Portal:Aviation/Anniversaries/February 8

February 8


 * 2011 – A Royal Jordanian Air Force General Dynamics F-16AM Fighting Falcon crashed in central Jordan, killing the pilot.


 * 2010 – First flight of the Boeing 747-8 in the United States.


 * 2010 – Launch: Space Shuttle Endeavour STS-130 at 09:14 UTC. Mission highlights: ISS assembly flight 20A: Node 3 and Cupola.


 * 2008 – Eagle Airways Flight 2279, a BAe Jetstream 32, is hijacked ten minutes after taking off from Blenheim, New Zealand by a passenger who attacked both pilots. The hijacker is eventually restrained by the co-pilot and the flight lands safely at Christchurch. All nine on board survive the incident.


 * 2006 – Steve Fossett takes off The Scaled Composites Model 311 Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer for a world endurance record.


 * 1999 – First flight of the Tupolev Tu-334, a Russian short to medium range airliner project that was developed to replace the aging Tu-134 s and Yak-42 s


 * 1993 – Iran Air Tours Tupolev Tu-154 departing on a non-scheduled flight from Mehrabad International Airport, Tehran, to Khoram Dareh is involved in a midair collision with an Iranian Air Force Sukhoi Su-24 that was on approach to the same airport.


 * 1989 – Independent Air Flight 1851, a Boeing 707, crashes into a hill on approach to Santa Maria, the Azores. All 144 people on board are killed.


 * 1988 – The Federal Aviation Administration retires an aircraft registration number for the first time – That of Amelia Earhart’s airplane, which disappeared over the Pacific in July 1937.


 * 1982 – Death of Vladimir Yevgeniyevich Turovets, Russian test pilot in the crash of a Mi-8 Helicopter.


 * 1974 – The crew of Skylab 4 leaves the American space station for the last time.


 * 1974 – A USAF Boeing B-52G Stratofortress, 58-0174, of the 744th BS, 456th BW, veered off the runway during night take-off from Beale AFB, California, skidded 1,500 feet through a muddy field before overturning, destroyed by four massive explosions and fire. One crew member, the first pilot, was thrown free with severe burns, but seven others perished.


 * 1967 – First flight of the Saab 37 Viggen, a Swedish single-seat, single-engine, short-medium range fighter and attack aircraft.


 * 1966 – Freddie Laker founds Laker Airways


 * 1965 – Eastern Air Lines Flight 663, a Douglas DC-7B on takeoff, overreacts in avoiding Pan Am Flight 212 (a Boeing 707) on approach, loses control, and crashes into the ocean several miles off Jones Beach State Park, New York, killing all 84 on board.


 * 1958 – A nuclear weapon was inadvertently dropped from a Boeing B-52D Stratofortress bomber parked at a pad and ready to be unloaded at Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota. Preliminary reports indicated that an airman erred and pulled the manual release handle which released the weapon from the bomb bay and through the unopened bomb bay doors. Damage to the weapon included a dented afterbody, two smashed fins, and a displaced secondary. There was no capsule aboard the aircraft. The bomb was loaded aboard a trailer and removed to the Q Area weapons maintenance depot (Site F) at Rushmore Air Force Station, South Dakota, adjacent to Ellsworth AFB. The damaged weapon was later exchanged for an operational weapon from stockpile.


 * 1956 – A flight of eight Royal Air Force Hawker Hunter F1s was redirected to another airfield due to inclement weather. With low visibility over the alternate airfield and little fuel left, six aircraft ran out of fuel and crashed, with one pilot killed.


 * 1951 – First flight of the Leduc 0.16, a French research aircraft powered solely by a ramjet, evolution of the 0.10 featuring a Turbomeca Marbore I turbojet on each wingtip, to provide better control during landings


 * 1950 – A Lockheed P-2 Neptune of the US Navy establishes a distance record for carrier-launched aircraft flying 5,156 miles in 25 hours 59 min, non-stop from the Atlantic to San Francisco.


 * 1943 – The second Bell XP-39E Airacobra (of three), 41-19502, is damaged during a forced landing when a Wright Field test pilot runs out of fuel short of Niagara Falls Airport, New York, where the Bell Aircraft plant is located.


 * 1941 – Prototype Curtiss XSB2C Helldiver, BuNo 1758, suffers engine failure just prior to landing and fuselage is heavily damaged. Repaired.


 * 1941 – A fleet of Junkers Ju 52s is used to airlift German troops to North Africa.


 * 1933 – Squadron Leader O Gayford (officer in charge of the RAF Long Range Development Unit) and his navigator Flight Lieutenant G. E. Nicholetts lands their Fairey Long-Range Monoplane at Walvis Bay, South West Africa. Coming from Cranwell they set a 5,309 mile (8,544 km) flight, new distance record. They took 57 hours 25 min.


 * 1933 – First flight of the Boeing 247, an early US airliner, considered the first such aircraft to fully incorporate advances such as all-metal (anodized aluminum) semi-monocoque construction, a fully cantilevered wing and retractable landing gear.


 * 1928 – Charles Lindbergh with the Spirit of St Louis completes the 7,800-mile (12,600 km) “Good Will Tour” of Latin America and the Caribbean after having spent 125 hours in the air.


 * 1919 – Henry Farman carries 11 paying passengers in his F.60 Goliath plane from Paris to London on first commercial flight between the two cities.


 * 1918 – Lafayette Escadrille, the US volunteer squadron serving in the French Army is transferred to the US Army and re-designated the 103rd Aero Squadron.


 * 1917 – First allied pilot to shoot down a German heavy bomber is French Georges Guynemer, bringing down a Gotha G.III with his Spad VII.


 * 1914 – 8-10 – Berliner, Haase and Nikolai fly 3053 km in their free balloon from Bitterfeld to Perm. This record lasted until 1950.


 * 1913 – Russian pilot N. de Sackoff becomes the first pilot shot down in combat when his biplane, possibly a Maurice Farman MF.7, is hit by ground fire following bomb run on the walls of Fort Bizani during the First Balkan War. Flying for the Greeks, he comes down near small town of Preveza, on the coast N of the Aegean island of Levkas, secures local Greek assistance, repairs plane and resumes flight back to base.


 * 1912 – Robert Grant Fowler lands his Wright biplane in Jacksonville, Florida, after a 4 months west to east coast-to-coast journey. coming from San Francisco. He becomes the first person to traverse the US from the West Coast to the East Coast.


 * 1912 – Birth of Horst Ademeit, German WWII fighter ace.


 * 1909 – Birth of Wassili Iwanowitsch Rakow, Soviet WWII Pilot and high-ranking officer.


 * 1908 – First flight of the Gastambide-Mengin monoplane, (later Gastambide-Mengin I, Gastambide-Mengin II and Antoinette II), early French experimental aircraft designed by Leon Levavasseur and first aircraft built by the Antoinette company.


 * 1902 – Birth of Gori Castellani, Italian raid aviator.


 * 1899 – Birth of Lester James Maitland, American aviation pioneer and a veteran pilot of WWI and WWII.


 * 1896 – Birth of Bruce Digby-Worsley, British WWI fighter ace.


 * 1894 – Birth of Air Marshal William Avery “Billy” Bishop VC, CB, DSO & Bar, MC, DFC, ED, Canadian WWI flying ace, officially credited with 72 victories, making him the top Canadian ace, and according to some sources, the top ace of the British Empire.


 * 1894 – Birth of Erich Bönisch, German WWI flying ace.


 * 1892 – Birth of William Spurrett Fielding-Johnson, British WWI flying ace.


 * 1892 – Birth of Wilhelm Fahlbusch, German WWI flying ace.


 * 1886 – Birth of Gunther Plüschow, German aviator, aerial explorer and author, Only German Prisoner of war (in either WW) to escape from Britain back to Germany.


 * 1884 – Birth of John Theodore Cuthbert Moore-Brabazon, first Baron Brabazon of Tara, GBE, MC, PC, English aviation pioneer and politician, first Englishman to pilot a heavier-than-air machine under power in England, who he served as Minister of Transport and Minister of Aircraft Production during WWII.


 * 1882 – Birth of Thomas Etholen Selfridge, first person to die in a crash of a powered airplane. He was a passenger while Orville Wright was piloting the Wright Flyer.


 * 1862 – Birth of Ferdinand Ferber, French Army artillery captain who played an important role in the development of aviation.


 * 1825 – Birth of Henri Giffard, French engineer, who invented the steam injector and the powered airship.