Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/February 15

February 15


 * 2011 – United Airlines temporarily grounds all 96 of its Boeing 757 aircraft to check on a recent software upgrade that had not been performed to spec.


 * 2011 – Death of Jean Boulet, French test pilot and helicopter record breaker.


 * 2010 – Spanish airline Hola Airlines ceases operations.


 * 2009 – A Bell 205 Helicopter while flying in dense mist and light rain crashes into Polhuín Hill, Chanco, Cauquenes Province, Chile.  The accident occurred when the Bell helicopter owned by Flight Services Helicópteros was ferrying local fire-fighters from a Eucalyptus plantation to a forest fire in the Quirihue Sector of the Eighth Region.  The wreckage from the accident was scattered over a large area killing the pilot a former Chilean Airforce officer and 12 fire-fighters from the Celulosa Arauco y Constitucion (CELCO) company.


 * 2007 – Air Mauritanie hijacking: A Boeing 737-700 on a flight from Nouakchott to Las Palmas in the Spanish Canary Islands was hijacked by Mohamed Abderraman, who was allegedly seeking political asylum in France.


 * 2006 – Origin Pacific Airways, New-Zealand airline, ceased operations.


 * 2005 – The first 777-200LR Worldliner, the world’s longest range commercial airplane is rolled out in Everett, Wash. It can carry 301 passengers up to 9,420 nautical miles.


 * 1996 – At the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in China, a Long March 3 rocket, carrying an Intelsat 708, crashes into a rural village after liftoff, killing many people.


 * 1994 – First flight of the Eurocopter EC135


 * 1991 – Iraqi shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles shoot down two U. S. Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt II aircraft while they are attacking Iraqi Republican Guard forces, and a U. S. Navy A-6E Intruder crashes in Saudi Arabia due to battle damage. A U. S. Air Force F-15 Eagle on an anti-Scud ballistic missile mission destroys a hovering Iraqi helicopter with a laser-guided bomb; the helicopter is the last Iraqi aircraft destroyed in the air during the Gulf War.


 * 1986 – First flight of the Beechcraft Starship, a twin-turboprop six- to eight-passenger pressurized business aircraft.


 * 1971 – Breda Nardi Costruzioni Aeronautiche is established for licensed production of the Hughes Helicopter series.


 * 1970 – Death of Air Chief Marshal Hugh Caswall Tremenheere Dowding, first Baron Dowding GCB, GCVO, CMG, British officer in the Royal Air Force. He was the commander of RAF Fighter Command during the Battle of Britain.


 * 1970 – The RAF Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding, AOC-in-C Fighter Command during the Battle of Britain, died at the age of 87.


 * 1970 – Contaminated fuel causes dual engine failure shortly after takeoff from Las Américas International Airport near Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic in the Dominicana DC-9 air disaster; all 102 on board were killed.


 * 1965 – Mrs. Guy Meher sets out from Culver City, California on a journey to become the first woman to cross the United States by helicopter


 * 1964 – Birth of Leland Devon Melvin, American engineer and NASA astronaut.


 * 1964 – The North Vietnamese Air Force scores its first aerial victory against an American aircraft when a North Vietnamese T-28 Trojan armed trainer shoots down a C-123 Provider transport plane.


 * 1961 – Sabena Flight 548, a Boeing 707, crashes on approach in Brussels, Belgium, killing 73, including the entire United States figure skating team: a runaway stabilizer is thought to have been the cause of the first fatal accident involving a 707 in regular passenger service.


 * 1959 – First flight of the Aermacchi AL-60


 * 1950 – A de Havilland DH 108 “Swallow” (a British tailless, swept wing with a single vertical stabilizer experimental aircraft), VW120, flown by RAE's OC, Squadron Leader J. Stewart R. Muller-Rowland, enters steep dive from 27,000 feet (8,200 m), breaking up around 10,000 feet (3,000 m) with fatal result. The main wreckage comes down at Little Brickhill, near Bletchley. The pilots body was found near Sandy Lane near Woburn Sands also near Bletchley. Accident investigation pointed to a faulty oxygen system that incapacitated the pilot.


 * 1949 – First flight of the Breguet Deux-Ponts, a French double-deck transport aircraft.


 * 1947 – An Avianca Douglas DC-4 Crashed into Mount Tablazo obscured by fog, 30 km NW of Bogota, killing all 53 on board.


 * 1947 – Birth of Viktor Ivanovich Belenko, American aerospace engineer and lecturer of Soviet origin. Belenko was sentenced to death in the Soviet Union for state treason, having successfully defected to the West, flying his Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25 “Foxbat” jet fighter to Hakodate, Japan.


 * 1946 – First flight of the Douglas DC-6, an American piston-powered airliner and transport aircraft.


 * 1945 – In ten weeks of steady bombardment of Iwo Jima, the U. S. Army Air Forces‘ Seventh and Twentieth Air Forces have dropped nearly 6,800 tons (6,168,920 kg) of bombs on the island.


 * 1944 – Birth of Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Serebrov, Russian cosmonaut.


 * 1944 – Very heavy Allied air raids demolish the Benedictine monastery at Monte Cassino in Italy, but fail to dislodge its German defenders Off Anzio, a German guided bomb destroys a Liberty ship unloading ammunition and a tank landing craft alongside her.


 * 1943 – Convoy JW 53 departs Loch Ewe, Scotland, for the Kola Inlet in the Soviet Union. The British aircraft HMS Dasher escorts it, but must turn back after only two days due to damage incurred during bad weather. No aircraft carrier escorts an Arctic convoy again until February 1944.


 * 1941 – First flight of the Curtiss XP-46, a US prototype fighter aircraft.


 * 1940 – The Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA), British WWII civilian organization that ferried new, repaired and damaged military aircraft between UK factories, assembly plants, transatlantic delivery points, Maintenance Units (MU), scrap yards, and active service squadrons and airfields, is formed.


 * 1938 – First flight of the Bloch MB-170, French twin engine 3 seat reconnaissance bomber prototype.


 * 1936 – Italian aircraft based at nearby Mek’ele, Ethiopia, maintain at least 12 aircraft over the battlefied all day during the Battle of Amba Aradam against Ethiopian troops. It is a forerunner of the World War II “cab rank” technique of keeping airborne aircraft continually on call over a battlefield to bomb enemy positions when needed.


 * 1935 – Birth of Roger Bruce Chaffee, American aeronautical engineer, Lieutenant Commander in the U. S. Navy and NASA astronaut.


 * 1926 – The Ford Motor Co. becomes the first U. S. private air carrier to operate a contract airmail (CAM) route. Ford begins operations with CAM-6 between Detroit and Chicago and CAM-7 between Detroit and Cleveland.


 * 1923 – King George V granted the prefix “Royal” to the Canadian Air Force.


 * 1918 – Death of Kenneth Lloyd Gopsill, British WWI flying ace, Killed in action.


 * 1917 – Death of Hans von Keudell, German WWI flying ace, killed in his Albatros D.III by a British Nieuport.


 * 1917 – Death of Marcel Hauss, French WWI flying ace, killed in action.


 * 1915 – Russian Sikorsky Ilya Muromets bombers attack the Vistula-Dobrzhani area of Poland


 * 1910 – King Edward VII grants the title “Royal” to the Aero Club of the United Kingdom.


 * 1897 – Birth of Frederick Dudley Travers, British WWI flying ace and pioneering airliner pilot.


 * 1895 – Birth of Dennis Edward Francis Waight, British WWI fighter ace.


 * 1895 – Birth of George Everard Gibbons, British WWI fighter ace.


 * 1890 – Birth of Cosimo Rennella, Italian born Ecuadorian WWI flying ace, and pioneering aviator in South America pre and post WWI war.


 * 1890 – Birth of Marie Gaston Fulerand Leon Vitalis, French WWI flying ace.


 * 1890 – Birth of Matome Ugaki, admiral in the Imperial Japanese Navy during WWII, most remembered for his role at the Battle of Leyte Gulf. He led the last Kamikaze mission.


 * 1858 – Birth of John Joseph Montgomery, American aviation pioneer who made the first manned, controlled, heavier-than-air flights of the US.