"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
07/25/2017 at 12:35 • Filed to: planelopnik history, Planelopnik
13
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"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
07/25/2017 at 12:35 • Filed to: planelopnik history, Planelopnik | 13
| 17 |
Welcome to This Date in Aviation History , getting you caught up on milestones, important historical events and people in aviation from July 22 through July 25.
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July 23, 1983 – Air Canada Flight 143 runs out of fuel over Manitoba. When driving a car, most people rarely give the fuel gauge more than a passing glance. Even if the fuel level is low, a driver can pull over at any convenient gas station and top up. Driving across the country requires a bit more attention, as gas stations can be spaced farther apart, and perhaps even a little bit of math might be involved to figure out if there’s enough fuel to reach the next town or if you need to fill up now. And even then, running out of gas on the road is generally more of an inconvenience than a life-and-death situation. But calculating the amount of fuel to put in a transcontinental airliner is a much more involved task, and one that actually could be a matter of life or death. The aircrew must make calculations for the weight of the aircraft at takeoff, taxiing time, the distance and altitude of the flight, the rate at which the fuel burns off, and they must make sure that there is enough fuel in reserve to divert to another airport. The vast majority of the time, the pilots get it right, and with fuel to spare. But in the case of Air Canada Flight 143, which came to be known as the Gimli Glider, the pilots got it completely wrong. Air Canada Flight 143 was a scheduled flight from Montreal to Edmonton when, at 41,000 feet, pilots Captain Robert Pearson and First Office Maurice Quintal were alerted to fuel pressure problem onboard their !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (C-GAUN). Due to an electronic fault, the airliner’s fuel gauges weren’t working, but the pilots assumed that they had plenty of fuel based on the calculations made on the ground before the flight. In reality, they took off with half the amount of fuel necessary to reach their destination. Soon after the alarm, both engines quit, the 767 lost all power and the majority of the instrument panels went dark. The pilots found themselves at the controls of world’s largest glider, a situation for which neither of them had ever trained. With the aid of ground controllers, the crew determined that their best option would be an emergency landing at !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , a former air station of the RCAF. However, though the runways were still mostly intact, the station was no longer active, and much of it had been turned into an industrial park and racetrack. And there was a race being held on the track at the time. The pilots performed a gravity drop of the landing gear, but the nose wheel failed to lock, and with no hydraulic power and limited electricity being generated by an external turbine, the pilots still managed to land safely. A small fire in the nose of the aircraft was extinguished by race safety personnel at the scene, and all passengers and crew exited the plane safely, though some passengers were injured when the safety slides at the rear of the craft weren’t long enough to reach the ground due to the collapsed nose gear. Investigators found that the fuel exhaustion was caused by a combination of miscommunication between the cockpit crew and maintenance personnel, fuel gauges that were disconnected or not functioning properly, and fuel calculations that had been made in pounds instead of kilograms, a result Canada’s ongoing transition from the Imperial to the metric system.
The Gimli Glider waits patiently in the Mojave Desert before being scrapped
For their role in the incorrect fuel calculation, Captain Pearson and FO Quintal were initially found to be partially at fault for the incident. Pearson was demoted for six months, and Quintal was suspended for two weeks. Maintenance personnel were also suspended. Despite these punitive measures, the flight crew was awarded the first ever !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! Diploma for Outstanding Airmanship in 1985, and FO Quintal was eventually promoted to captain. The Gimli Glider was repaired and returned to service, and took its final flight on January 24, 2008, after which it was retired to storage in the Mojave Desert. When no buyers came forward to purchase the 767, it was dismantled, and aluminum from the plane was turned into souvenir keychains. (Photo by Wayne Glowacki, Winnipeg Free Press; C-GAUN photo by Akradecki via !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! )
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July 25, 2000 – The crash of Air France Flight 4590. The first airplane flew past the speed of sound in 1947 and, for the next twenty years, supersonic flight was solely the realm of the military. But within a few short years, commercial aircraft designers started to investigate the development of a supersonic airliner. In the 1950s, both England and France began developing their own SST, with the two countries eventually signing a treaty in 1962 to begin working together, an agreement that gave the aircraft its name and which culminated in the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Ultimately, 20 Concordes were built, six of which were prototypes and used for development and testing. Of the remaining 14, Air France and British Airways each received seven. Following its introduction in 1976, Concorde flew regular routes from London’s Heathrow and Paris’ Charles de Gaulle to New York’s JFK Airport, Washington Dulles and Barbados. More cities followed as Concorde expanded it routes. Its four !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! afterburning turbojets provided a maximum cruising speed of Mach 2.04, and cut the flying time between transatlantic destinations in half when compared to traditional airliners. And, for most of its operational history, Concorde had a stellar safety record. Only twice had there been incidents that could have led to a crash. In 1989, a British Airways Concorde suffered a structural failure of the vertical stabilizer, followed by a similar failure on another British Airways Concorde in 1992. On both occasions, the airliner landed safely. Only one Concorde has ever suffered a fatal crash, but that single accident ultimately helped bring an end to all Concorde flights.
Air France Concorde F-BTSC in 1985
That tragic accident occurred on July 25, 2000 when Air France Flight 4590 (F-BTSC), a charter flight from Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris to New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport, suffered a catastrophic fire on takeoff and crashed into a hotel near the airport, killing all 109 passengers and crew on board the airliner plus four people on the ground. Following the crash, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (BEA) carried out the official investigation, which determined that the crash was caused by a punctured tire which was damaged by a strip of titanium alloy that was lying on the runway after falling from a Continental Airlines !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! which had departed ahead of Flight 4590. A large chunk of the damaged tire struck the wing and ruptured the fuel tank, causing fuel to pour from the tank which was then ignited by the engine and led to the loss of the two port engines. Though the crew was able to restore power to one of the failed engines, the extra drag from the landing gear, which could not be retracted, in concert with the asymmetric thrust caused by the loss of engine power on once side, caused a loss of control and the eventual crash. Continental Airlines, along with one of its mechanics, were initially found guilty of involuntary manslaughter, but that ruling was overturned. During the trial, however, witnesses questioned the official BEA explanation, saying that a wheel spacer had not been installed on the left landing gear, and that the plane actually caught fire some 1,000 feet prior to passing the metal dropped by the Continental DC-10. The official explanation remained unchanged, though. As a result of the crash, all Concordes were grounded until safety upgrades could be made. Electronic flight controls were made more secure, the fuel tanks were lined with Kevlar to help shield them from debris, and special burst-resistant tires were fitted to the remaining airliners. After a 14-month hiatus, Concorde flights resumed, but low passenger numbers and a drop in air travel following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, as well as rising maintenance costs, led to the Concorde’s complete retirement in November 2003. (Accident photo by Toshihiko Sato; F-BTSC photo by Michel Gilliand via !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! )
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Short Takeoff
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July 22, 1955 – The first flight of the Republic XF-84H “Thunderscreech,”
a development of the
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to provide the US Navy with a fighter that could take off without a catapult. The XF-84H had a 5,850 hp
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turboprop located behind the cockpit that turned a propeller through drive shaft and also provided thrust through its exhaust. An afterburner was fitted but never used. While the concept showed unprecedented acceleration, the aircraft took 30 minutes to warm up, and the supersonic propeller, turning at a constant Mach 1.18, caused continuous sonic booms that created a shock wave which induced acute nausea and headaches in the ground crew. The XF-84H was also one of the loudest aircraft ever produced, and its warmup could be heard 25 miles away. The test program was plagued by difficulties with control and engine reliability, and the XF-84H was cancelled in 1956 after the construction of two prototypes.
(US Air Force photo)
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July 22, 1918 – The death of Indra Lal Roy, India’s only WWI flying ace. Born on December 2, 1898 in Calcutta, British India, Roy was attending school in London when the war broke out, and he was initially rejected by the Royal Flying Corps for poor eyesight. Only after getting a second opinion was he accepted for flight duty. After recovering from injuries suffered in the crash of his !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , Roy returned to service and scored 13 victories (2 shared) in just two days. Roy was killed in a dog fight against a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and was posthumously awarded the United Kingdom’s !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the first Indian to receive the honor. Roy was just 19 years old. (UK Government photo)
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July 23, 1973 – The death of Eddie Rickenbacker.
Born on October 8, 1890 in Columbus, Ohio, Rickenbacker was America’s leading ace in WWI and a recipient of the
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. Rickenbacker served in the
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, nicknamed the “Hat-in-the-Ring” squadron, where he flew French-made
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and
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fighters and finished the war with 26 confirmed victories. Rickenbacker eventually commanded the 94th, and after the war he started the short-lived
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in 1920. But Rickenbacker made his greatest contribution to aviation as the head of
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, which he led from 1938 until his retirement in 1963. Rickenbacker died of a stroke at the age of 82.
(Photo author unknown)
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July 23, 1952 – The first flight of the Fouga CM.170 Magister,
a jet-powered trainer built for the French
Armée de l’Air
to replace the
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. The world’s first purpose-built jet trainer to enter production, the Magister is a straight-wing monoplane with a distinctive V-shaped tail, a design element that Fouga borrowed from its
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glider. Fouga also produced a naval version for the French Navy, the CM.175 Zéphyr, which was used as the primary trainer for pilots learning carrier operations. Widely exported and also built under license by West Germany, Finland and Israel, a total of 929 CM.170s were produced. The Magister also operated as a light attack aircraft, and could be armed with two machine guns and up to 310 pounds of external ordnance.
(Photo by Rob Schleiffert via
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)
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July 23, 1932 – The death of Alberto Santos-Dumont,
a Brazilian aviation pioneer and one of the early inventors of aircraft in France. Born on July 20, 1873, Santos-Dumont got his start in aviation with ballooning and dirigibles, then constructed his first aircraft, the
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, in which he made the first heavier-than-air flight in Europe in 1906. His final aircraft, the
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monoplane, became the world’s first production airplane. A national hero in his homeland, where he is considered the “father of flight,” Santos-Dumont committed suicide by hanging himself. He was said to be depressed over his multiple sclerosis, and also upset over the use of aircraft as a weapon of war in São Paolo’s
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. Santos-Dumont was 59 years old.
(Postcard artist unknown; Santos-Dumont photo via US Library of Congress)
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July 23, 1930 – The death of Glenn Curtiss. Though often eclipsed in history books by the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , Glenn Curtiss was one of America’s greatest aviation pioneers, and has been credited with the creation of the American aviation industry. Born o May 21, 1878, Curtiss’ credits include the first officially witnessed flight in North America, victory at the world’s first international air meet in France, and the first long-distance flight in the US. Curtiss also provided the US Navy with its first aircraft, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , in 1911, heralding the birth of US Naval Aviation. Curtiss’ contributions to military aviation in both World Wars are !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! to mention here, but some of the most important aircraft built by him or his company include the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! biplane, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . (Photo author unknown)
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July 24, 1978 – McDonnell Douglas completes the 5,000th F-4 Phantom II. One of the iconic aircraft of the Cold War Era, the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! entered service in 1960 with the US Navy and eventually became one of the few fighters to serve in the Navy, US Marine Corps and US Air Force. Production of the two-seat all-weather interceptor/fighter-bomber began in 1958 and, by the time production ended in 1981, a total of 5,195 were built to serve the US military and 11 export nations. The F-4G !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! electronic warfare variant served as late as 1991 in the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and, following the Phantom’s retirement from US service in 1996, remaining F-4s were converted to QF-4 target drones. (Photo author unknown)
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July 24, 1946 – Bernard Lynch becomes the first person to be ejected from an airplane. When !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! died in an aviation accident in 1942, it spurred his business parter !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! to begin work on the first production ejection seat. In 1944, the RAF Air Staff approached Martin to develop an escape system for their new jet-powered fighters. Martin designed a seat that was launched out of the aircraft using an explosive charge and, after numerous tests on the ground over the course of a year, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! employee Bernard Lynch was successfully ejected from a !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! flying at 8,000 ft. Fortunately for Lynch, the seat performed flawlessly, and Martin-Baker continues making ejection seats to this day. (Photo author unknown)
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July 24, 1897 – The birth of Amelia Earhart. Born in Atchison, Kansas, Amelia Earhart holds a significant place in the annals of American aviation history, as she was not only a pioneering aviator but also a pioneer in the expansion of societal roles for women in general. Earhart took her first flying lessons in 1921, and set her first world altitude record the next year. In 1928, she was the first woman to cross the Atlantic by plane, albeit as a passenger, but made her own transatlantic solo flight in 1932, a feat for which she received the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . Earhart set numerous other flying records, but disappeared over the Pacific Ocean in 1937 with navigator !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! while attempting a circumnavigation of the globe. (Photo author unknown)
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July 25, 1984 – Cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya becomes the first woman to perform a spacewalk (EVA). Beginning her career as a pilot, Savitskaya set 18 international world records flying MiG fighters and another three records in team parachute jumping before beginning her training as a cosmonaut in 1980. She went to space for the first time in 1982 onboard the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! mission, becoming the second woman in space. On her second trip to space, she performed an !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! outside of the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! space station, spending over 3 hours in space tethered to the station. Savitskaya was twice awarded the title !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , her nation’s highest honor. She retired from the Russian Air Force in 1993 with the rank of major. (Photo author unknown)
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July 25, 1909 – French pilot Louis Blériot becomes the first person to fly across the English Channel. Blériot was one of the pioneering French aviators in the early days of powered flight, and he set numerous records for flight and formed his own aircraft manufacturing company. The English Channel was seen as one of the great obstacles in the early days of powered flight, and Blériot’s greatest fame came when he took off from France and flew his !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! monoplane, powered by a 25-horsepower, 3-cylinder Anzani motor, across the Channel. After the 36 minute flight, Blériot landed hard in England, damaging his aircraft. Fortunately, Blériot was unhurt, and he claimed a £1,000 prize for being the first to make the crossing. (Type XI photo author unknown; Blériot photo via US Library of Congress)
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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!!! . You can also find more stories about aviation and aviators at !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .
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My X-type is too a real Jaguar
> ttyymmnn
07/25/2017 at 12:49 |
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An episode of Air Disasters on the Smithsonian Channel covered the Gimli Glider, it is a very interesting story. It really shows the number of errors that go into a commercial aircraft accident. One error won’t do it, complex compounding issues certainly will.
HammerheadFistpunch
> ttyymmnn
07/25/2017 at 12:54 |
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this feels like a very crashy edition.
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ttyymmnn
> HammerheadFistpunch
07/25/2017 at 12:55 |
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Unfortunately, things just work out that way sometimes.
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ttyymmnn
> My X-type is too a real Jaguar
07/25/2017 at 12:56 |
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Exactly. Unless it’s a single event like a bomb, aircraft crashes are almost always a chain of events that could have been broken at any time.
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My X-type is too a real Jaguar
> ttyymmnn
07/25/2017 at 13:01 |
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I’ve been tempted to watch the episode on the AirTran crash, but I knew several people on that flight and can’t bring myself to watch it. That crash caused major tombstone regulation.
RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
> ttyymmnn
07/25/2017 at 13:03 |
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One thing I liked seeing in
Wonder Woman
was the photograph of Steve Trevor in the hat-in-the-ring squadron - a hack of/tribute to the above famous picture of Rickenbacker.
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HammerheadFistpunch
> ttyymmnn
07/25/2017 at 13:03 |
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indeed.
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ttyymmnn
> RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
07/25/2017 at 13:04 |
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I paid a lot of attention to the aircraft in that film, and I think they got most everything right.
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ttyymmnn
> My X-type is too a real Jaguar
07/25/2017 at 13:06 |
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Sadly, the FAA is all about tombstone regulation. That’s what happens when you have a government agency that is tasked with both promoting and policing an industry. I had a friend who was a pilot for Air Tran when that crash happened (I refuse to call it an accident, because it was not accidental; it was criminal). When I got home that day and heard about the crash, I couldn’t raise him (this was in the days before ubiquitous cell phones and texts). I finally got hold of his father, who told me it wasn’t him. It was an absolutely avoidable tragedy.
user314
> ttyymmnn
07/25/2017 at 13:56 |
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I know there’d be a lot of factors working against it, but I’m still kinda surprised none of the airlines have tried in-flight refueling.
I’m amazed that in 2017 the F-4 is still in service.
This list
is out of date, but I’m pretty sure the JASDF, RoKAF, and THK are still flying their Rhinos.
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ttyymmnn
> user314
07/25/2017 at 14:07 |
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I would think that inflight refueling of passenger jets would just have too many safety issues. Besides, airliners already have such amazing range that it’s probably not seen as necessary.
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user314
> ttyymmnn
07/25/2017 at 14:18 |
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Oh yeah, the FAA would have a collective coronary if someone proposed it, and like you said, it’s superfluous now, but I would have bet money someone would have tried during the Sixties or Seventies.
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ttyymmnn
> user314
07/25/2017 at 14:26 |
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https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/17504/why-dont-airliners-use-in-air-refueling-systems
http://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=757749
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user314
> ttyymmnn
07/25/2017 at 14:36 |
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There’s also the simple fact that the first time this would happen to United
They’d be done.
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ttyymmnn
> user314
07/25/2017 at 14:47 |
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I’ve seen that Code Brown before. I sure hope everybody was strapped in.
Sampsonite24-Earth's Least Likeliest Hero
> ttyymmnn
07/25/2017 at 15:11 |
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that top picture is awesome lol its like its bowing
gmporschenut also a fan of hondas
> ttyymmnn
07/25/2017 at 23:13 |
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“caused continuous sonic booms that created a shock wave which induced acute nausea and headaches in the ground crew.”
could you imagine 24 hour carrier ops?