2000
A second fatal accident in the V-22 Osprey Tiltrotor test programme causes the United States Marine Corps (USMC) fleet of MV-22 aircraft to be grounded. The next day a panel is appointed by the Defense Secretary to look at the whole program.

10 December 2004
Two CT-114 Tutors from Canada’s Snowbirds aerobatic team collide while training near Mossbank, Saskatchewan. Captain Miles Selby is killed and Captain Chuck Mallet is injured.

The United States Federal Aviation Administration issues an Emergency Airworthiness Directive effectively grounding the entire U.S. fleet of Beechcraft T-34 Mentor aircraft. The AD is in response to fatal in-flight structural failure accidents during simulated aerial combat flights. ==================================================================== That’s it for this week Folks. See ya in seven.

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