Portal:Aviation

Main page

Categories & Main topics

Tasks and Projects

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

A U.S. Air Force F-35A off the coast of Florida

The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is an American family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather stealth multirole combat aircraft that is intended to perform both air superiority and strike missions. It is also able to provide electronic warfare and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities. Lockheed Martin is the prime F-35 contractor, with principal partners Northrop Grumman and BAE Systems. The aircraft has three main variants: the conventional takeoff and landing (CTOL) F-35A, the short take-off and vertical-landing (STOVL) F-35B, and the carrier-based (CV/CATOBAR) F-35C. (Full article...)

More selected articles

Selected image

Wingtip vortices

Credit: US Air Force photo

Wingtip vortices are visible trailing from an F-15E Strike Eagle as it disengages from midair refueling with a KC-10 Extender during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Did you know

...that Suriname's worst air disaster was Surinam Airways Flight 764, which crashed after the pilots ignored repeated warnings that they were flying too low? ...that the fighter pilot Aleksandr Kazakov destroyed 32 German and Austro-Hungarian planes during WWI, while his formal tally of 17 is explained by the fact that only planes crashed in the Russian-held territory were officially counted? ...that a Cambridge University society has launched high altitude balloons that have taken a picture of the earth's curvature from a height of 32 km?

General images -

The following are images from various aviation-related articles on Wikipedia.

• 
  German Taube monoplane, illustration from 1917 (from History of aviation)
• 
  The business class cabin on an A350 (from Wide-body aircraft)
• 
  The economy class cabin of an Airbus A350 (from Wide-body aircraft)
• 
  Planophore model aeroplane by Alphonse Pénaud, 1871 (from History of aviation)
• 
  Map of record breaking flights of the 1920s (from History of aviation)
• 
  General aviation aircraft at Cheb Airport in Czech Republic (from General aviation)
• 
  Experimental helicopter by Enrico Forlanini (1877), exposed at the Museo nazionale della scienza e della tecnologia Leonardo da Vinci of Milan, Italy (from History of aviation)
• 
  French reconnaissance balloon L'Intrépide of 1796, the oldest existing flying device, in the Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna (from History of aviation)
• 
  Otto Lilienthal, 29 May 1895 (from History of aviation)
• 
  The Wright Flyer: the first sustained flight with a powered, controlled aircraft (from History of aviation)
• 
  Me 262, world first operational jet fighter (from History of aviation)
• 
  Alberto Santos-Dumont flying the Demoiselle over Paris (from History of aviation)
• 
  The 14-bis, or Oiseau de proie (from History of aviation)
• 
  "Governable parachute" design of 1852 (from History of aviation)
• 
  The Aeroplane of Victor Tatin, 1879. (from History of aviation)
• 
  La France flying in 1885 (from History of aviation)
• 
  Flagg biplane from 1933 (from History of aviation)
• 
  Sailplane, a Rolladen-Schneider LS4 (from General aviation)
• 
  First failure of Langley's manned Aerodrome on the Potomac River, 7 October 1903 (from History of aviation)
• 
  Robinson R22, a light piston-engine helicopter (from General aviation)
• 
  Santos-Dumont's "Number 6" rounding the Eiffel Tower in the process of winning the Deutsch de la Meurthe Prize, October 1901 (from History of aviation)
• 
  Woodcut print of a kite from John Bate's 1635 book The Mysteryes of Nature and Art (from History of aviation)
• 
  1843 artist's impression of John Stringfellow's plane Ariel flying over the Nile (from History of aviation)
• 
  Cathay Pacific's first class cabin on board a Boeing 747-400 (from Wide-body aircraft)
• 
  Concorde, G-BOAB, in storage at London Heathrow Airport following the end of all Concorde flying. This aircraft flew for 22,296 hours between its first flight in 1976 and final flight in 2000 (from History of aviation)
• 
  Early Voisin biplane (from History of aviation)
• 
  Cessna CitationJet/M2, part of the Citation family of business jets (from General aviation)
• 
  The Biot-Massia glider, restored and on display in the Musee de l'Air (from History of aviation)
• 
  First female combat pilot, Sabiha Gökçen, reviews her Breguet 19 (from History of aviation)
• 
  Clément Ader Avion III (1897 photograph) (from History of aviation)
• 
  One of Leonardo's sketches (from History of aviation)
• 
  1928 issue of Popular Aviation (now Flying magazine), which became the largest aviation magazine with a circulation of 100,000. (from History of aviation)
• 
  Daedalus working on Icarus' wings (from History of aviation)
• 
  Nieuport IV, operated by most of the world's air forces before WW1 for reconnaissance and bombing, including during the Italian-Turkish war (from History of aviation)
• 
  Qantas De Havilland biplane, c. 1930 (from History of aviation)
• 
  D.H. Comet, the world's first jet airliner. As in this picture, it also saw RAF service (from History of aviation)
• 
  "Map of Air Routes and Landing Places in Great Britain, as temporarily arranged by the Air Ministry for civilian flying", published in 1919, showing Hounslow, near London, as the hub (from History of aviation)
• 
  Jean-Marie Le Bris and his flying machine, Albatros II, 1868 (from History of aviation)
• 
  Maxim's flying machine (from History of aviation)
• 
  Leonardo da Vinci's ornithopter design (from History of aviation)
• 
  The Wright Military Flyer aboard a wagon in 1908 (from History of aviation)
• 
  Apollo 11 lifts off on its mission to land a man on the Moon (from History of aviation)
• 
  Félix du Temple's 1874 Monoplane (from History of aviation)

In the news

Wikinews Aviation portal

• May 29: Austrian Airlines cancels Moscow-bound flight after Russia refuses a reroute outside Belarusian airspace
• August 8: Passenger flight crashes upon landing at Calicut airport in India
• June 4: Power firm helicopter strikes cables, crashes near Fairfield, California
• January 29: Former basketball player Kobe Bryant dies in helicopter crash, aged 41
• January 13: Iran admits downing Ukrainian jet, cites 'human error'
• January 10: Fire erupts in parking structure at Sola Airport, Norway
• October 27: US announces restrictions on flying to Cuba
• October 3: World War II era plane crashes in Connecticut, US, killing at least seven
• September 10: Nevada prop plane crash near Las Vegas leaves two dead, three injured
• August 6: French inventor Franky Zapata successfully crosses English Channel on jet-powered hoverboard

Related portals

Associated Wikimedia

The following Wikimedia Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:

• 

  Commons
  Free media repository

• 

  Wikibooks
  Free textbooks and manuals

• 

  Wikidata
  Free knowledge base

• 

  Wikinews
  Free-content news

• 

  Wikiquote
  Collection of quotations

• 

  Wikisource
  Free-content library

• 

  Wikiversity
  Free learning tools

• 

  Wikivoyage
  Free travel guide

• 

  Wiktionary
  Dictionary and thesaurus

Selected biography

Charles Augustus Lindbergh, Jr. (February 4, 1902 – August 26, 1974), known as "Lucky Lindy" and "The Lone Eagle", was a pioneering United States aviator famous for piloting the first solo non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean in 1927, flying from Roosevelt Airfield (Nassau County, Long Island), New York to Paris on May 20-May 21, 1927 in his single-engine aircraft The Spirit of St. Louis.

He grew up in Little Falls, Minnesota. Early on he showed an interest in machinery, especially aircraft. After training as a pilot with the Army Air Service Lindbergh took a job as lead pilot of an airmail route in a DeHavilland DH-4 biplane. He was renowned for delivering the mail under any circumstances.

Lindbergh is recognized in aviation for demonstrating and charting polar air-routes, high altitude flying techniques, and increasing aircraft flying range by decreasing fuel consumption. These innovations are the basis of modern intercontinental air travel.

Selected Aircraft

The Pregnant Guppy was a large, wide-bodied cargo aircraft built in the USA and used for ferrying outsized cargo items, most notably NASA's components of the Apollo moon program. The Pregnant Guppy was the first of the Guppy line of aircraft produced by Aero Spacelines, Inc. The design also inspired similar designs such as the jet-powered Airbus Beluga, and the Boeing 747 LCF designed to deliver Boeing 787 parts.

• Span:141 feet, 3 inches.
• Length: 127 feet.
• Height: 31 feet, 3 inches.
• Engines: 4 3500hp P&W R-4360.
• Cruising Speed: 250 mph
• First Flight:September 19, 1962
• Number built: 1

Today in Aviation

June 23

• 2012 – A Colombian Army Cessna 208B Caravan crashed during near to Tocaima, all four on board killed.

• 2012 – Three Syrian Army pilots defect, crossing the border into Jordan.

• 2006 – The RAF Retire the Canberra from service after 55 years.

• 1994 – First flight of the Antonov An-38

• 1985 – Air India Flight 182, a Boeing 747, is bombed by Sikh extremists. It crashes into the ocean near Ireland, killing all 329 people on board.

• 1980 – Sanjay Gandhi, son of Indira Gandhi, dies when his private aerobatic biplane has an accident.

• 1967 – Mohawk Airlines Flight 40, a BAC One-Eleven, crashes in Blossburg, Pennsylvania, killing all 34 people on board.

• 1959 – Lockheed F-104A-5-LO Starfighter, 56-742, c/n 183-1030, to General Electric Flight Test, June: 1957, performed accelerated service tests on J79 engine. Crashes this date on landing approach at Edwards AFB, California, when split flap condition occurs. Pilot ejects too low and is killed.

• 1952 – June 23-24 – In the most intense use of airpower of the Korean War, US Navy and Marine Corps aircraft fly 1,200 sorties against North Korean power generation facilities.

• 1951 – The famous non-fatal Grumman F9F-2 Panther ramp strike accident occurs as Cdr. George Chamberlain Duncan attempts landing on USS Midway in BuNo 125228, during carrier suitability tests in the Atlantic Ocean. Forward fuselage breaks away and rolls down the deck, pilot suffering burns. Footage of this accident has been used in several films including Men of the Fighting Lady, Midway, and The Hunt For Red October.

• 1951 – Second Avro CF-100 Mk.1, 19102, 'FB-K',crashes on the day it is handed over to the RCAF.

• 1950 – Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 2501, a Douglas DC-4, crashes into Lake Michigan 18 miles (29 km) north-northwest of Benton Harbor, Michigan, after entering a squall line and turbulence, killing all 58 people on board. It is the deadliest commercial airliner accident in American history at the time.

• 1948 – First flight of the Arsenal VG 70

• 1944 – (23–27) Los Negros-based U. S. Army Air Forces B-24 Liberators of the Thirteenth Air Force fly an average of 21 daily bombing sorties against Yap. Two are shot down and 21 damaged.

• 1944 – (Overnight) Japanese aircraft in small numbers conduct night raids against U. S. Navy forces off Saipan, damaging several amphibious warfare and auxiliary ships.

• 1942 – First flight of the Martin JRM Mars

• 1941 – During the second day of Operation Barbaross, the Soviets lose another 1,000 aircraft.

• 1935 – First flight of the Bristol Bombay

• 1931 – June 23-July 1, Wiley Post and Harold Gatty fly around the world in a Lockheed Vega, the Winnie Mae, covering 15,474 miles in 8 days 15 hours 51 min – A new record

• 1924 – The prototype Focke-Wulf A 16 monoplane made its first flight. Capable of carrying four passengers, it was the first product of Focke-Wulf Flugzeugbau GmbH.

• 1924 – Lt Russell Maughan makes the first one-day crossing of the United States, completing the flight from Long Island to San Francisco in a Curtiss PW-8 in 21 hours, 48 min.

• 1921 – First flight of the R38 class airship

• 1919 – Six Zeppelins (LZ 46, LZ 79, LZ 91, LZ103, LZ 110, and LZ 111) are destroyed at Nordholz by their own crews in order to prevent them from falling into Allied hands.

• 1916 – Victor Chapman of Lafayette Escadrille becomes the first US airman to be killed in action, shot down near Verdun.

• 1913 – The S-21 Sikorsky Russky Vityaz ("Russian Knight"), designed by Igor Sikorsky and built by the RBVZ, a redesigned variant of the Bolshoi Baltiski, as the first large aircraft intended exclusively as a bomber, first flies on this date, the world's first four-motored aircraft. It is lost in a freak accident during 1913 military trials when the Gnôme rotary on a Moller II pusher biplane (some sources cite a Morane design) tears loose and hits the giant bomber.

• 1905 – First flight of the Wright Flyer III

• 1784 – First US balloon flight (13 year old Edward Warren).

References

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

• Shortcuts to this page: Portal:Airplanes • P:AVIA