Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/December 25

December 25


 * 2012 – The crew of an Air Bagan Fokker 100 with 71 people on board for a domestic flight in Burma from Rangoon to Heho via Mandalay mistakes a road for the runway while descending to land at Heho in heavy fog, hits power lines, and crash-lands either on the road or in a neaby rice paddy and burns, killing a tour guide and injuring eleven other people aboard the plane. A man on the ground riding a bicycle also is killed.


 * 2012 – An Antonov An-72 military transport aircraft belonging to the military forces of Kazakhstan carrying a crew of seven and 20 members of the Kazakhstan Border Guard Service crashes in bad weather about 20 km (12 miles) from Shymkent while descending to a landing there after a domestic flight from Astana, killing everyone on board. The acting Director of the Kazakhstan Border Guard Service, Colonel Turganbeck Stambekov, is among the dead, along with one of his deputies and a number of regional Border Guard commanders.


 * 2009 – Northwest Airlines Flight 253, an Airbus A330-300 is attacked by a man using a small explosive device, causing only a small fire inside the plane, which is extinguished by a flight attendant; the man is subdued by passengers and crew; there are 3 injuries.


 * 2003 – UTAGE Flight 141, a Boeing 727, runs off the end of the runway upon takeoff at Cotonou, Benin and crashes onto the beach on the Bight of Benin, killing 151 of the 163 occupants.


 * 1999 – Cubana de Aviación Flight 310, a Yakovlev Yak-42D, crashes into the San Luis Hill near Bejuma, Venezuela while on approach to Arturo Michelena International Airport; all 22 on board die.


 * 1997 – First flight of the Gulfstream G200


 * 1986 – Iraqi Airways Flight 163, a Boeing 737, is hijacked by Hezbollah militants while en route to Amman, Jordan. A shootout with security forces causes the plane to crash, killing 63 of the 106 people on board.


 * 1981 – USAF lieutenant Thomas Tiller is rescued from the Atlantic Ocean by a boat after his plane, a F-4 Phantom had an accident seven days before.


 * 1979 – Antonov An-12s and An-22s airlift the first Soviet troops into Afghanistan. 5,000 arrive in the first 24 hours.


 * 1976 – EgyptAir Flight 864, a Boeing 707, crashes into an industrial complex near Bangkok, Thailand due to pilot error; all 52 on board are killed as well as another 19 on the ground.


 * 1972 – The United States begins a 36-hour pause in the bombing of North Vietnam.


 * 1968 – Apollo 8 performs the very first successful Trans Earth Injection (TEI) maneuver, sending the crew and spacecraft on a trajectory back to Earth from Lunar orbit.


 * 1966 – (25-26) The United States conducts a 48-hour stand-down of air operations over Vietnam for the Christmas holiday.


 * 1965 – Hoping to begin peace talks with the Vietcong and the North Vietnamese, President Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration orders a cessation of American air strikes in Vietnam.


 * 1959 – Michael P. Anderson, astronaut, was born (d. 2003). Anderson was a United States Lieutenant Colonel (USAF), a NASA astronaut, and the Space Shuttle payload commander of STS-107 (Columbia) who was killed when the craft disintegrated after reentry into the Earth’s atmosphere.


 * 1958 – First flight of the Sukhoi Su-11


 * 1954 – BOAC Boeing 377 Stratocruiser G-ALSA crashes on landing at Glasgow Prestwick Airport, killing 28 of the 36 passengers and crew on board.


 * 1946 – Nicknamed “Black Christmas”, three passenger planes, all flying in from Chongqing, China, crash due to fog in separate incidents in Shanghai, China, killing at least 62 of the combined 68 passengers and 9 crew members aboard. Two of the planes belong to China National Aviation Corporation and one to Central Air Transport.


 * 1940 – Two British Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm Grumman Martlets of 804 Naval Air Squadron shoot down a German Junkers Ju 88 off Scapa Flow. It is the first aerial victory in Europe by an American-made aircraft in history and the first by any variant of the Grumman F4 F Wildcat.


 * 1934 – French pilot Raymond Delmotte sets a new world speed record for land planes of 314.33 mph, flying a Caudron 460.


 * 1924 – An Imperial Airways de Havilland DH.34 crashes near Purley, Surrey, killing all 8 on board; the cause is never determined.


 * 1914 – HMS Empress, HMS Engadine and HMS Riviera launch a seaplane attack on the Zeppelin sheds at Cuxhaven. Fog prevents the aircraft from reaching their target, and only three of the nine aircraft find their way back to their mother ships.