This Date in Aviation History: April 30 - May 3

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
05/03/2016 at 12:35 • Filed to: planelopnik, planelopnik history

Welcome to This Date in Aviation History , getting you caught up on milestones, important historical events and people in aviation from April 30 through May 3.

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May 1, 1960 – Francis Gary Powers is shot down over the Soviet Union. In the early days of the Cold War, the United States was desperate for timely, accurate intelligence on Russian military operations. By 1960, rudimentary satellite imagery was available, but it was unreliable, and not at all timely, since satellite photos had to be ejected from the orbiting satellite and return to Earth for pickup, usually snatched from the air as they descended by parachute. It was not a foolproof system, and many rolls of film were lost. What the US sorely needed was an aircraft that could fly high above Russia out of the reach of Soviet fighters, take pictures of military installations, missile tests, or other high-value assets, then return quickly to have the images analyzed. At the time, there was perhaps nobody better suited to tackle that problem than Kelly Johnson, head of Lockheed’s super-secret Skunk Works. Johnson and his team of engineers produced just what the American government needed in the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , an aircraft that was capable of flying at 70,000 feet. While the “Dragon Lady” was by no means a fast aircraft, its extreme operating altitude made it immune to interception by enemy fighters. But as Soviet antiaircraft missile technology improved, the US knew it was just a matter of time before one of their pilots was shot down. The inevitable occurred on May 1, 1960, when CIA pilot Francis Gary Powers was shot down while on a spy mission over Russia. Powers had taken off from Pakistan and flown northward to photograph ICBM sites at the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . After taking photographing the sites, his flight plan dictated that he continue north and land in Norway. By now, these flights had become somewhat routine, and Powers was flying a predictable route. Soon after entering Soviet airspace north of Kazakhstan, his aircraft was detected near Chelyabinsk and fighters were sent to intercept it. Try as they might, the fighters were unable to reach the spy plane at its extreme altitude, so the Russians launched eight !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! missiles at Powers. The first one hit the U-2, and another downed at least one of the Russian fighters. Powers ejected, but the plane came to earth relatively intact. He chose not to take the poison capsule that the CIA provided him with, though its use was optional. At first, the US denied that Powers was on a spy mission. They explained that the unmarked U-2 was a “weather plane” that had gone off course. As part of the attempted cover up, NASA released a detailed account of how one of its research planes had flown off course, and other U-2s were hastily painted with NASA markings. But the Russians were not fooled, and the incident was another blow to already-brittle US-Soviet relations. The Eisenhower administration was forced to admit the true nature of the flight, and Powers pled guilty at what was essentially a propaganda show trial. He was convicted of espionage and received a sentence of ten years in prison, including seven years of hard labor. Ultimately, Powers served only 21 months of his sentence, and on February 10, 1962, Powers was exchanged for KGB spy !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , who had been convicted for espionage in what was known as the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Following the incident, the US halted flights over the Soviet Union, and accelerated its work on satellite reconnaissance. But the true legacy of the Powers incident was the CIA’s Oxcart program, which saw the development of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and eventually the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , whose combination of extreme altitude and Mach 3 speed made it capable of flying over enemy territory with impunity. (Powers photo by Chernov via !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! ; U-2 wreckage photo author unknown)

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May 1, 1940 – The first flight of the Douglas SBD Dauntless. In the summer of 1921, US Army Air Service Brig. Gen. !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! carried out a series of tests to demonstrate the potential for air power alone to destroy ships at sea. Mitchell’s unit was successful in sinking the captured German battleship !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , but the results remained controversial. Though the battleship sank, no direct hits were made were made by the large level bombers, and the Ostfriesland and other targets ships were all lying at anchor and making no attempts to defend themselves. Some hits were achieved by !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! fighters acting as dive bombers. Nonetheless, Mitchell’s experiment proved the potential of airpower over sea power. And it would be the dedicated dive bomber that would turn the tide of battle in the Pacific. The Douglas SBD Dauntless (SBD stands for Scout Bomber Douglas) traces its lineage back to the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , a two-seat, single-engine dive bomber developed for the US Navy that first flew in 1935. An innovative feature of the BT was its spilt perforated flaps, which helped eliminate tail buffeting during dives. These split flaps would become a trademark of the later Dauntless. When Northrop was taken over by !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in 1937, work on Northrop projects continued. Development of the Dauntless was taken over by a team led by !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and it would be the first in a long list of great warplanes that Heinemann had a hand in. The first production models of the Dauntless were the SBD-1. which went into service with the US Navy, and the SBD-2, which served with the US Marine Corps. Both were powered by a 1,000 hp Wright Cyclone engine, and differed only in that the Marine Corps version had an increased fuel capacity and different armament. Development progressed to the SBD-3 in early 1941 with addition of more armor plating to protect the crew, increased firepower in the form of four machine guns, and self-sealing fuel tanks. But it was the SBD-5 that would become the mainstay of the US Navy in the early years of the war. The most marked changed in the SBD-5 was the inclusion of a more powerful !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! engine. This was the same engine that powered the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and boosted the SBD’s power up to 1,200 hp. In addition to its two rearward-firing .30 caliber defensive machine guns, the SBD-5 also featured two forward-firing .50 caliber machine guns which proved quite effective against the more lightly built Japanese fighters. Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the Dauntless went directly into battle, attacking Japanese positions throughout the Pacific Theater. The first significant contribution made by the Dauntless and her crews was in the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! on May 4-8, 1942, when SBDs flying from the carriers !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! sank the Japanese light carrier !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and damaged the fleet carrier !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , which had taken part in the attack on Pearl Harbor. It was the first naval battle in history where the surface ships of the opposing navies never sighted each other. While a tactical victory for the Japanese, the battle slowed Japanese expansion north of Australia, and set the stage for the pivotal !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! a month later. During that battle, four squadrons of SBDs flying from the American carriers Yorktown , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! sank the Japanese fleet carriers !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , all four of which had taken part in the attack on Pearl Harbor. The Americans lost one carrier, but the balance of power in the Pacific, and the initiative, had decisively shifted to the Americans. Though the Dauntless was meant to be replaced by the more powerful !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the SBD soldiered on, and fought effectively throughout the Pacific War. The US Army evaluated a land-based version called the A-24 Banshee that was identical save for the removal of the tail hook and the inclusion of an inflated tail wheel, but it was not nearly as successful as the Dauntless. When production of the SBD and A-24 finished in 1944, nearly 6,000 aircraft had been built. (US Navy photo)

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Short Take Off

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April 30, 1985 – The first flight of the British Aerospace Harrier II, the second-generation development of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , itself a derivative of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Provided with a more powerful engine, an improved wing, and upgraded avionics, the Harrier II was operated by both the Royal Air Force and Royal Navy and saw service in Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan, where it flew air interdiction and close air support missions. Due to budget shortfalls, a controversial decision was taken by the British government to retire the Harrier II in December of 2010, with no immediate successor in place. Eventually, the Harrier II’s role will be taken over by the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , operating from two new !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! scheduled for activation in 2018. (US Air Force photo)

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April 30, 1958 – The first flight of the Blackburn Buccaneer, a low-level, subsonic, carrier-based attack plane developed by the Royal Navy to counter the recently activated Soviet !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The Buccaneer could carry either conventional or nuclear weapons, and entered service in 1962. It saw action with the South African Air Force during the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and in the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , where Buccaneers flew as target designation aircraft for the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The Buccaneer was retired from service in 1994 and replaced by the Tornado in the RAF and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in the Royal Navy. (Photo via !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! )

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April 30, 1926 – The death of Bessie Coleman. Coleman was born on January 26, 1892 in Atlanta, Texas, and was the first woman of African American descent to become a pilot, and the first woman of Native American descent to hold a pilot’s license. Coleman developed an interest in flying after WWI, but had to earn her pilot license in France because no American pilots would agree to train her. After receiving her license in 1920, Coleman returned to the US and flew on the barnstorming circuit, and hoped to establish a flight school for African American women. Coleman was killed during a reconnaissance flight for a parachute display. With her mechanic at the controls, Coleman, who was not wearing a seat belt, was thrown from the cockpit following an unexpected dive. (Photo via !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! )

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May 2, 1998 – The 100th and final Rockwell B-1B Lancer is delivered . The Rockwel B-1 was originally envisioned as a Mach 2, long-range nuclear bomber to replace the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The B-1 was canceled in 1977 by the Carter administration, but was resurrected during the Reagan administration as the B-1B, and its mission was changed to low-level bombing with conventional armament. Despite the recent emphasis on !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the B-1B has become a mainstay of the Air Force, serving in all US conflicts since !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! in 1988. With recent upgrades !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the “Bone” is expected to serve until at least 2030. (Photo by the author)

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May 3, 2007 – The death of American astronaut Walter “Wally” Schirra. Schirra was born on March 12, 1923 in Hackensack, New Jersey, and graduated from the US Naval Academy, becoming a Naval Aviator in 1948. Schirra served in Korea, and later as a test pilot, before becoming a member of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , flying the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! mission in 1962 which orbited the Earth six times. In 1965, he flew the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and maneuvered his spacecraft to within one foot of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , completing the first rendezvous in space. And in 1968, Schirra commanded !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the first launch of the Apllo program carrying a crew into space. The Apollo flight made Schirra the first man to go to space three times, and the only astronaut to have flown in all three American manned space programs. (NASA photo)

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May 3, 1952 – The first American aircraft lands at the North Pole. US Air Force pilots Lt. Col. William P. Fletcher and Lt. Col. Joseph Fletcher beat the US Navy to the North Pole while flying a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! equipped with landing skis. The landing was the team’s second attempt during what was dubbed Operation Oil Drum, and Fletcher became the first person to undisputedly stand at the exact geographic North Pole. Along with Flecther and Benedict on the flight was scientist Dr. Albert Crary, who would travel to the South Pole in 1961, becoming the first person to stand at both poles. (US Air Force photo)

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May 3, 1695 – The birth of Henri Pitot, a French hydraulic engineer and inventor of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , a pressure measurement instrument that is used by aircraft to determine its airspeed. Pitot discovered the concept of the pressure sensing device in 1732 while measuring the flow of the River Seine in Paris. The eponymous device used on airplanes was modified to its current form by French scientist !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Pitot was named a member of the French Academy of Sciences in 1724, and died in 1771. (Pitot portrait via !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! ; pitot tube photo by the author)

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Recent Aviation History Posts

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If you enjoy these Aviation History posts, please let me know in the comments. And if you missed any of the past articles, you can find them all at !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

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DISCUSSION (2)

MonkeePuzzle > ttyymmnn
05/03/2016 at 12:59

did not know the B1 was “the Bone”. Learn something new everyday.

user314 > MonkeePuzzle
05/06/2016 at 20:22

Yup, got its nickname same as Huey: pilots and crew saw the designation (HU-1, B-One) and went with it.