Airplane Facts?

Question

What are some interesting airplane facts?

Answer 1

The British, Germans, Americans, and Russians had the largest impact in bringing Aviation into our daily lives.
(It began from drawings to gliders to steam powered to engine powered to jet engines to todays commercial aviation)
The Army Air Corps (USA) and The German Military first brought the airplane into the battlefield.
1500 --The Italian artist and inventor Leonardo da Vinci made drawings of flying machines with flapping wings.

1783 --Two Frenchmen--Jean F. Pilatre de Rozier and the Marquis d'Adlandes--made the first free lighter-than-air ascent. They made the ascent in a hot-air balloon.

1804 --Sir George Cayley of Great Britain flew the first successful model glider.

1843 --William S. Henson, a British inventor, patented plans for a steam-driven airplane that had many of the basic parts of a modern airplane.

1848 --John Stringfellow of Great Britain built a small model based on Henson's plane. It was launched but remained in the air only briefly.

1891-1896 --Otto Lilienthal, a German, became the first person to successfully pilot a glider in flight.

1896 --Samuel P. Langley of the United States flew a steam powered model plane.

1903 --Orville and Wilbur Wright of the United States made the first engine-powered, heavier-than-air flights, near Kitty Hawk, N.C. Their first flight went 120 feet (37 meters) and lasted only about 12 seconds.

1906 --Trajan Vuia, a Romanian inventor, built the first full-sized monoplane, but it could not fly.

1909 --Louis Bleriot of France became the first person to fly across the English Channel.

1913 --Igor I. Sikorsky, a Russian inventor, built and flew the first four-engine plane.

1915 --The first flight of an all-metal, cantilever-wing plane, the Junkers J 1, took place in Germany.

1924 --The first all-metal, tri-motor transport, the Junkers G 23, was test-flown in Germany.

1927 --The Lockheed Vega, a single-engine transport, flew for the first time. It became one of the most popular transport planes of the 1920's and early 1930's

1936 --Douglas DC-3 transport planes entered airline service in the United States. They became the most widely used airliners in history.

1939 --The first successful flight of a jet-engine airplane took place in Germany.

1942 --The Bell Aircraft Company built the first jet airplane in the United States. It was flown by Robert M. Stanley at Muroc Dry Lake, California.

1947 --Charles Yeager, a U.S. Air Force captain, made the first supersonic flight, in a Bell X-1 rocket plane.

1952 --De Havilland Comets, the world's first large commercial jetliners, began service.

1953 --The first turboprop transport, the Vickers Viscount, began regular airline service.

1953 --The North American F-100 Super Sabre jet fighter became the first operational supersonic fighter.

1958 --The Boeing 707 began the first US jet transport service between the United States and Europe.

1968 --Russian pilots test-flew the world's first supersonic transport plane, the TU-144.

1970 --The first jumbo jet, the Boeing 747, entered airline service.

1976 --The Concorde, a supersonic transport plane built by Britain and France, began passenger service.

1983 --A Rockwell Sabreliner became the first plane to cross the Atlantic Ocean with a pilot guided only by a satellite navigation system.

1995 --The Boeing 777 airliner, the world's largest twin-engine jet, began passenger service.

Answer 2

Concorde flew in Singapore Airlines livery for a while

The 'e' at the end of the word Concorde was put there by the French - it's spelt without the e in English and the French were gonna pull out of the whole deal if they didn't get their way

The French are the worst for legislation/restrictions/favouritism in Aviation in Europe (RIP Air Liberte)

The French are playing dirty politics with Airbus/EADS

The British should have kept their stake in Airbus - the Government should have stepped in - It's France's/Germany's gain.

Business/Executive Jets are becoming more affordable to fly or own. (My G5 is on it's way!)

Airplanes can reach Mach 0.85 and fly at 41,000 feet for 10 hours

Answer 3

well PAN AM was the first airline to fly a 747, then National airlines
was the first airline to fly a 707 but it wasn't their airplane! (it
was Pan Am's)
in 1956 United and TWA had a midair collision over the grand canyon then about 4 years later they ran into each other again
over New York and both accidents killed the exact same number of people!

Answer 4

www.airbus.com
Wow, go there and take a virtual tour of their fleet, it is really cool.