Portal:Aviation

The Reverend John Flynn (25 November 1880 – 5 May 1951) was an Australian Presbyterian minister and aviator who founded the Royal Flying Doctor Service, the world's first air ambulance.

Throughout his ministerial training, Flynn had worked in various then-remote areas through Victoria and South Australia. As well as tending to matters spiritual, Flynn quickly established the need for medical care for residents of the vast Australian outback, and established a number of bush hospitals. By 1917, Flynn was already considering the possibility of new technology, such as radio and the aeroplane, to assist in providing a more useful acute medical service, and then received a letter from an Australian pilot serving in World War I, Clifford Peel, who had heard of Flynn's speculations and outlined the capabilities and costs of then-available planes. Flynn turned his considerable fund-raising talents to the task of establishing a flying medical service.

The first flight of the Aerial Medical Service was in 1928 from Cloncurry. In 1934 the Australian Aerial Medical Service was formed, and gradually established a network of bases nationwide. Flynn remained the public face of the organisation (through name changes to its present form) and helped raise the funds that kept the service operating.

The de Havilland Canada DHC-8, popularly the Dash 8, is a series of twin-turboprop airliners designed by de Havilland Canada in the early 1980s. They are now made by Bombardier Aerospace which purchased DHC from Boeing in 1992. Since 1996 the aircraft have been known as the Q Series, for "quiet", due to installation of the Active Noise and Vibration Suppression (ANVS) system designed to reduce cabin noise and vibration levels to near those of jet airliners.

Notable features of the Dash 8 design are the large T-tail intended to keep the tail free of propwash during takeoff, a very high aspect ratio wing, the elongated engine nacelles also holding the rearward-folding landing gear, and the pointed nose profile. First flight was in 1983, and the plane entered service in 1984 with NorOntair. Piedmont Airlines (formerly Henson Airlines) was the US launch customer for the Dash 8 in 1984.

The Dash 8 design had better cruise performance than the earlier Dash 7, was less expensive to operate, and more notably, much less expensive to maintain. The Dash 8 had the lowest costs per passenger mile of any feederliner of the era. The only disadvantage compared to the earlier Dash 7 was somewhat higher noise levels, but only in comparison as the Dash 7 was notable in the industry for extremely low noise due to its four very large and slow-turning propellers.

• Length: 107 ft 9 in (32.84 m)
• Wingspan: 93 ft 3 in (32.84 m)
• Height: 27 ft 5 in (8.34 m)
• Powerplant: 2× Pratt & Whitney Canada PW150A turboprops, 5,071 shp (3,781 kW) each
• Cruise speed: 360 knots (414 mph, 667 km/h)
• Maiden Flight: June 20, 1983

February 10

• 2011 – A Peruvian Air Force Zlin Z-242L crashed at Pisco airfield, Peru killing the two crew.

• 2011 – Manx2 Flight 7100 from Belfast, operated by Fairchild Swearingen Metroliner EC-ITP leased from Flightline BCN of Barcelona, overturns on its third attempt to land at Cork, Republic of Ireland in fog, killing six and injuring six.^[1][2][3]

• 2010 – A Eurocopter AS350 helicopter of the Brazilian Army crashed while training tactical piloting maneuvering at Sao Pedro da Aldeia naval base, about 130 kilometers (81 mi) away from Rio de Janeiro city.

• 2009 – The communications satellites Iridium 33 and Kosmos-2251 collide in orbit 490 miles (789 km) above Siberia at a speed of 26,170 miles per hour (42,120 km/h).This was the first major collision of two satellites in Earth orbit. Both satellites were destroyed.

• 2004 – Kish Air Flight 7170, a Fokker 50, crashes at Sharjah International Airport, killing 43 people. Three survive with serious injuries.

• 2000 – Death of Igor Bensen, Russian born American engineer, founder of the Bensen Aircraft, which produced a successful line of Gyro-gliders (rotor kites) and Autogyros. He founded the Popular Rotorcraft Association in 1962, a non-profit interest group for owners and homebuilders of auto-gyros and helicopters, based in Mentone, Indiana.

• 1997 – Death of Amron Harry Katz, American physicist who specialized in aerial reconnaissance.

• 1995 – The prototype Antonov An-70 is destroyed after a mid-air collision with an An-72 chase plane. All seven aboard are killed in the crash.

• 1995 – Two Peruvian Sukhoi Su-22 Ms are shot down by a pair of Ecuadorian Mirage F.1JAs. Almost simultaneously, a Peruvian Cessna A-37 B is also shot down by an Ecuadorian Kfir C.2.

• 1993 – McDonnell Douglas produces its 10,000th aircraft

• 1991 – U. S. Navy A-6 Es sink two Iraqi Navy patrol boats in the northern Persian Gulf. Iraqi antiaircraft artillery shoots down a U. S. Marine Corps AV-8 B Harrier II over southern Kuwait.

• 1988 – The pilot of an General Dynamics F-16A Block 15J Fighting Falcon, 82–0909, c/n 61–0502, ejected safely when his plane caught fire and crashed on take-off at Moody Air Force Base in south Georgia. Problems occurred during a routine practice flight. Witnesses said the aircraft climbed straight into the air during take-off and exploded into flames before hitting the ground. The plane was assigned to Moody.

• 1982 – The flight of the Argus 10742 from Summerside to Rockcliffe for delivery to National Aviation Museum. The Argus overflew Canadair plant in a final salute.

• 1981 – Two United States Marine Corps helicopters (a CH-46 and a CH-53) collide over Tustin MCAS in California, United States, six killed.

• 1977 – Death of George John Dufek, American naval officer, naval aviator, and Arctic expert.

• 1975 – The Royal Australian Navy suffers its only operational Grumman S-2E Tracker loss during approximately 17 years of operation of the type when N12-153608 is lost at sea with two fatalities.

• 1971 – Death of Alfred Clayburn Atkey, Canadian WWI fighter ace.

• 1968 – Birth of Garrett Erin Reisman, American engineer and NASA astronaut.

• 1967 – First flight of the Dornier Do 31, a West German experimental VTOL jet transport.

• 1964 – The Royal Australian Navy aircraft carrier HMAS Melbourne (R21) collides with the destroyer HMAS Voyager (D04) during exercises off of Jervis Bay, Australia, slicing the destroyer in two and killing 82 of Voyager's sailors.

• 1964 – Death of Eugen Sänger, Austrian-German aerospace engineer best known for his contributions to lifting body and ramjet technology.

• 1963 – Death of Isidore Auguste Marie Louis Paulhan, known as Louis Paulhan, pioneering French aviator who flew “Le Canard”, the world's first seaplane.

• 1962 – American U-2 pilot Gary Powers, shot down and arrested in the U. S. S. R. May 1st 1960, is exchanged along with American student Frederic Pryor in a well publicized spy swap for Soviet KGB Colonel Vilyam Fisher (aka Rudolf Abel), a Soviet colonel who was caught by the FBI and put in jail for espionage, at the Glienicke Bridge in Berlin, Germany.

• 1953 – Death of William Spurrett Fielding-Johnson, British WWI flying ace.

• 1952 – Maj George A. Davis Jr is awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously, after attacking a group of 12 Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15s that were about to bounce other US aircraft. He shot down two before being shot down himself.

• 1949 – USAF Douglas A-26B-66-DL Invader, 44–34719, out of Greenville AFB, South Carolina, piloted by Robert L. Kenyon, crashes at Waples Pond, Delaware - four killed.

• 1945 – German Junkers Ju 88s attack Convoy JW 64 in the Arctic Ocean.

• 1944 – American Airlines Flight 2, a Douglas DC-3, crashes into the Mississippi River for reasons unknown, killing all 24 occupants (21 passengers and 3 crew members).

• 1943 – A U. S. Army Air Forces Antisubmarine Command B-24D Liberator sinks a German submarine, apparently U-519, in the North Atlantic Ocean, the first submarine sunk by the command.

• 1942 – A Hawker Hurricane Mk. I, P3664, of No. 55 OTU, based at RAF Usworth,[109] crashes in bad weather in an orchard opposite the High Marley Hill Radio Mast, killing RCAF Sergeant Pilot James D’Arcy Lees Graham, 24, of Carstairs, Alberta. The Air Ministry Crash Card records that the fighter flew into high ground in a squall, the weather deteriorated and the aircraft dived out of low cloud into a snow squall and failed to pull out of the dive. The pilot was interred at St Margaret's Church Cemetery, Castletown, Sunderland.

• 1941 – Britain uses paratroops for the first time in an attack on Tragino

• 1941 – (overnight) – 222 British bombers attack Hanover, Germany, losing seven of their number, and 43 others attack oil storage tanks in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. In the Rotterdam raid, the Short Stirling makes its combat debut as the United Kingdom's first four-engined heavy bomber.

• 1936 – First flight of the Fiat BR.20, an Italian low-wing twin-engine medium bomber.

• 1935 – First flight of the A. N. F. Les Mureaux 180, a French Single engine High wing monoplane 2 seat fighter prototype, evolution of the ANF Les Mureaux 170.

• 1933 – First flight of the Hawker Demon

• 1930 – An Air Union Farman F.63 Goliath crashes while attempting an emergency landing at Marden Airfield, Marden, Kent due to structural failure, killing 2 of 6 on board.

• 1929 – Evelyn “Bobbi” Trout broke the record for the first all-night flight by a woman as well as and the new women's solo endurance record flying more than 17 hours in an open cockpit Bruner Winkle biplane .Trout flew from Mines Field USA.

• 1925 – The 1030 hrs. crash of a Curtiss JN-6H, AS-44806, ~2 miles (3.2 km) E of Brooks Field, Texas, kills instructor 1st Lt. Arthur L. Foster along with Maj. Lee O. Wright. Foster Field at Victoria, Texas is later dedicated to the pilot on 22 February 1942. Foster's widow, Mrs. Ruth Young Foster, of San Antonio, Texas, unveiled a plaque that read "Dedicated to the memory of Lieut. Arthur Lee Foster, a pioneer in aviation who gave his life teaching others to fly." Foster Field was designated Foster Air Force Base on an inactive status on 1 September 1952, by Department of the Air Force General Order No. 38, dated 29 August 1952.

• 1925 – Pacific Airways Ltd. was formed by D. R. MacLaren and took over the fishery patrol from the RCAF.

• 1923 – An experimental night flight arrives to Le Bourget, France, from Croydon, England. The pilot has given his position by radio and used the aviation light beacons to make his approach.

• 1914 – Berliner, Haase and Nikolai land their free balloon in Perm, setting a new distance record of 3053 km from Bitterfeld.

• 1913 – Birth of Federico Cozzolino, Italian Aviator.

• 1903 – Birth of George John Dufek, American naval officer, naval aviator, and Arctic expert.

• 1898 – Birth of Thomas Sydney Chiltern, British WWI flying ace.

• 1897 – Birth of Erik Thomas, German WWI flying ace.

• 1892 – Birth of Roland Rohlfs, American early aviator and test pilot.

• 1891 – Birth of Air Marshal Sir William Lawrie Welsh KBE, DSC, AFC, British Royal Air Force officer who commanded British air operations during Operation Torch and also a WWI RNAS Pilot.